How effectively did the design and decoration of the Parthenon suit its function?
3594 words
How effectively did the design and decoration of the Parthenon suit its function?
Athens was at the height of its shortly lived power after the Persian wars. Created from this threat a league for all Greek states was put together, this was for the safety of Greece from the Persians after the second invasion from them was crushed. The first of which was halted shortly at the battle of Marathon and the second coming to an end at the sea battle of Salamis, which was out side Athens itself. At the head of the Delian league and supreme ruler of the Greek states was Athens; this was the making of its own empire and with that came the riches of Greece. All of the Greek states played Athens to protect them from the Persians, this was because they had the greatest fleet of all the Greek city's and it was the Aegean Sea witch separated them from their enemies, the Persians. Gold poured through Athens but this soon found other uses apart from the upkeep of the Greek fleet.
To represent there authority and power, Athens built the mightiest temple ever created. So the Parthenon was built. Construction started from the Beginning of 447 BC and stopped at 432BC, the Parthenon was the centre of attention of the redesigned acropolis and was in a perfect line of site when viewed from the Propylaea which is the monumental gateway to the Acropolis. This suits it purpose as a mighty tribute to Athenian skill, when viewed from the gate, the site you see is that of one that views as much of the Parthenon that can be seen from one point ,you glance across the west end and the north flank of the temple. This is shown in the floor plan of the acropolis below.
Propylaea
It is positioned perfectly so the full unyielding flank is exposed for the spectator to look upon. The function of the temple to be a glorious tribute to Athena is proved by the positioning of the temple to have a prime point for the worshipers to gaze in utter awe at the greatest building to have ever been constructed at the time.
To design and build it the architects Ictinus and Callicrates were brought in and also the famous sculpture Phidias. Phidias acted as the supervisor for all of the artistic works and architecture for the Parthenon and for the rest of the acropolis. Although much of the works and the Parthenon still stand today, none of Pheidias's personal contributions remain. With these three highly skilled and influential men working on the building, the temple was destined to be a status symbol that would not be forgotten to this day.
This temple was created to better any that came before it. The standard hexastyle type temple that was the template for most Greek temple was not good enough for the Athenians as they wanted to express their supremacy in a physical feature to stand and out from the rest. They wanted viewers to be in awe with its vastness.
The new octostye design was a development from the hexastyle norm. On the two widths of the temple the 6 Doric columns would be now 8 and along the flank 13 would be 17. But although the temple was different in many ways is was also similar. It kept the tradition of the standard Doric column (except within the treasury were they were ionic) and the general design was much the same. The entrance still faces east and it was devoted to one god, Athena. Athenians did not hold back on the design and construction and used the best that was to offer.
This is the ground plan for Zeus's temple at Olympia.
The treasury
This the ground plans for the Parthenon on the acropolis.
As the temple to Zeus set the record for the largest before the Parthenon all aspects of new temple would better it. Zeus's 23.533m width would be stretched to 30.88m and the length would go from 66.94m to 69.503m. With such a small increase in this case it was evident that this was just for the Athenians boasting rights. All aspects from the number of rooms to the amount of sculptures, the Parthenon was bigger and better than any before. The 10.3 meter high columns and the 13.716 meter high temple made the temple a new breed of building, one on a scale that has never been seen before.
The statue inside the temple as well as honouring Athena was designed as a status symbol to coincide with the temple itself. As well as creating a temple bigger that any other in Greece that even outsized the mighty temple at Olympia that stood at 27.68 m x 64.12 m; external front columns: 5.23 m (4.79 m at corners); external front column lower diameter: 2.25 m; external side column lower diameter: 2.21 m; height external columns: 10.43 m., they also constructed the largest statue in ever known to print Athens's name on all of Greece.
The ground ...
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The statue inside the temple as well as honouring Athena was designed as a status symbol to coincide with the temple itself. As well as creating a temple bigger that any other in Greece that even outsized the mighty temple at Olympia that stood at 27.68 m x 64.12 m; external front columns: 5.23 m (4.79 m at corners); external front column lower diameter: 2.25 m; external side column lower diameter: 2.21 m; height external columns: 10.43 m., they also constructed the largest statue in ever known to print Athens's name on all of Greece.
