The ''Athena Promachos'' (, "Athena who fights in the front line") was a colossal bronze statue of

Athena Athena or Athene, often given the epithet Pallas, is an ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, warfare, and handicraft who was later syncretism, syncretized with the Roman goddess Minerva. Athena was regarde ...

sculpted by Pheidias, which stood between the

Propylaea In ancient Greek architecture, a propylaion, propylaeon or, in its Latinized form, ''propylaeum''—often used in the plural forms propylaia or propylaea (; Greek: προπύλαια)—is a monumental gateway. It serves as a partition, separat ...

and the

Parthenon The Parthenon (; ; ) is a former Ancient Greek temple, temple on the Acropolis of Athens, Athenian Acropolis, Greece, that was dedicated to the Greek gods, goddess Athena. Its decorative sculptures are considered some of the high points of c ...

on the

Acropolis An acropolis was the settlement of an upper part of an ancient Greek city, especially a citadel, and frequently a hill with precipitous sides, mainly chosen for purposes of defense. The term is typically used to refer to the Acropolis of Athens ...

of Athens. Athena was the

tutelary deity A tutelary (; also tutelar) is a deity or a Nature spirit, spirit who is a guardian, patron, or protector of a particular place, geographic feature, person, lineage, nation, culture, or occupation. The etymology of "tutelary" expresses the concept ...

of Athens and the goddess of wisdom and warriors. Pheidias also sculpted two other figures of Athena on the Acropolis, the huge gold and ivory ("

chryselephantine Chryselephantine sculpture () is a sculpture made with gold and ivory. Chryselephantine cult statues enjoyed high status in Ancient Greece. Ancient examples Chryselephantine statues were built around a wooden frame with thin carved slabs of ...

cult image In the practice of religion, a cult image is a Cultural artifact, human-made object that is venerated or worshipped for the deity, Spirit (supernatural entity), spirit or Daimon, daemon that it embodies or represents. In several traditions, incl ...

of ''

Athena Parthenos The statue of ''Athena Parthenos'' () was a monumental chryselephantine sculpture of the goddess Athena. Attributed to Phidias and dated to the mid-fifth century BCE, it was an offering from the city of Athens to Athena, its tutelary deity. The ...

'' in the Parthenon and the '' Lemnian Athena''. The designation ''Athena Promachos'' is not attested before a dedicatory inscription of the early fourth century CE; Pausanias (1.28.2) referred to it as "the great bronze Athena" on the Acropolis.

History

The ''Athena Promachos'' was one of the earliest recorded works by Pheidias and was originally a well-known and famous Athenian landmark. According to the Greek traveler and geographer, Pausanias, the top of Athena's helmet as well as the tip of her spear could be seen by sailors and anyone approaching Athens from

Attica Attica (, ''Attikḗ'' (Ancient Greek) or , or ), or the Attic Peninsula, is a historical region that encompasses the entire Athens metropolitan area, which consists of the city of Athens, the capital city, capital of Greece and the core cit ...

, at

Sounion Cape Sounion (Modern Greek: Aκρωτήριο Σούνιο ''Akrotírio Soúnio'' ; ''Άkron Soúnion'', latinized ''Sunium''; Venetian: ''Capo Colonne'' "Cape of Columns") is the promontory at the southernmost tip of the Attica peninsula, ...

. It originally stood between the

Erechtheion The Erechtheion (, latinized as Erechtheum ; , ) or Temple of Athena Polias is an ancient Greek Ionic temple on the north side of the Acropolis, Athens, which was primarily dedicated to the goddess Athena. The Ionic building, which housed the ...

and the

Erected around 456 BCE, the ''Athena Promachos'' was either to memorialize the

Battle of Marathon The Battle of Marathon took place in 490 BC during the first Persian invasion of Greece. It was fought between the citizens of Athens (polis), Athens, aided by Plataea, and a Achaemenid Empire, Persian force commanded by Datis and Artaph ...

or the

Greco-Persian Wars The Greco-Persian Wars (also often called the Persian Wars) were a series of conflicts between the Achaemenid Empire and Polis, Greek city-states that started in 499 BC and lasted until 449 BC. The collision between the fractious political world ...

which is possibly what the dedicatory inscription refers to; this inscription also mentions that the trophies won in the Persian War were once placed around the

pedestal A pedestal or plinth is a support at the bottom of a statue, vase, column, or certain altars. Smaller pedestals, especially if round in shape, may be called socles. In civil engineering, it is also called ''basement''. The minimum height o ...

of the statue. It took somewhere near nine years to construct. According to the Greek Byzantine historian Niketas Choniates, the Athena Promachos stood at around tall. It is known that the statue was to be a 'thanks' after war but there are many disagreements about which war. It has also been suggested that the ''Athena Promachos'' may have been a cult statue. For a long time there was speculation if the ''Athena Promachos'' even existed, however most scholars now agree that it did as there is proof from Roman coins that depict it. Surviving accounts for the creation process for the sculpture cover nine years, but the dates are not identifiable, because the names of officials are missing. The sculpture may have commemorated Kimon's defeat of the Persians at the Eurymedon in 467 BCE or the peace of Kallias in approximately 450 or 449 BCE. Made entirely of bronze, the ''Athena Promachos'' was spoken of as both 'the bronze Athena' and 'the great bronze Athena,' in ancient times. The term 'Promachos' meaning 'fighting before' or 'in front of' was not originally used when referring to the statue; this nickname came later, most notably being used by

Zosimus Zosimus, Zosimos, Zosima or Zosimas may refer to: People * * Rufus and Zosimus (died 107), Christian saints * Zosimus (martyr) (died 110), Christian martyr who was executed in Umbria, Italy * Zosimos of Panopolis, also known as ''Zosimus Alch ...

