Is the Parthenon a Typical Doric Temple?

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Is the Parthenon a Typical Doric Temple?

         The Parthenon temple of the goddess Athena is considered to be the greatest of the Greek temples in the Doric style. However it is not a typical Doric temple, incorporating the Ionic order as well. The Doric Style that was developed by the Dorian Greeks, it was sturdy in proportion, with a simple cushion capital, a frieze of triglyph’s and metopes and mutules in the cornice.  The Athenians in 451, who were now challenging for the supremacy in Greece, considered it proper that they should build new temples to commemorate their victory over Persia and as well to glorify the city and make it a architectural splendour that would be worthy of its name. The Parthenon was built in honour of the Goddess Athena who was the Protector of Athens and the Goddess of war. It was designed so that it would dominate the city, and be the most magnificent temple in all of Greece even out shining the Temple of Zeus in Olympia. It was built in fifteen years which is a very short length of time. It was commissioned by Pericles, with Iftinas and Callicrates as the architects and Pheidas as the sculptor. There were many reasons behind the building of the Parthenon to glorify the city of Athens, political purposes, religious purposes and propaganda.

         The Parthenon an exceptional building designed by Pericles incorporated Doric and Ionic Orders to make it an incomparable sight. Doric temples have a capital (the top) made of a circle topped by a square. The shaft (the tall part of the column) is plain and has twenty sides. The Doric order is very simple but yet very powerful in its design. The Doric order like many other Greek designs works very well horizontally, so it fits perfectly with the Greek designs (all Greek architects tried to design correctly symmetrical buildings). Doric, columns normally six in width and thirteen in length have no base, they rest on the floor of the temple and the base and the capital are carved from a single piece of stone, while the drum is composed of drum sections.  They are fluted with a plain rounded disk for a capital. This is the plainest part of the column. They have square bases with circular capitals and a plain sided shaft.  The Doric Capitals consist of an echinus and a square abacus which both support the entablature. The entablature was less than a third of a column height and divided into three parts architrave, and the cornice. In the frieze there was one triglyph over each column and one between so that the intervening metopes were approximately square. The triglyph are a pattern of three vertical lines between the metopes. The metopes had statues of heroes or Gods on them and were made of smooth, plain stone. In the cornice there was one mutule (blue in colour) over each triglyph and one between. The space that was between the mutules was called the viae and this was red. The pegs that held the mutules in place where unpainted. Above the cornice at the short ends were the pediments. These pediments were crowned with a raking cornice and the centre of the pediment, the tympanum, often had sculptures. Doric columns can be identified by the type of fluting on the column drums as the fluting should be come to a sharp point, unlike Ionic which has the tips of the columns flattened.  Columns bulged about two thirds of the way up (entasis) and leaned slightly inwards to correct optical distortion.

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        To reflect Pericles' Pan-Hellenic claims for Athens, the Parthenon was uniquely designed as a Doric temple with several Ionic features. The original width was intended to be 23.533m. The temple was extended to 30.88, and so wider than the temple of Zeus in Olympia. It however, was not so greatly extended in length. The original length at 66.94 with six by sixteen columns gave a surprisingly long affect. The new length, 69.503, accommodated one extra column, making a total of seventeen, and the façade now accommodated eight instead of six. The dimensions of the stylobate 230 x 102 were in ...

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