Parthenon facts

Site: Athens
Type: Temple
Date: around 447 BC -432 BC
Period: Classical

Plan:

Doric style temple, 8 x 17 columns. Double cella with two porches, both with 6 columns. The smaller west cella had 4 interior columns. Inside the east cella was a U-shaped colonnade of 9 columns, and 3 columns on the short side.

Towards the west end of the interior colonnade was a statue base for the cult statue of Athena Parthenos with a large shallow rectangle cut to create a reflecting pool in front of it. Bronze doors closed both the eastern and western cellas.

History:

This temple replaced an earlier temple in the same location, the Pre-Parthenon, built before the Persian War and destroyed by the Persians in 480/79 BC. The Parthenon was created by Iktinos, Kallikrates and Pheidias. The eastern cella was dedicated to Athena Polias and the western cella was dedicated to Athena Parthenos, 'the Virgin', from which the whole building became known as the Parthenon.

It is likely that the doors of the western cella were strengthened with bronze bars and that the western cella was used as a treasury. The eastern doors were probably hollow bronze.

The Classical Parthenon seems to have been damaged by fire but the exact date of the fire and subsequent repairs is debated, with suggestions ranging from 150 BC to 267 AD (during the invasion of the Herulians). In any case, repairs included the exact reconstruction of the colonnade of the eastern cella, a new statue base and repairs to the capitals on the columns of the western porch.

The Parthenon was converted to a Christian church around 600 AD, and in 1687 a small mosque was built in the cella.

Dimensions:

30.88 m x 69.50 m. Height exterior columns: 10.43 m