Unexpectedly, the last piece I wrote on here (Oligarchs Pour Billions Into My Hometown) was a minor hit and also unexpectedly that piece then followed me around, thematically speaking, on a long-planned archaeology trip made to Greece with an old friend to see a selection of charismatic rubble.
We visited sites, this friend and I, in Thebes, Delphi, Corinth, Plataea, Mycenae and Athens, but it was at the archaeological site of Eleusis, centre of the cult of the Goddess Demeter for well over one thousand years - and the place where the video above is shot - that I felt most at home.
On entering the archaeological site - before hitting anything actually Greek - you are obliged to first encounter the remains of a Roman courtyard, a 65m by 40m marble-paved hangout, reached on its original completion by passing beneath a 16m triumphal arch, once bedecked - archaeologists hold - with bronze statues of Roman emperors and their Kushners.
Across this grand, triumphant arch, chiselled proudly into both sides, were the words: «THE PANHELLENES DEDICATED THE ARCH TO THE GODDESSES AND THE EMPEROR», with the word ‘Emperor’ featured exactly above the centre of the curve. (The Panhellenes incidentally being a Rome-led puppet organisation created to administer the conquered Greek diaspora).
Subtle, right.
This two-thousand-year-old example of a new empire rocking up and sealing the legitimacy of its dominion via quasi-philanthropic over-writing of the meaningful sites of a previous world power could not remind me more of the US oligarchs Larry Ellison and Steven A. Schwarzman’s twenty-first century moves towards the monumental dominance of Oxford. And actually, I found it great fun to think in this way, while strangely it feels quite sweet and reassuring that these cashed-up big dogs are still so touchy that they have to do this kind of emotionally basic showing off.
Because let’s be honest, with the U.S. in 2026, we are dealing with an out and out Empire, and we are dealing with an orange guy who will inevitably in time take his historical place alongside Nero in the pantheon of ridiculous and world-historic tyrants - a fitting subject even for Tacitus.
History could not be happening more obviously right before our eyes. It’s darkly thrilling seeing this whole grand narrative ‘historical Rise and Fall of Empires’ stuff unfolding as journalism; to feel how base and normal and parochial and gaudy it all is. For me, it brings the past to life - makes me feel, for example, close to the Romans, sense what a bunch of jumped-up march-arounds they were; these comically bossy dudes pitching up, pointing, ordering, building. Claiming other people’s kit.
But please don’t think that by teasing the exploits and pretensions of both Romans and Americans I am here implying some Brit superiority. My hometown of Oxford is a one-time colonial madrassa with the self-regard of empire still baked into the stone for anyone interested in life beyond the Downton Abbeyfication of contemporary culture to see. History outright bellows that the popinjay venality of our rulers has no mother tongue. But what are we going to do about it?
Statues and arches are brittle metaphors for the real freedom you can make for nothing in your mind. There are diamonds everywhere. Plough your field, love your loved ones, feel the sun and the breeze. Life is magnificent my friends.
*
Less weightily, but again quite sweet, we believed that the accomodation we rented for the single night we stayed in Eleusis, was a knocking shop. The tacky baroque vibes (below) were screaming brothel. But apparently not. It is in fact a Love Hotel. With intergenerational living being the norm in Greece, lovers rent this place for a little privacy.
So cute. Mammals and their actions, eh.
