John Travlos, anatomist of ancient Greece

A man of action rather than words, of simple ways and profound intellectual powers, John Travlos (1908-1985) was an archaeologist's architect, with the ability to envision the whole from a fragment. Thanks to his painstaking work, he is also responsible for an impressive number of buildings and monuments in Attica and beyond that we tend to take for granted.

"He had the gift of complex thinking," says Angeliki Kokkou, an archaeologist who worked with Travlos for 20 years and author of a richly illustrated book on his life and work, published recently by Kapon (in Greek).

Travlos' contribution was significant both in volume and importance, and it unfolds in Kokkou's biographical narrative. Perhaps his most famous project was on the restoration of the Stoa of Attalos at the Ancient Agora in the 1950s and his work at the Archaeological Site of Eleusis. Over the course of...