Kaningos Square Page 2

Steps from the square is a 24 hour internet cafe on adjacent Gladstonos street, named for English Prime Minister Gladstone.

Kaningos Sq. is named for British PM George Canning In honor of the felicitous role he played during the Greek War of Independence and later which set the boundaries of the new Greek Kingdom. That's him on the right.

Chosen as Prime Minister in 1827, Canning was chosen in preference to Sir Robert Peel and the Duke of Wellington.

Neither agreed to serve under his administration and were followed by five other members of his predecessor's cabinet as well as forty junior members of the parliament.

In his day Canning was a controversial politician. However, I attribute the bullet holes plainly visible in the pediment of his pendelic marble statue not to his politics, but to those of Greece, whose slings and arrows he was privileged to survive during his permanent tenure in the square.

The bullet damage to his monument was probably done during the Greek civil war  between left and right, following WW II and its ensuing bloody struggle for central Athens.

This particular area of Athens resonates with echoes of British influence and appears as one of Greece's' way of honoring these Phil-hellenes.

On a historical note, If you look at walking tour map no 3 (above) closely you can make out Winston Churchill Street and Franklin Delano Roosevelt Street parallel to it. That particular Athens map is from the early 1950's and still serves its purpose admirably and here are two street names that you can actually pronounce.

These streets, laid out by Bavarian hired city planners of the 1840's are now named Academia's and Stadiou. After the aforementioned Greek civil war in which the Bolsheviks, British, and Americans were instrumental, the winners got streets temporarily named after them. Since then, the names have been changed for whatever reasons but I could hazard a guess.

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