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Plans to Restore Abandoned Palace of Prince Philip’s Family in Greece

The Tatoi Palace was home to the Greek Royal Family before they fled Greece in 1967. LOUISA GOULIAMAKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
The Tatoi Palace was home to the Greek Royal Family before they fled Greece in 1967. LOUISA GOULIAMAKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
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Plans to Restore Abandoned Palace of Prince Philip’s Family in Greece

The Tatoi Palace was home to the Greek Royal Family before they fled Greece in 1967. LOUISA GOULIAMAKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
The Tatoi Palace was home to the Greek Royal Family before they fled Greece in 1967. LOUISA GOULIAMAKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

A grand palace owned by the late Prince Philip’s family has been left untouched for decades. But a £12.3million renovation of the home could finally see it restored to its original glory.

The Tatoi Palace - located on Mount Parnitha, near Athens - was the Greek royal family's home before the abolition of monarchy in 1973. King George I bought the 10,000-acre estate with private funds from Denmark in 1872 for his family to enjoy in the summertime, according to the Ground News website.

Surrounded by woods, rivers, and wildlife, the staggering complex is made up of personnel quarters, stables, beehives, and farms, as well as the main palace building. It is also the final resting place of Philip's father and King Charles's grandfather, Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark.

A meeting between King Charles, Greek prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and his wife Mareva Grabowski-Mitsotakis last year appeared to mark the start of a new chapter. Charles visited the Palace as part of the 200th anniversary of the Greek War of Independence.

A £12.3 million investment will reportedly see the palace revived and transformed into a museum by 2025, as part of a joint venture between Britain and Greece.

King Charles' Prince's Foundation is said to be providing advice to the Greek government on restoring the complex. Works are set to include converting King George I's stables into a museum and renovating the gardens, which house several royal tombs. It comes after a lengthy legal battle over who owned the palace was finally settled in 2002.

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Varieties

A Set of 1st Editions of Shakespeare's Plays Could Fetch $6 million at Auction

This photo issued by Sotheby's on Wednesday April 23, 2025, shows The First Folio of William Shakespeare, which contains 36 of Shakespeare's plays, and is "the most significant publication in the history of English literature". It is one of four folios which are due to go on sale at Sotheby's in London on May 23, where they are expected to fetch between £3.5 million and £4.5 million. (Sotheby's via AP)
This photo issued by Sotheby's on Wednesday April 23, 2025, shows The First Folio of William Shakespeare, which contains 36 of Shakespeare's plays, and is "the most significant publication in the history of English literature". It is one of four folios which are due to go on sale at Sotheby's in London on May 23, where they are expected to fetch between £3.5 million and £4.5 million. (Sotheby's via AP)
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A Set of 1st Editions of Shakespeare's Plays Could Fetch $6 million at Auction

This photo issued by Sotheby's on Wednesday April 23, 2025, shows The First Folio of William Shakespeare, which contains 36 of Shakespeare's plays, and is "the most significant publication in the history of English literature". It is one of four folios which are due to go on sale at Sotheby's in London on May 23, where they are expected to fetch between £3.5 million and £4.5 million. (Sotheby's via AP)
This photo issued by Sotheby's on Wednesday April 23, 2025, shows The First Folio of William Shakespeare, which contains 36 of Shakespeare's plays, and is "the most significant publication in the history of English literature". It is one of four folios which are due to go on sale at Sotheby's in London on May 23, where they are expected to fetch between £3.5 million and £4.5 million. (Sotheby's via AP)

A set of the first four editions of William Shakespeare’s collected works is expected to sell for up to 4.5 million pounds ($6 million) at auction next month.

Sotheby’s auction house announced the sale on Wednesday, Shakespeare's 461st birthday. It said the May 23 sale will be the first time since 1989 that a set of the First, Second, Third and Fourth Folios has been offered at auction as a single lot.

The auction house estimated the sale price at between 3.5 million and 4.5 million pounds.

After Shakespeare’s death in 1616, his plays were collected into a single volume by his friends John Heminges and Henry Condell, actors and shareholders in the playwright’s troupe, the King’s Men, The AP news reported.

The First Folio — fully titled “Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories & Tragedies” — contained 36 plays, of which half were published there for the first time. Without the book, scholars say, plays including “Macbeth,” “The Tempest” and “Twelfth Night” might have been lost. Sotheby’s called the volume “without question the most significant publication in the history of English literature.”

About 750 copies were printed in 1623, of which about 230 are known to survive. All but a few are in museums, universities or libraries. One of the few First Folios in private hands sold for $9.9 million at an auction in 2020.

The First Folio proved successful enough that a an updated edition, the Second Folio, was published in 1632, a third in 1663 and a fourth in 1685.

Although the First Folio is regarded as the most valuable, the third is the rarest, with 182 copies known to survive. It is believed the third book’s rarity is because some of the stock was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666.

The Third Folio included seven additional plays, but only one – “Pericles, Prince of Tyre” – is believed to be by Shakespeare.