The ground plan for the Parthenon is obviously grander compared to the one at Olympia, the greater use of columns represents the scale on which the temple is based upon. The Parthenon puts more of its space to more practical use as the rear room is redesigned into a usable room with the purpose of the treasury. The shear size of the Parthenon presents a vast amount of room available that is split between the needs of the gods as the patron of Athens is honoured with the largest house is the known world and the needs of the Athenian citizens who are provided with a safe treasury .
On the west side of the temple unusually for a Greek temple there is a second room. This housed the treasure and wealth of Athens for around 454 BC Athenians moved the League treasury from the Panhellenic sanctuary at Delos to the Athenian acropolis. Within the treasury the ionic columns create a more lavish and spacious space as the more slender columns were more suited to confines of a small room that the stocky Doric columns used with rest of the temple.
(Used in (Used in the
most of
the temple) treasury)
Doric Ionic
This was an ideal place to store the huge wealth of the city as tradition and superstition stopped all people who believed in the Greek gods from stealing from any temple. This was because they feared they would be struck down by the wrath of the gods. This was successful until foreign invaders came across the vast horde and gave no thought to the enemy's gods and plundered and sacked the temple, as the Persians did 480 BC.
This floor plan shows the treasury as the room to the left hand side. As you can see the column appears slimmer as the ionic kind tended to be.
For the design to suit the functions of the temple, it had to be designed to stay in one piece. This is accredited for the builders of the Parthenon as some of it still stands to this day. The Greek builders developed a method of holding the stones together without mortar; the edges of the blocks were precisely curved.
Double't' clamps were used to attached the stone blocks above the pillars together and were joined in the middle of the pillar for support. The iron clamps were then covered with lead so they would not rust. The Victorians found out that when trying to restore part of the Parthenon, when they did not seal the clamps with lead that they rusted their work by not doing this only caused greater ruin for the blocks that that thought had been repaired.
(Holes for
Double't' clamps)
Columns were constructed out of marble and curved into stone drums, attached to each other by blocks of wood. (As seen below.) These were staked onto of each other to form a column. Columns in Greek temples are evenly spaced in rows called colonnades. The Columns were constructed out of cylindrical stone drums, attached to each other by plugs of cypress wood. As they were constructed out of heavy marble the pressure of the weight kept it together, as they had not invented concrete.
(Hole for
Cypress wood
Plugs)
The Athenians idealised the idea of perfection and this was achieved in the appearance of the Parthenon. Although the temple appears to only contain straight lines this is in fact quite the opposite. All of the columns are wider around the centre; this creates the optical appearances of them being straight from a distance. Opposite to this the steps leading up to the temple are lower than either side. This to gives an impression of a strait line when viewed from a distance, also the columns were not vertical, (they were had fact had a curved profile towards the centre). This was to counter the idea that a perfectly straight column would appear to lean outwards. All of this was to counter the sagging at the centre and the falling apart at the ends. This perfectionism created the image of the perfect Doric temple.
(Vanishing
Point)
First and foremost the design and decoration function was to honour and please the god Athena, protector of Athens. Within the temple stood the great chryselephantine statue of Athena, this stood 11 meters tall. Although it has not survived the tests of times, there are written accounts of its existence from a roman writer along with a number of smaller marble copies.
(Nike)
The impressive site was designed to pay homage to the patron of Athens. Athena is the main statue, and in the palm of her hand stood Nike (shown in the image). This was a gesture of offering victories to the Athens. This links to the fact that the temple its self was built on the foundations of an earlier temple destroyed by the Persians in 480 BC, as the Persian victories kindled the Athenian rise to power. This image shows what the statue may have looked like the one in the Parthenon.
In attempt to slow the cracking of the ivory that made up Athena's ivory skin, presidia's devised a pool of water or oil centred midway in the naos, this had two purposes. Firstly it was to keep the air moist to slow the cracking of the ivory in the statue and secondly to reflect the sun through the east entrance and light up the naos with shimmering light. Also it most defiantly would have added an addiction drama to the already over powering statue.
