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Guide to Greece, Vol. 1: Central Greece Paperback – August 7, 1984

by Pausanias (Author), Peter Levi (Translator)
4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 58 ratings
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The first volume of the time-honored travel book about Greece, written 2,000 years ago

Written in the second century AD by a Greek traveller for a predominantly Roman audience, Pausanias' Guide to Greece is an extraordinarily literate and well-informed guidebook. A study of buildings, traditions and myth, it describes with precision and eloquence the glory of classical Greece shortly before its ultimate decline in the third century. This volume, the first of two, concerns the five provinces of central Greece, with an account of cities including Athens, Corinth and Thebes and a compelling depiction of the Oracle at Delphi. Along the way, Pausanias recounts Greek legends that are unknown from any other source and quotes a wealth of classical literature and poetry that would otherwise have been lost. An inspiration to Byron and Shelley, Guide to Greece remains one of the most influential travel books ever written.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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Previous page
  1. Print length
    608 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Penguin Classics
  4. Publication date
    August 7, 1984
  5. Dimensions
    5.1 x 1.05 x 7.75 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0140442251
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0140442250
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Pausanias was a Greek geographer and native of Lydia who explored Greece, Macedonia, Asia and Africa, before settling in Rome. Pausanias is believed to have lived in the second half of the second century A.D. and is thought by some historians to have been a doctor as well as a scholar.

Peter Levi was a Jesuit priest and archaelogical correspondent for The Times before his appointment as Professor of Poetry at Oxford. In addition to his translation of Pausanias he also published biographies of Tennyson, Edward Lear, Virgil, Horace and John Milton, and 22 volumes of poetry.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penguin Classics; Reprint edition (August 7, 1984)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 608 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0140442251
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0140442250
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 14.8 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.1 x 1.05 x 7.75 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.7 4.7 out of 5 stars 58 ratings

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Customer reviews

4.7 out of 5 stars
4.7 out of 5
58 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Josephine Cox
5.0 out of 5 stars An Ancient Version of a Lonely Planet Guide.
Reviewed in the United States on November 20, 2011
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Put simply, this book is great. It is written in an accessable manner (sometimes ancient authors are difficult to understand). I really love the history of the Greco-Persian wars. Seven hundred Thespian soldiers died with the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae. Trying to find any information on Thespiae is almost impossible. Information on Athens and Sparta is easy to find but the rest of ancient Greece is often ignored. This is a sad fact about books on the history of ancient Greece. There is so much more than the history of Sparta and Athens. This book has a lot about Boeotia and Thespiae. It was a God send! If you want to find out more about Greek city states you can't go too far wrong here.
4 people found this helpful
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Jan Wouters
5.0 out of 5 stars Travel Guide of Antiquity
Reviewed in the United States on December 6, 2014
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I always enjoyed Pausanias. He has a wealth of background information to share and many (though) of course not all of the landmarks he describes can still be visited. I think modern travel guides can pick up a few pointers from Pausanias for how to make a decent traveling guide
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SEBASTIANVS
4.0 out of 5 stars recommendable book
Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2000
One of the most interesting classical Greek texts. If you are interested in ancient Greece, you must read PAUSANIAS ! Of course Pausanias' series in the Loeb classical library are the best. And I don't agree with the policy of Penguin Classic's translator. However I recommend the book for English-speaking people who cannot read Classical Greek.
9 people found this helpful
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Bruce Robinson
5.0 out of 5 stars Really pleased with this order.
Reviewed in the United States on February 8, 2018
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Book was better than expected and arrived well before expected delivery date.
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B. W.
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on August 9, 2017
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Well packaged and just as described
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pierre desrochers
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on February 14, 2016
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impeccable
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cordyceps
3.0 out of 5 stars badly out of date
Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2013
When we arrived in Athens last summer and checked into the Hilton, I picked up a copy of "Guide to Greece" in the gift shop thinking it would be useful. What a disappointment! No restaurant ratings, bus info, or night life section - to say nothing of the complete absence of photographs. With a bit of luck we made it to the akropolis hoping to catch the sacrifice to Erechtheus featuring an oracle, only to find no quaint local rituals, not even a lousy roof on the Parthenon (as we discovered later, many temples in Greece lack roofs or even walls - the Greeks seem to have no concept of proper maintenance). Well, we made the best of it and "Guide to Greece" became something of a running joke: "Holler when you see the minotaurs!" Yeah, yeah. I gave it three stars just for the gag value, but this Pausanias guy must be a total slacker because this guide feels like it's seriously centuries out of date.
32 people found this helpful
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Ian M. Slater
5.0 out of 5 stars Ian Myles Slater on A Personal Tour of an Antique Land
Reviewed in the United States on September 19, 2003
Yes, my title alludes to Shelley's poem about ancient Egypt, but the Greece that Pausanias describes has in many ways suffered a collapse as notable as that of Ozymandias. Looted before his time by Macedonians, Romans, and warring Greeks, it has since suffered from religious upheaval, antiquities collectors of various types, and, not least, the demolition of ancient structures to obtain building materials and limestone (for fertilizer). The notes to Peter Levi's translation (which is in two volumes -- if you order it, be sure to get both) gives many instances of these loses. This is not for someone planning a visit to Greece in the immediate future, nor easy reading for the curious (although browsing can be fun), but it is a remarkably valuable contribution to modern knowledge of the ancient world.

