In addition, they built an extensive system of roads and aqueducts to supply water to the city. Thus, the interior only received a limited amount of light. [37], The costs could be immense. Its size, colonnade, and roof made it different from then-contemporary buildings.[6]. Early Ionic columns had up to 48 flutings. 1967 p.129. It supports a further foundation of three steps, the crepidoma. 'dwelling,' semantically separate from Latin templum, "temple") were structures created in ancient Greek religion to contain god statues within Greek sanctuaries. Garlic-eaters were forbidden in one temple, in another women unless they were virgins; restrictions typically arose from local ideas of ritual purity or a perceived whim of the deity. "Architecture in City and Sanctuary". Its surface is carefully smoothed and levelled. Inside the colonnades, the frieze (carved in low relief) went high up around all four sides of the temple. Its column bays (axis to axis) measured 16 feet (4.9m), a triglyph + metope 8 feet (2.4m), a mutulus plus the adjacent space (via) 4 feet (1.2m), the tile width of the marble roof was 2 feet (0.61m). The oldest Doric temple entirely built of stone is represented by the early 6thcenturyBCE Artemis Temple in Kerkyra (modern Corfu). In contrast, the term peripteros or peripteral designates a temple surrounded by ptera (colonnades) on all four sides, each usually formed by a single row of columns. The architecture of the 5th century BC was developed from that of Pericle's time. The elements of this simple and clearly structured wooden architecture produced all the important design principles that were to determine the development of Greek temples for centuries. In some cases, different solutions were used on the broad and narrow sides of the same building. This shows a growing adjustment to the proportion and weight of Ionic temples, mirrored by a progressive tendency among Ionic temples to become somewhat heavier. Only after a long phase of developments did the architects choose the alignment of the outer wall face with the adjacent column axis as the obligatory principle for Doric temples. Most Greek temples were oriented astronomically.[1]. This produces an unobstructed surrounding portico, the peristasis, on all four sides of the temple. For example, depictions of the running Nike crowned the Alcmaeonid temple of Apollo at Delphi, and mounted amazons formed the corner akroteria of the temple of Asklepios in Epidauros. The east and north halls of the Erechtheion, completed in 406BCE, follow the same succession of elements. The temple is considered semi-classical, with a plan essentially that of a Greek temple, with a naos, pronaos and an opisthodomos at the back. It is based on a 6-by-6-foot (1.8m 1.8m) grid (the exact dimensions of its plinths). It was typically necessary to make a sacrifice or gift, and some temples restricted access either to certain days of the year, or by class, race, gender (with either men or women forbidden), or even more tightly. Not far away, Segesta has a single Doric temple whose main structure is largely intact. The peristasis could also be used for cult processions, or simply as shelter from the elements, a function emphasised by Vitruvius (III 3, 8f). The basic proportions of the building were determined by the numeric relationship of columns on the front and back to those on the sides. It was used by priests to enter and exit the room without disturbing the proceedings inside. There is very little evidence of Ionic temples in Magna Graecia. and achieved the final flourish of Ionic architecture around 200BCE. Placed on the stylobate are the vertical column shafts, tapering towards the top. What did the ancient Greeks use to decorate their temples? This type of construction is still used today for buildings such as churches and mosques. [52] Frontality is a key feature of Ionic temples. In spite of the eight columns on its front, the temple is a pure peripteros, its external naos walls align with the axes of the second and seventh columns. The construction of temples was usually organised and financed by cities or by the administrations of sanctuaries. A similarly direct association is provided by the birth of Athena on the east pediment of the Parthenon, or the struggle for Attica between her and Poseidon on its west pediment. Thus, the east pediment at Olympia depicts the preparations for a chariot race between Pelops and Oinomaos, the mythical king of nearby Pisa.
