Private Athens Art Tour: National Archaeological Museum and Byzantine and Christian Museum

Athens, Greece

Learn about Greek art and history on a private half-day tour of two must-visit Athens museums: Byzantine and Christian Museum and the National Archaeological Museum. Led by an art-loving local guide, the tour highlights the most incredible pieces of religious art created during the Byzantine period, plus the different eras of Greek civilization. See key mosaics, paintings, books and more on this exciting art history tour that includes all public transport costs. The only thing you need to pay for is the entrance fee to each museum.

Meet your private guide at Evangelismos metro station in central Athens, and then walk to the nearby Byzantine and Christian Museum. After paying your entrance fee, head inside and explore the incredible collection of antiquities, religious artifacts and paintings from the days of Byzantine Empire in Greece.

With some 25,000 artifacts on display, the museum is vast, and knowing where to start can be bewildering. Let your guide introduce you to its best bits while learning about the era that stretched roughly from 600 BC to the mid-15th century. Highlights of the museum include a beautiful gallery of Coptic Christian paintings, mosaic icons inside the reconstructed Christian church and a collection of medieval books. The building itself is both beautiful and historic, too: It was once the palace of a Greek duchess.

Enjoy a break in the museum’s on-site café, and then take the metro with your guide to the National Archaeological Museum, the largest archaeological exhibition in Greece. Devoted to ancient Greek art, the exhibition space comprises several spacious rooms featuring art from the Stone Age, Cycladic and Minoan eras, as well as Classical and Hellenistic works. Learn about Greek civilization throughout the different artistic periods while browsing the exhibitions and admiring sculptures, paintings and metalwork.

Your private tour finishes inside the National Archaeological Museum; you can stay inside after your tour, if you wish.

Traveler Reviews

Review by:   Patricia M,    June 2015
We have enjoyed our previous tours with Athens Walking. Despite our guides apparent knowledge in the art-she was difficult to locate at the meeting point-no sign. I was going around the metro asking people if they were our guide. Another family was added without explanation by the guide. I had booked our private tour 5 months prior and the other family said they had just booked the day before. Our guide took us to the Athens subway and did look back to see if we were with her and the doors closed leaving us in the subway. She pointed to go ahead. We got off at the stop they we thought might be nearest the Archaeological Museum. I finally got a call on my cell paying the international fee to cover the group. We wanted to stop and rest after the walk to the museum,but the other family needed to get to another tour-so the guide deferred to their needs. We did not agree to her proposal that we sit by ourselves while she gave them a quick tour of the archaeological museum. Our tour was to be 5 hours-we did not plan for 7 hours. I told the guide I was expecting a private tour and she said she was told she would have another group. 8 hours after the tour the owner called our hotel to state a problem occurred and offered a 50 discount. He Kosta or the guide should have addressed this at some point during our tour. The other Viatour private tours in other countries were excellent and private. Would highly recommend Fez tours in Istanbul. Be aware that a private tour with Athens Walking may be a small group tour. In conclusion of conversation with the owner did he offer full compensation but i would have much preferred the day I had booked months in advance or an upfront explanation from the guide at the start of the day.

All Traveler Reviews...