Sometime during the reign of Hadrian, a very well-read Greek set down a description of the Greek mainland, paying attention mainly to pre-Roman structures and works of art. A long tradition of German scholarship has denied that Pausanias ever left his library, ignoring English "amateurs" who had little trouble following him on the ground. Those interested in this controversy, or uncertain of whether they want to commit themselves to a work of this size, can now turn to Christian Habicht's first-rate introduction to the book and its critical reception, "Pausanias' Guide to Ancient Greece." Habicht also evaluates existing translations, including this one.

There is no substitute, however, for the riches lying within what looks like a dry account of buildings and natural wonders.

First of all, Pausanias had the good sense to avoid retelling the best-known stories and historical episodes, and give space to lesser-known material. It is thanks to manuscripts of his work that we have, for examples, the stories of the Messenian struggles against Sparta (a fascinating mixture of history and patriotic romance), and some of the more obscure episodes of Athenian history under Macedonian rule.

Secondly, Pausanias provides otherwise unknown versions of many classical myths, explaining exactly where they were told, and how they were connected to the local cults. This is an extremely valuable source for Greek mythology as part of a living culture, instead of a literary theme. From time to time we get a glimpse of rituals, and frequently we learn of abandoned cults and forgotten shrines -- it is sometimes hard to remember that the ancient world was subject to profound changes, even before the rise of Christianity or the Barbarian Invasions. (Come to think of it, Pausanias includes interesting details of a Celtic invasion of Greece which is seldom mentioned in modern general histories.)

Finally, if read with great care, Pausanias provides an extraordinary amount of detail about the physical realities of the ancient world. Used with intelligence, it has been of enormous value to archeologists. On the other hand, the descriptions are sometimes extremely obscure, due to unstated assumptions as well as textual corruptions, and the application of Pausanias to the evidence of excavations has often been controversial. (Habicht is, again, a good introduction to the issues.)

Although Levi's translation is not always ideal (the distribution between two volumes is eccentric, and some passages, such as the list of Spartan kings, are shortened) , and the line drawings which illustrate it are sometimes as frustrating as they are helpful, it is a handy, relatively inexpensive, and mostly very reliable, contribution.

[Notes, September 2013: As will be evident to anyone reading this on Amazon, Penguin has since issued the "Guide" in a Kindle edition -- still in two "volumes" (which I find annoying). As for other translations, the bilingual Loeb Classical Library edition is still available in hardcover, and is still -- or, rather, more -- expensive than ten years ago. The excellent, but archeologically very, very dated, six-volume translation-with-commentary by J.G. Frazer (yes, the author of "The Golden Bough," and quite a bit more) has been reprinted, in hardcover and paperback editions. However, it is available *free* as a set of pdf files on Archive.org (a Library of Congress website), along with some translations from the eighteenth- and earlier nineteenth-centuries, which are mainly of curiosity value, unless one is tracing a history of scholarship on some place or topic. Frazer's impressive Classical scholarship still makes his four volumes of commentary (plus a separate index volume) a useful guide to other Classical sources and previous studies. Frazer's translation (in the first volume) is, naturally, rather Victorian-sounding, but not without literary merit.]
42 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

chandralynn
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in Canada on January 30, 2017
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Just as advertised! Thank you!
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Paul Galbally
5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful source material
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 22, 2013
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A beautiful penguin classic on what is the first holiday guide to Greece, except this is Classical greece, and it was written for roman tourists, a fascinating and very important book, we are lucky this has survived to the modern day.
5 people found this helpful
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Tie-Man
5.0 out of 5 stars Good quality
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 12, 2016
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Good quality
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Bill Buchanan
3.0 out of 5 stars A mixed bag
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 31, 2021
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Some parts of the book are quite engrossing, but there are also pages of lists which read a bit like an inventory. If you’re interested in the topic, it’s worth persevering, in my opinion.
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SueK
5.0 out of 5 stars Great read
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 19, 2015
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Informative
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