Anonymous: Periegesis of Athens (P.Hawara 80–81)

Periegesis of Athens (P.Hawara 80–81) is the name given to the fragments of an anonymous Greek description of Athens and its harbours preserved on papyri from Hawara in Egypt and collected as number 369 in Jacoby's Fragments of the Greek Historians. The better-preserved fragment describes the Piraeus: the harbour of Zea with its ship-sheds and a sundial, the famous sanctuary of Artemis at Munichia, the circuit of the Piraeus wall, and the Long Walls joining the port to the city.

The text is a rare surviving example of the periegetic literature, guides to cities and their monuments, that preceded and accompanied Pausanias. Damaged as it is, it offers independent testimony on the topography and fortifications of the Piraeus and on how ancient writers presented Athens to readers who might never see it.