The Parthenon is world renowned for its sculpture. Leading the design for the sculptures upon of was the artist Phidias who helped sculpture and advised all sculpture on the Parthenon. There were three main types of sculpture on the temple that were started on 447BC and completed in 432BC.
With the theme of the mightiest temple ever built, the materials had to be fit for the gods, the material with which the Parthenon was built consisted of solid white Pentelic marble this was a fine white marble quarried on Mount Pentelicus near Athens. Twenty-two thousand tons of this marble was used. When the Parthenon was completed it glistened white and gold .Some of the financial accounts for the Parthenon survive, and show that the largest single expense was transporting the stone from Mount Pentelicus, about 16km from Athens. Unusually for Greek temple marble was also used for the roof tiles as well as the walls. This created an image of utmost perfection and the sign of wealth where money is no limit.
The sculptures on the other hand were created with the even more expensive Parian marble. This type of marble is a fine-grained semi translucent pure-white marble quarried on the island of Paros. This was the highest prized marble for the Greeks, as it was this that created some of the greatest masterpieces of ancient Greek sculpture.These materials expresses the basic purpose of the temple, an ultimate building for the god Athena and for Athens.
First to be put in were the metopes. These were relief style sculptures sculptured from marble block that were slid into slots before the roof was put on. There were 92 of these Parian marble metopes and unlike most other temples every single one of then had a scene carved into them. They all represented the struggle between democracy and chaos. On the east side shows a war between giants and gods while the west depicts the battle
against the Amazons. The north reveals the ancient battle was between the Trojans and Greeks based around the Iliad and finally the south side shows the dispute between the Lapiths and Centaurs. This relates to the supremacy of the civilised over the unruly, the Greeks over the Persians and democracy over dictatorship
Second to be installed on the Parthenon was the 662ft long frieze that ran along the entire four lengths on the temple as well as in a new area that Phidias invented him self. This consisted of 115 plaques that were 524 feet in length containing 360 figures in low relief. This image shows it running along the inside out the temple walls. This makes it clear that was designed for the gods to view as for any human these would have been very hard to see. These were also painted is bright glorious colours. The whole frieze shows the procession of the festivals that I have previously talked about. The frieze shows the order in which the festival would have made its way either side of the temple. This incorporated all citizens of Athens with most types represented including musicians, chariots, sacrificial animals and many figures with a wide variety of ritual tasks.
(The frieze was believed to have been painted in bright, bold colours. This was to decorate the temple and to help the viewers from below depict the scenes high above them)
A large proportion of the temple was based around the festivals that happened every year. There were two kinds of festival that revolved around the Parthenon, there was the panathenaic festival annually and every 4 years there was the great panathenaia at which 100 heifers were sacrificed. This was one the grandest in the Greek world which included all people of the polis accept slaves. This is shown on the frieze as it is mirrored is what order and form the procession was ordered in. at the front of the Parthenon there appears to be to handed to Athena as what happened within the festival were it ended in front of the Erechtheum. Were the new peplos was presented from the cayaatid porch.
This was believed to be the occasion of Athena's birthday and honour her as the patron of Athens and her divine divinity. It starts from the dipylon gate at dawn. This is lead through the agora and into the acropolis. Only citizens of Athens were allowed to pass through the propylea into the acropolis. The procession was then split into two and passed down both sides of the Parthenon.
All this is leading towards the east side of the temple were the main gods of Greek religion are waiting for the procession to pass by as a reception committee. Within the east side with the arrangement of gods there appears to be two women folding a cloth that is meant to represent the peplos. Strangely enough although this is meant to be Athena's new robe she seems to be paying no attention. My personal view on this, it that this is the old peplos being folded, and put away. All of witch was painted in bright bold colours as this image depicts. This was to create a bolder image and so they could be recognised for the viewers from far below.
(The peplos on the east pediment being folded)
The great panathenaia was created in 566BC and was thought up from Peisistratus. There was to be a different to the festival every four years as it would extent over 4 days with many public events. Much of the attraction for the festivals was the feast that follows it. As there was so many sacrifices devoted to Athena there was enough meat to go around, on the forth year the 100 heifer that were sacrificed were burnt completely to form a heca tomb or a holocaust.