Recessed or otherwise shaded elements, like mutules or triglyph slits could be painted black. This led to them creating many types of buildings that weren't even necessary for living comfortably! These were placed above the axis of each column, and above the centre of each intercolumniation. The financial needs were covered by income from taxes or special levies, or by the sale of raw materials like silver. Other thematical contexts could be depicted in this fashion. 40 flutings enriched the complex surface structure of the column shafts. The Temple of Hephaistos at Athens, erected shortly after the Parthenon, uses the same aesthetic and proportional principles, without adhering as closely to the 4:9 proportion.[49].
For example, innovations regarding the construction of the entablature developed in the west allowed the spanning of much wider spaces than before, leading to some very deep peristaseis and broad naoi. It consists of the geison (on the sloped sides or pediments of the narrow walls a sloped geison), and the sima. Temple G, Selinus, with well-defined adyton. This might include many subsidiary buildings, sacred groves or springs, animals dedicated to the deity, and sometimes people who had taken sanctuary from the law, which some temples offered, for example to runaway slaves. Walter Voigtlnder in: Adolf Hoffmann; Ernst-Ludwig Schwandner; incorporation of the Greek world within the Roman state, "Minoan and Mycenaean civilization comparison", Classical mythology in western art and literature, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ancient_Greek_temple&oldid=1099624905, Articles containing Ancient Greek (to 1453)-language text, Short description is different from Wikidata, All articles with specifically marked weasel-worded phrases, Articles with specifically marked weasel-worded phrases from July 2012, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Pyknostyle, tight-columned: intercolumnium = 1 lower column diameters, Systyle, close-columned: intercolumnium = 2 lower column diameters, Eustyle, well-columned: intercolumnium = 2 lower column diameters, Diastyle, board-columned: interkolumnium = 3 lower column diameters, Araeostyle, light-columned: intercolumnium = 3 lower column diameters, Yeroulanou, Marina. Only details, like the horizontally cut grooves at the bottom of Doric capitals (annuli), or decorative elements of Doric architraves (e.g. Sometimes, the divine character of the cult image was stressed even more by removing it further into a separate space within the naos, the adyton. Another determining design feature was the relationship linking naos and peristasis. In spite of the still widespread idealised image, Greek temples were painted, so that bright reds and blues contrasted with the white of the building stones or of stucco. So they made holes in it for doors and windows, and left it alone otherwise. Or it could show Hercules killing the Nemean Lion. E.g., the temple of Zeus at Labraunda had only 6 8 columns,[65] the temple of Aphrodite in Samothrace only 6 9. With its 6 13 columns or 5 12 intercolumniations, this temple was designed entirely rationally.
This choice, which was rarely entirely free, but normally determined by tradition and local habit, would lead to widely differing rules of design. The pronaos was linked to the naos by a door. The demise of the Hellenistic monarchies and the increasing power of Rome and her allies placed mercantile elites and sanctuary administrations in the positions of building sponsors. It was the first monumental peripteros of Ionia, erected between 350 and 330BCE by Pytheos. All of this mathematical rigour is relaxed and loosened by the optical refinements mentioned above, which affect the whole building, from layer to layer, and element to element. Above the architrave of the peristasis, there was a figural frieze of 137 m length, depicting the amazonomachy. Also inside the temple were rooms called niches. [64] The interior was structured with powerful pilasters, their rhythm reflecting that of the external peristasis. The tympanon was usually richly decorated with pedimental sculpture of mythical scenes or battles. There are many where the platforms are reasonably complete, and some round drum elements of the columns, which were harder for later builders to re-use. Especially in Magna Graecia, this tradition continued for a long time. The niches were also where flowers and fruits were placed to honor the gods. [36], Building contracts were advertised after a popular or elected assembly had passed the relevant motion. For example, surviving receipts show that in the rebuilding of the Artemision of Ephesos, a single column cost 40,000 drachmas. Nonetheless, its ground plan follows the Ionic examples of Samos so closely that it would be hard to reconcile such a solution with a Doric triglyph frieze.