. ''Athena Promachos'' stood overlooking her city for approximately 1000 years, until shortly after 465 CE, when the sculpture was transported to

Constantinople Constantinople (#Names of Constantinople, see other names) was a historical city located on the Bosporus that served as the capital of the Roman Empire, Roman, Byzantine Empire, Byzantine, Latin Empire, Latin, and Ottoman Empire, Ottoman empire ...

(capital of the

Eastern Roman Empire The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

) as a trophy in the " Oval Forum", which became the last bastion and safe haven for many surviving Greek bronze sculptures under the protection of the Eastern Empire's Imperial court. Niketas Choniates documented a riot taking place in the Forum of Constantine in Constantinople in 1203 CE where a large, bronze, statue of Athena was destroyed by a "drunken crowd" which is now thought to have been the ''Athena Promachos.'' Lemnia torso05 pushkin

Of surviving models thought to represent the type, the two outstanding ones are the ''Athena Elgin'', a small bronze statuette in the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

, who bears an owl in her outstretched hand (as among some coin types), and the ''Athena Medici'' torso in the

Musée du Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is a national art museum in Paris, France, and one of the most famous museums in the world. It is located on the Rive Droite, Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement of Paris, 1st arron ...

,MA 3070. Height 2.6 m. of which there are a number of replicas.

Iconography

The engravings on the shield which Athena is holding were originally drafted by the great Greek painter,

Parrhasius (painter) Parrhasius of Ephesus () was a famed painter of Ancient Greece. Zeuxis, Timanthes and Parrhasius were painters who belonged to the Ionian School of painting. The Ionian School flourished during the 4th-century BCE. Life Born to the painter E ...

Ephesus Ephesus (; ; ; may ultimately derive from ) was an Ancient Greece, ancient Greek city on the coast of Ionia, in present-day Selçuk in İzmir Province, Turkey. It was built in the 10th century BC on the site of Apasa, the former Arzawan capital ...

. Although he drafted them, the engravings were physically done by an engraver named Mys. The engravings were not done during the time the statue was being made but actually added after. A 'molding pit' from the fifth century BCE was found near the south side of the Acropolis and it is thought that the statue was made in a nearby workshop. Niketas gives a vivid description of the Athena Parthenos:

Similar depictions

, another lost colossal statue that was originally located inside the

. Made by

Phidias Phidias or Pheidias (; , ''Pheidias''; ) was an Ancient Greek sculptor, painter, and architect, active in the 5th century BC. His Statue of Zeus at Olympia was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Phidias also designed the statues of ...

. * Lemnian Athena, classical Greek statue also made by Phidias. * Varvakeion Athena, a 3rd-century Roman copy of the ''Athena Parthenos''.

Coinage depictions

The very first specific archaistic ''Athena Promachos'' coin image was depicted on coins that were issued by

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

in 326''.'' One side of this coin depicts

Heracles Heracles ( ; ), born Alcaeus (, ''Alkaios'') or Alcides (, ''Alkeidēs''), was a Divinity, divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of ZeusApollodorus1.9.16/ref> and Alcmene, and the foster son of Amphitryon.By his adoptive descent through ...

while the other side shows the god,

Zeus Zeus (, ) is the chief deity of the List of Greek deities, Greek pantheon. He is a sky father, sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, who rules as king of the gods on Mount Olympus. Zeus is the child ...

, with Athena by his knee ready to fight with her spear in her right hand and a shield held in her left. Around ten years later, the ''Athena Promachos'' appears on coins issued by

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...

in Alexandria before taking the title of king around 315 BCE. Attic coins from the second and third centuries CE show the only known images of Phidias' ''Athena Promachos''. On one side is the depiction of the view of the

from the north. Between the Propylaia and the Erechtheion, there is large female statue of Athena facing towards the west. As these images place the statue of the Athena Promachos in this specific location, there is no doubt that it existed. There is another group of provincial Roman coins that depict the bust of Athena alone. In this depiction she is wearing a Corinthian helmet with a "wave" of hair upon her forehead. These coins date from the first half of the second century CE to the second half of the third century CE and are considered to be the most common. Since more coinage depictions of Athena wearing a Corinthian helmet have been found as opposed to those that depict her with an Attic helmet, it is thought that the Corinthian were a more popular representation.

Notes

References

* John Boardman and David Finn, ''The Parthenon and its Sculpture'' * J. J. Pollitt, 2nd ed., 1990. ''The Art of Ancient Greece: Sources and Documents'' (Cambridge University Press) * Jenifer Neils, ed., ''The Parthenon: From Antiquity to the Present''
The Temple of Athena Nike at the Acropolis
Bibliography of the temple and the ''Athena Promachos'' * R.J.H.Jenkins, 1947. "The Bronze Athena at Byzantium", ''Journal of Hellenic Studies'' 67 pp 31–33.

interpreting documentation of a Roman coin. Reconstructions of urbanistic context.

votive bronze, ca 480 BCE ( Archaeological Museum of Athens)

External links

* {{coord, 37, 58, 18, N, 23, 43, 33, E, source:kolossus-itwiki, display=title 5th-century BC religious buildings and structures Acropolis of Athens Sculptures by Phidias Promach Commemoration of the battle of Marathon Ancient Greek military art Ancient Greek and Roman colossal statues Sculptures of Athena