Athens and the Panatheneia
The Parthenon, the Temple of Athena, in Athens.
Geography
Athens
Athens and Athena
Athena (Minerva)
• Greek name: Athena
• Roman name: Minerva
• Epithets (other names): Pallas, owleyed
• Parentage: Zeus-Metis
• Origin: Aegean city goddess
• Concerns: defensive warfare,
wisdom, arts and crafts
• Attributes: goatskin, Gorgon's head,
owl, olive, helmet
Greek Religion and the Nature of the Divine
ATHENA
GOD—HERO—HUMAN
ANTHROPOMORPHISM
POLYTHEISM
MONOTHEISM
CIVIC DEITY
ATHENS-ATHENA
Relief of the "Mourning Athena". The goddess is clad in an Attic
peplos with a belt and slightly bends her head towards the stele
depicted in front of her. Dated to ca. 460 B.C. Inv. no. 695.
Acropolis Museum. Athens.
The Panathenaia and the Parthenon
Worship of Athena
City Festival (Panathenaia)
Glory of the Polis (Athens)
Athens as the School of Greece
The Athenian Acropolis
Acropolis Timeline
• 480-479 B.C. Persians destroyed most of the buildings of the
Acropolis in Athens.
• 447-438 B.C. Construction of Parthenon under Pericles. Ictinus
and Callicrates as architects and Pheidias as sculptor.
• 391 A.D. The Emperor Theodosius closes all pagan temples.
Parthenon becomes a Christian Church dedicated to the Virgin Mary
• 1204 The Franks into a Catholic Church
• 1458 The Turks into a Mosque
• 1674 French artist Jacques Carrey sketches the Parthenon
• 1687 Acropolis bombarded during Venetian siege. Parthenon
receives a direct hit on Sept. 26
• 1806 Thomas Bruce (Lord Elgin) removes sculptures from
Parthenon
• 1816 Elgin Marbles displayed at British Museum
• 1821-1829 Greek War of Independence
Pericles
For this reason are the works of
Pericles all the more to be wondered
at; they were created in a short time for
all time. Each one of them, in its
beauty, was even then and at once
antique; but in the freshness of its vigor
it is, even to the present day, recent
and newly wrought. Such is the bloom
of perpetual newness, as it were, upon
these works of his, which makes them
ever to look untouched by time, as
though the unfaltering breath of an
ageless spirit had been infused into
them. Plutarch. Life of Pericles
Pheidias and Athena Parthenos
Parthenon (Nashville)
1. Foundation
2. Krepidoma
3. Stylobat
4. Cella wall
5. Internal Pillars
6. Roof Tiles
7. External Pillars (Peristyle)
8. Epistyle
9. Triglyph
10. Metope
11. Pediment
Panathenaia
Festival for Athena
Competitions for Rhapsodes and
Athletes
Panathenaic Procession
A Good Website on Panathenaic Festival
Panathenaic Stadium
History of the Stadium
• originally a small natural valley, between the
two hills of Agra and Ardettos, over Ilissos
river
• transformed into a stadium by Lykourgos in
330-329 BC
• north semicircular wall added in Roman times
• Restored/rebuilt in late 19th century
• Used for two modern Olympics (1896 and
2004)
19th Century Reconstruction
Athens Olympics 1896
Athens Olymics 2004
Panathenaic Contests
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musical and rhapsodic contests
athletic contests for boys and youths
athletic contests for men
equestrian contests
tribal contests
torch race and pannychos (nocturnal ritual):
procession and sacrifice
• apobatês and boat races
• awarding of prizes: feasting and celebration
Panathenaic Procession
Panathenaic Procession
• four little girls carrying a peplos for the life-size statue of Athena
Polias
• priestesses of Athena and Athenian women carrying gifts
• sacrificial animals (cows and sheep)
• metics (resident aliens), wearing purple robes and carrying on trays
cakes and honeycombs for offerings
• musicians playing the aulos and the kithara.
• a colossal peplos (for Athena Parthenos) hung on the mast of a ship
on wheels
• old men carrying olive branches9
• four-horse chariots with a charioteer and fully armed man (apobatês)
• craftswomen (ergastinai - weavers of peplos)
• infantry and cavalry
• victors in the games
• ordinary Athenians arranged by deme
Preparing Athena’s peplos.
Athenian riders preparing to mount
Hydria Bearers
Seated Gods: Poseidon,
Apollo, and Artemis.
Panathenaic Procession on the Parthenon
Freize
The “Elgin Marbles”
The British Museum:
and the Elgin Marbles
The Elgin Marbles:
Keats’ “On Seeing the Elgin Marbles”
On Seeing the Elgin Marbles for the First Time by John Keats (1817)
My spirit is too weak; mortality
Weighs heavily on me like unwilling sleep,
And each imagined pinnacle and steep
Of godlike hardship tells me I must die
Like a sick eagle looking at the sky.
Yet 'tis a gentle luxury to weep,
That I have not the cloudy winds to keep
Fresh for the opening of the morning's eye.
Such dim-conceived glories of the brain
Bring round the heart an indescribable feud;
So do these wonders a most dizzy pain,
That mingles Grecian grandeur with the rude
Wasting of old Time -with a billowy main,
A sun, a shadow of a magnitude.
Dionysos (?) from the East Pediment
The New Acropolis Museum
Panathenaic Procession on the Parthenon
Freize
Diphrophoros (couch carrier)
Parthenon’s East Pediment
Dionysos (?) from the East Pediment
"Three Fates" from the East Pediment
of the Parthenon.
West Pediment: Athena and Poseidon
West Pediment