The execution of the naos, with a western room containing four columns, is also exceptional. Elongated peristaseis became a determining element. Metope from the Temple of Zeus from Olympia, A centaur struggling with a Lapith on a metope from the Parthenon, in the British Museum (London), Lapith fighting a centaur on a metope from the Parthenon, in the British Museum, Architrave with sculpted metope showing sun god Helios in a quadriga, from the Temple of Athena at Troy, circa 300280 BC. By adding columns to this small basic structure, the Greeks triggered the development and variety of their temple architecture. They were not normally designed with consideration for their surroundings, but formed autonomous structures. Not one block of the building, not a single architrave or frieze element could be hewn as a simple rectilinear block. [83] Its architectural members are entirely in keeping with the Asian/Ionic canon. To preserve this connection, the single row of columns often found along the central axis of the naos in early temples was replaced by two separate rows towards the sides. Although a strong tendency to emphasize the front, e.g. An example is Temple C at Thermos, c.625BCE,[40] a 100-foot-long (30m) hekatompedos, surrounded by a peristasis of 5 15 columns, its naos divided in two aisles by a central row of columns. The sculptor Phidias made most of the original statues that can be seen in the British Museum today. Greek temples (Ancient Greek: , romanized:nas, lit. Special attention was paid to the decoration of the pediments, not least because of their size and frontal position. Although Athens and Attica were also ethnically Ionian, the Ionic order was of minor importance in this area. The construction of large projects, such as the temple of Apollo at Didyma near Miletus and the Artemision at Sardis did not make much progress. Apart from this exception and some examples in the more experimental poleis of Greater Greece, the Classical Doric temple type remained the peripteros. Many rural sanctuaries probably stayed in this style, but the more popular were gradually able to afford a building to house a cult image, especially in cities. Depending on the architectural order, a different number of flutings are cut into the column shaft: Doric columns have 18 to 20 flutings, Ionic and Corinthian ones normally have 24. In contrast, the naos itself was often finished with some moderation, although by the Roman period some had clearly become rather cluttered with other statues, military trophies and other gifts. In contrast, from an early point, Ionic temples stress the front by using double porticos. It probably dates to the late 3rdcenturyBCE. Hermogenes, who probably came from Priene, was a deserving successor[according to whom?] The metopes (high relief carvings) were positioned at the same level as the frieze above the architrave surmounting the columns on the temple's exterior. Only the west of Asia Minor maintained a low level of temple construction during the 3rdcenturyBCE. This mighty dipteros with its 110 44 m substructure and 8 20 columns was to be one of the largest Corinthian temples ever. Inside the temple was a large room called the cella. [9] At the same time, the rulers of the various Hellenistic kingdoms provided copious financial resources.
The original advert contained all the information necessary to enable a contractor to make a realistic offer for completing the task. Its Asian elements and its conception as a dipteros made the temple an exception in Athens. New temples now belonged to the tradition of the Roman temple, which, in spite of the very strong Greek influence on it, aimed for different goals and followed different aesthetic principles (for a comparison, see the other article). In some places visitors were asked to show they spoke Greek; elsewhere Dorians were not allowed entry. But in spite of such examples and of the positive conditions produced by the economic upturn and the high degree of technical innovation in the 3rd and 2ndcenturiesBCE,[11] Hellenistic religious architecture is mostly represented by a multitude of small temples in antis and prostyle temples, as well as tiny shrines (naiskoi). Once inside the naos it was possible to pray to or before the cult image, and sometimes to touch it; Cicero saw a bronze image of Heracles with its foot largely worn away by the touch of devotees. In the case of public buildings, the materials were normally provided by the public sponsor, exceptions were clarified in the contract. Some temples are said never to be opened at all. If South Italian architects tried to solve it, they used a variety of solutions: broadening of the corner metopes or triglyphs, variation of column distance or metopes. Columns became narrower, intercolumniations wider. Older Ionic temples normally lacked a specific visible substructure. The back