The PARTHENONACROPOLIS OF ATHENS, GREEK.

INTRODUCTION

• The Parthenon was the largest temple on Greek mainland at that time.

• It was built during the 5th century BC. (447BC. ~ 438BC.). • It is now one of the most famous heritage in the world.

ATHENA VS POSEIDON

• In the legend in Greek, Athena (daughter of Zeus, God of Intelligent) and Poseidon (son of Zeus, God of Sea) fought for a city in Greek, which was the Athens. In the end, Athena won by giving the reason that she can bring peace and wealth to Athens. And so, the citizens of Athens started to worship Athena.

• During the 5th century BC., the Ancient Persian Empire attacked Athens. Athens won the battle for twice but lost at the third time. The Persians offense the city and destroyed everything.

• At the year of 461BC., Pericles had safe Athens and grant it a brand new life.

• Pericles is the most famous politician of the Ancient Greek.

• Pericles’s period was the most famous Golden Age among all time of the Ancient Greek.

• He was also the origin who invented the system of democracy.

• At that time, Pericles wanted to dedicate a brand new temple to Goddess Athena. Hence, he asked three of these people to build the temple, which is now the Parthenon.

• These three people were Ictinus, Callicrates and Phidias.

• Ictinus and Callicrates were the most flourished architect during the 5th century BC., while Phidias was Pericles’s best friend, one of the greatest Athenian sculptor at that time, said by the people, he was the artistic director of the construction of the Parthenon.

• This temple was built on top of the Athenian Acropolis. The Acropolis was the highest land of Athens.

• In the past, the Acropolis was the place where they built their government building, as the people said, it was the highest land in Athens, hence they built the most important building on top of it. Now, the Parthenon was built on it.

• After about 9 years of time, the most luxurious temple, Parthenon was finally done built. The citizens of Athens dedicated it to the Goddess Athena during the greatest Athenian festival ‘Panathenaia’. Since that day, the Athenian live in peace and happiness.

• The Parthenon was built by costly materials, as the people mentioned, the reason why Pericles made the Parthenon this extravagant was to serve it not just as a temple, but also served it as a national exchequer.

• Yet, days of blissful did not seems long. 7 years afterwards, Athens enmeshed into war again.

• 431BC., the Spartans attacked Athens, Pericles retreated due to the great disparity of the fighting force.

• Unexpectedly, just after the Athenians retreated, plague burst in Athens, most of the Athenians dead, and also Pericles.

• In the end, Athens fell to Spartans’ occupation.

• In the next 2000 years, Athens kept fell into the hands of other empire.

• The Parthenon was used as other uses by the people, it became churches, mosques, and even gunpowder keg.

• 17th century BC., the Parthenon was hit by the artillery from the war between the Venetians and the Ottomans.

• Parthenon was then left only few groups of pillars and walls.

• Last but not least, at year 1801, culture ransacked happened. Lord Elgin from England ransacked most of the relics of the Parthenon and brought them all the way back to England with the excuse of protecting the relics.

•At the year of 1829, Greek finally ended the Osman Military rule after 400 years. Greek government started to reclaim the Parthenon relics from England, but they kept delaying and even ignored them.

• Year 1975, the Greek government hired the most intelligent archaeologists, architects and sculptors, intended to rebuild the Parthenon.

• Yet, these people did a mistake that almost caused the Parthenon collapses.

• The rebuild of Parthenon is still continuing until now.

• Another question, where is the Parthenos Athena sculpture?

• Said by the people, during the Roman Empire, the extravagant Athena sculpture was brought away by one of the Roman Emperor to the Constantinople.

• Yet it was turned out to be unaccounted.

• What about Lord Elgin? He was detained by French and was put into prison. During that time, the Parthenon relics was found in his cellar. After Lord Elgin left the prison, he sold all the relic to the England government.

• The relics were now the most precious collections of The British Museum.

• By the way, this is the origin of the word “Elginism”, which means cultural or historical ransack.

ANALYSIS• The Parthenon is an

extravagant temple that Pericles decided to build and dedicate it to the Goddess Athena. Besides, he also intended to make it as a national exchequer. Hence the materials used to build this temple was costly.

• The materials used to build the main structure, which was the pillars, walls and foundation was Pentelic marbles and limestones while for the materials used for the sculptures was Parian marbles, gold and ivory.

• The Parthenos Athena sculpture was 38 ft. tall, built by gold and ivory. The eyes of the Athena was made by gemstone.

• The gown of the Athena alone cost beyond 2500 pounds of gold.

• Besides being a temple, this building was also known as the vital building of democracy, due to Pericles was the one who decided to build this temple and he was the one who invented the system of democracy.

• Hence, this building was designed in Doric order to show the democracy system initiated by Pericles.

• Although the temple is Doric order, a marked counterpoint Ionian by four columns that are in order undoubtedly exists after the goddess and which should keep the material values that were the treasure of the goddess.

• The measures of its sides, height and separation columns remain exactly the same between them.

• The temple itself is fraught with optical refinements. This makes the Parthenon seem even more perfect as it correct distortions that inevitably leads to the human eyes to see.

• The columns are wider in its central part to correct the distortions generated by the human eye to see a slim object higher.

• The base is slightly curved, stands with regard to their side 10cm in length and 5 at its short side. This makes the feeling to watch is that of a parallelepiped perfect.

• The columns are slightly inclined to join a trend in its top to look at from beneath the sensation that they are perfectly parallel.

• The radian of the pillar was the radian of 1 meter away from a compass.

• Besides, the pillars were actually a stacked up work of few pieces of short columns.

• Every piece of the short column is unique, that they cannot fit together with other column as they had their own particular place to be fit into.

• The gap between the columns can’t even been stab by knife.

• Besides, this building also shows the golden ration.

• It is a very significant example of all time to show golden ration on a building.

THE END & THANK YOU!

The PARTHENON BY

TAN JINGWEI (0320137 / ARCHI)DEENIE H’YATT BIIN JUMAT (0319719 / ARCHI)

HAU KAE SHIUN (0322143 / MECH EN)