With the temple built after the battle of marathon 490 BC from 447 BC and stopping at 432BC. Commemoration was built into the design of the Parthenon as the death of the citizens that died for Athens at marathon was still in Athenians memories. As well as honouring the gods, the 192 fallen Athenian warriors were depicted on horseback, as many heroes often are .The horsemen are divided into two lines of ten ranks this links to the same number of Attic tribes. This memorial for the fallen is very unusual to a temple as usually whole thing is devoted to the gods. These heroes are depicted as a reminder of victory within Athens's past and a reminder to non Athenians the power and success that Athens can muster. The horsemen overlook salamis, so a victory is overlooked by another of its kind , the mighty victory at marathon from the first Persian invasion is linked in with second blow the Persian empire at the sea battle of salamis ,out side of Athens's walls were the Persian suffered the great defeat of At least 200 ships, most of the sailors perished with the ships as the majority of the Persian sailors could not swim , those who did escape to the shore were slaughtered by the Greeks waiting for them .Below a section of the frieze depicts the 192 heroised dead of the battle of Marathon as they are immortalised in the presence of gods. This links to the frieze as it at the head of the possession are the gods waiting for their arrival.
Those 192 who died at the battle of Marathon died in one of history's most famous military engagements, also it is one of the earliest battles ever recorded in European history.
In September 490 BC the Persians invaded Greece with 600 ships containing 20,000 infantry and cavalry north of Athens. They came here to punish the Greeks for their support of their Ionian allies who had revolted against their Persian occupiers.
The Athenians were out numbered 2 to 1 with their 10,000 hoplites. General Miltiades after convincing his generals prepared the army for engagement. The Greeks made a front the same length as the Persians. Then at a dead run towards the enemy. While the battle was raging, the centre of the Greek line weakened and cracked under Persian numbers, but the sides of the army were strong enough to trap the Persians. 6,400 Persians were killed while only 192 Greeks were killed.
Finally there are the pediments. Situated on the east and west ends these triangular shaped plat formed housed the last of the sculpture to be put on to the temple. The east side showed the creation and birth of Athena when she was born out of Zeus's head when he had a headache ad she appeared in full armour. On the opposite side to this on the western side, the composition between the two gods Poseidon and Athena to be patron of Athens is depicted. Both gods offered a gift to the Athenians, Athena gave the olive tree and Poseidon created a salt-water spring. Athena was chosen and so the origin of the name of the city is created. All of these are freestanding sculpture with as much detail on the back of the sculpture as is on the front. This shows great pride and skill the sculpture had and also the thought that those gods see all and nothing can hide.
The reason why Athena was patron begins with her and Poseidon. They both wanted to be the protectors of Athens. To decide this, the two gods had to create something valuable for Athens, Poseidon created a salt water spring and Athena created the olive tree. In the end it was the olive tree which won, as it was a symbol of peace and prosperity while a salt water spring did not have a lot of use. Athens was thenceforth named after the Goddess Athena,
Ultimately the design and function of the Parthenon perfectly suited its function. This is because is stills stands as a monument to Athens's glory and past. The design of the temple was effective enough to stand for thousands of years and the decoration was crafted to a standard that is still admired today. The temple had many functions for many different reasons; each of these had been addressed and solved to a very high standard. From a temple to Athena, treasury for the state or a war memorial for the fallen at marathon, the Parthenon is a tribute to the Athenians that built it. These keys elements all combine to contribute to the purpose and function of the temple this being a symbol of their vast wealth, devoted religious worship, extraordinary craftsmanship and military supremacy all summed up into one building. So in effect the design and decoration of the temple suits in every way the functions put to it. Today the Parthenon remains as a symbol of the once great Greek culture, and the importance of the city of Athens.
Bibliography
The British museum
www.starlighttower.com/images/Louisa%27s_pictures/Battle_of_Marathon.png&imgrefurl=
www.livius.org/a/1/greece/peplos.jp
Google images
Class notes
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenon
www.ancient-greece.org/architecture/parthenon.html