room of the temple, the opisthodomos, usually served as a storage space for cult equipment. For example, the lower surfaces of Doric geisa could be decorated with coffers instead of mutuli. Here, already on the Archaic temples, the lower parts of the column shafts were decorated by protruding relief decorations, originally depicting rows of figures, replaced on their late Classical and Hellenistic successors with mythological scenes and battles. In such cases, the money came from the private treasury of the donor. What are the main elements of Greek architecture? [54] Later, the Western Greeks showed a pronounced tendency to develop unusual architectural solutions, more or less unthinkable in the mother poleis of their colonies. As soon as the Ionic order becomes recognisable in temple architecture, it is increased to monumental sizes. They constructed a massive statue of Zeus within, which was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. There is no door connecting the opisthodomos with the naos; its existence is necessitated entirely by aesthetic considerations: to maintain the consistency of the peripteral temple and to ensure its visibility from all sides, the execution of the front has to be repeated at the rear. George has been working in construction for over 10 years now, and he always looks for ways to improve his skillset. [45] All parts of this building are bulky and heavy, its columns reach a height of barely five times their bottom diameter and were very closely spaced with an intercolumniation of a single column width. One of the projects led by Hermogenes was the Artemision of Magnesia on the Maeander, one of the first pseudodipteroi. To loosen up the mathematical strictness and to counteract distortions of human visual perception, a slight curvature of the whole building, hardly visible with the naked eye, was introduced. A Greek temple was generally built to contain a cult statue or symbol. The same proportions, in a more abstract form, determine most of the Parthenon, not only in its 8 17 column peristasis, but also, reduced to 4:9, in all other basic measurements, including the intercolumniations, the stylobate, the width-height proportion of the entire building, and the geison (here reversed to 9:4).[27]. In the 6thcenturyBCE, Ionian Samos developed the double-colonnaded dipteros as an alternative to the single peripteros. Since the turn of the 3rd and 2ndcenturiesBCE, the proportion of column width to the space between columns, the intercolumnium, played an increasingly important role in architectural theory, reflected, for example, in the works of Vitruvius. Study of the soils around temple sites, is evidence that temple sites were chosen with regard to particular deities: for example, amid arable soils for the agricultural deities Dionysos and Demeter, and near rocky soils for the hunter gatherer deities Apollo and Artemis. Very few temples had an uneven number of columns at the front. The temple's width to height up to the geison is determined by the reverse proportion 9:4, the same proportion squared, 81:16, determines temple length to height. The whole pronaos may be omitted in this case or just leave the antae without columns. The main temple building sat within a larger precinct or temenos, usually surrounded by a peribolos fence or wall; the whole is usually called a "sanctuary". The temple interiors did not serve as meeting places, since the sacrifices and rituals dedicated to the respective deity took place outside them, within the wider precinct of the sanctuary, which might be large. Since it was not technically possible to roof broad spaces at that time, these temples remained very narrow, at 6 to 10metres in width. Here, most temple construction took place during the 6th and 5thcenturiesBCE. All architectural elements display slight variations from the right angle, individually calculated for each block. Circular temples form a special type. Contracts were normally awarded to the competitor offering the most complete service for the cheapest price. the Temple of Apollo on Delos (c.470BCE), the Temple of Hephaistos at Athens and the temple of Poseidon on Cape Sounion. In spite of the immense extra effort entailed in this perfection, the Parthenon, including its sculptural decoration, was completed in the record time of sixteen years (447 to 431BCE).[29]. The battles against the centaurs and Amazons, as well as the gigantomachy, all three depicted on the Parthenon, were recurring themes on many temples. [80][81][82], A further plan option is shown by the temple of Hekate at Lagina, a small pseudoperipteros of 8 11 columns. The Temple of Nike Aptera on the Acropolis, a small amphiprostyle temple completed around 420BCE, with Ionic columns on plinthless Attic bases, a triple-layered architrave and a figural frieze, but without the typical Ionic dentil, is notable.
