The Transplanted Olive of Megali tou Genous Scholis

In December 2015, a construction crew dug up an entire mature olive tree in the village of Elaionas, in the hills above Aigio, and drove it more than 200 kilometres to a traffic island in central Athens. The tree wasn't being rescued from age or disease. It stood inside the corridor cleared for a new railway line, and Greece's rail construction authority, ERGOSE, had committed to relocating rather than felling the older olives caught in its path, part of a program that has since moved more than 500 trees out of expropriation zones since 2013. The Agricultural University of Athens assessed this particular specimen at up to fifteen centuries old before the move, old enough to have already been ancient when the Byzantine Empire ruled from Constantinople. It survived the truck journey and a complete change of soil, climate and neighbours, and now stands on a traffic island opposite Evangelismos Hospital, a few steps from the Hilton, doing exactly what it always did: producing shade and, most years, olives. Nothing about its current setting hints at the story behind it. It is easy to walk past a well-kept municipal olive tree without a second look, which is roughly what most passersby here do. The square is unstaffed and open at all hours, a two minute walk from Evangelismos metro station.