Row over hotel on uninhabited Delos

Press, 5 February 1987, Page 8

Row over hotel on uninhabited Delos

NZPA-APP Delos The Greek Culture Minister, Ms Melina Mercouri, faces fierce opposition to her plan to build a hotel on the deserted Aegean island of Delos, famed for its sanctuary of Apollo. Islanders on nearby Mykonos, which houses many visitors to Delos, say the project could encourage pilfering of archaeological treasures from the sprawling ruins. They fear the hotel, which Ms Mercouri, a former actress, says would be for scientists and archaeologists only, could turn into a resort.

“Delos is unique and must be preserved for future generations. Putting up a hotel there amounts to sacrilege,” said the mayor of Mykonos, Mr Matthaios Apostolou, a leader of the campaign against the plan. Delos belongs to the municipality of Mykonos, the town council of which has rejected the proposal for the hotel, which would cost the Government an

estimated 5U51.38 million. It is an islet of five square kilometres, at the centre of the Cyclades Archipelago, and is one of Greece’s most important archaeological sites. According to mythology, Delos drifted around the Aegean before anchoring itself off Mykonos to become the birthplace of the god Apollo, a son of Zeus, king of the gods. In classical times the island was renowned as a place of pilgrimage and a commercial centre.

More than 40,000 tourists visit Delos every year, ferried in fishing boats across a 1.5-nautical-mile strait from Mykonos. They are not allowed on the island after sunset.

In summer, French archaeologists excavate on the island. In winter the only residents are six Greek Archaeological Service guards, who live in cottages without electricity and running water. The Government plan calls for a 12-room, 24bed hotel for scholars and scientists studying the

island’s antiquities and wildlife set on a four hectare site overlooking'a sheltered yacht anchorage.

“Our intention is to create a small modern hotel of limited capacity for experts from all over the world who have a scientific interest in this place,” said Ms Mercouri.

“We are committed to preserving and upgrading the archaeological site on Delos.”

Opponents say the proposed site is far larger than needed for a small hotel and that it will be expanded into a holiday resort.

They say also that there are enough hotels on Mykonos to serve visitors to Delos and that specialists can commute easily on the 30-minute boat ride.

“Delos is one of the things that has made Mykonos a successful tourist resort. Nothing should be allowed to spoil it,” said Nikos Palaiologos, a member of the Friends of Delos Commit-

tee .campaigning against the Culture Ministry.

The influential conservative Athens daily newspaper “Kathimerini,” wrote in an editorial: “We fear that even if this hotel is intended only for archaeologists, sooner or later it will become the starting point for tourist development on the island.” Some islanders on Mykonos are worried that a hotel could lead to more antiquity looting on Delos. “It would make it easier for people to dig illegally at night or rip up pieces of mosaic floor or carved marble and send them off by sea aboard yachts,” said Panayotis Kousathanas, headmaster of Mykonos’s high school. In more than 100 years of digging, French archaeologists have unearthed temples, gymnasiums, wealthy merchants’ houses decorated with frescoes and colourful mosaic floors,, and a road overlooked by a line of marble statues of

In the fifth century BC, Delos served as a religious centre and symbolic capital of a political alliance of Greek city states headed by Athens.

Tens of thousands of pilgrims flocked to the island for lavish festivals staged in honour of Apollo which included music, poetry, athletics, and horseracing. In Roman times, Delos was a leading commercial port and site of the biggest slave market in the eastern Mediterranean. Ancient historians record that up to 10,000 slaves were bought and sold in a single day’s trading.

Last December, the nine-member Mykonos town .council turned down the Culture Ministry’s request to cede the hotel site.

“That land won’t be transferred to the Culture Ministry or anyone else,” said Mr Apostolou. “We will fight Ms Mercouri and her advisers all the way through the courts over this project.” Although the Culture Ministry could overrule the council and requisition the hotel site, such an action more than likely would raise a storm of protest, and undermine the Socialist Government’s credibility.