The Temple of Aphaia () is an

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

temple located within a sanctuary complex dedicated to the goddess Aphaia on the island of

Aegina Aegina (; ; ) is one of the Saronic Islands of Greece in the Saronic Gulf, from Athens. Tradition derives the name from Aegina (mythology), Aegina, the mother of the mythological hero Aeacus, who was born on the island and became its king. ...

, which lies in the

Saronic Gulf The Saronic Gulf ( Greek: Σαρωνικός κόλπος, ''Saronikós kólpos'') or Gulf of Aegina in Greece is formed between the peninsulas of Attica and Argolis and forms part of the Aegean Sea. It defines the eastern side of the isthmus of C ...

. Formerly known as the Temple of

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a Jupiter mass, mass more than 2.5 times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined a ...

Panhellenius, the Doric temple is now recognized as having been dedicated to the mother-goddess Aphaia. It was a favourite of Neoclassical and Romantic artists such as

J. M. W. Turner Joseph Mallord William Turner (23 April 177519 December 1851), known in his time as William Turner, was an English Romantic painter, printmaker and watercolourist. He is known for his expressive colouring, imaginative landscapes and turbu ...

. It stands on a c. 160 m peak on the eastern side of the island approximately 13 km east by road from the main port. Aphaia (Greek ) was a Greek goddess who was worshipped exclusively at this sanctuary. The extant temple of was built over the remains of an earlier temple of , which was destroyed by fire . Elements of this older temple were buried in the infill for the larger, flat terrace of the later temple, and are thus well preserved. Abundant traces of paint remain on many of these buried fragments. There may have been another temple in the 7th century BC, also located on the same site, but it is thought to have been much smaller and simpler in terms of both plan and execution. Significant quantities of Late Bronze Age figurines have been discovered at the site, including proportionally large numbers of female figurines ( ''kourotrophoi''), indicating – perhaps – that cult activity at the site was continuous from the 14th century BC, suggesting a

Minoan The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age culture which was centered on the island of Crete. Known for its monumental architecture and Minoan art, energetic art, it is often regarded as the first civilization in Europe. The ruins of the Minoan pa ...

connection for the cult.Pilafidis-Williams argues that the character and relative proportions of the finds leads to the conclusion that the deity worshipped was a female fertility/agricultural goddess. The last temple is of an unusual plan and is also significant for its

pedimental sculpture Pedimental sculpture is a form of architectural sculpture designed for installation in the Tympanum (architecture), tympanum, the space enclosed by the architectural element called the pediment. Originally a feature of Ancient Greek architecture, ...

s, which are thought to illustrate the change from Archaic to Early Classical technique. These sculptures are on display in the

Glyptothek The Glyptothek () is a museum in Munich, Germany, which was commissioned by the Bavarian King Ludwig I of Bavaria, Ludwig I to house his collection of Ancient Greek art, Greek and Roman art, Roman sculptures (hence γλυπτο- ''glypto-'' "sculp ...

of Munich, with a number of fragments located in the museums at Aegina and on the site itself.

Exploration and archaeology

The periegetic writer Pausanias briefly mentions the site in his writings of the 2nd century AD, but does not describe the sanctuary in detail as he does for many others. The temple was made known in Western Europe by the publication of the ''Antiquities of Ionia'' (London, 1797). In 1811, the young English architect

Charles Robert Cockerell Charles Robert Cockerell (27 April 1788 – 17 September 1863) was an England, English architect, archaeologist, and writer. He studied architecture under Robert Smirke (architect), Robert Smirke. He went on an extended Grand Tour lasting sev ...

, finishing his education on his academic Grand Tour, and Baron Otto Magnus von Stackelberg removed the fallen fragmentary pediment sculptures. On the recommendation of Baron Carl Haller von Hallerstein, who was also an architect and, moreover, a protégé of the art patron Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria, the marbles were stolen and sold the following year to the Crown Prince, soon to be King

Ludwig I of Bavaria Ludwig I or Louis I (; 25 August 1786 – 29 February 1868) was King of Bavaria from 1825 until the German revolutions of 1848–49, 1848 revolutions in the German states. When he was crown prince, he was involved in the Napoleonic Wars. As ki ...

. Minor excavations of the east peribolos wall were carried out in 1894 during reconstruction of the last temple. Systematic excavations at the site were carried out in the 20th century by the German School in Athens, at first under the direction of Adolf Furtwängler. The area of the sanctuary was defined and studied during these excavations. The area under the last temple could not be excavated, however, because that would have harmed the temple. In addition, significant remains from the Bronze Age were detected in pockets in the rocky surface of the hill. From 1966 to 1979, an extensive second German excavation under Dieter Ohly was performed, leading to the discovery in 1969 of substantial remains of the older Archaic temple in the fill of the later terrace walls. Ernst-Ludwig Schwandner and Martha Ohly were also associated with this dig, which continued after the death of Dieter Ohly until 1988. Sufficient remains were recovered to allow a complete architectural reconstruction of the structure to be extrapolated; the remains of the entablature and pediment of one end of the older temple have been reconstructed in the on-site museum. Parts of the entablature and some columns of the temple have been restored during 1956-1960.

Phases of the sanctuary

The sanctuary of Aphaia was located on the top of a hill c. 160 m in elevation at the northeast point of the island. The last form of the sanctuary covered an area of c. 80 by 80 m; earlier phases were less extensive and less well defined.

Bronze Age phase

In its earliest phase of use during the

Bronze Age The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...

, the eastern area of the hilltop was an unwalled, open-air sanctuary to a female fertility and agricultural deity. Bronze Age figurines outnumber remains of pottery. Open vessel forms are also at an unusually high proportion versus closed vessels. There are no known settlements or burials in the vicinity, arguing against the remains being due to either usage. Large numbers of small pottery chariots and thrones and miniature vessels have been found. Although there are scattered remains dating to the Early Bronze Age such as two seal stones, remains in significant quantities begin to be deposited in the Middle Bronze Age, and the sanctuary has its peak use in the LHIIIa2 through LHIIIb periods. It is less easy to trace the cult through the Sub-Mycenaean period and into the

Geometric Geometry (; ) is a branch of mathematics concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. Geometry is, along with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. A mathematician w ...

where cult activity is once more reasonably certain.

Late Geometric phase

Furtwängler proposes three phases of building at the sanctuary, with the earliest of these demonstrated by an altar at the eastern end dating to c. 700 BC. Also securely known are a cistern at the northeast extremity and a structure identified as a treasury east of the propylon (entrance) of the sanctuary. The temple corresponding to these structures is proposed to be under the later temples and thus not able to be excavated. Furtwängler suggests that this temple is the ''

oikos ''Oikos'' ( ; : ) was, in Ancient Greece, two related but distinct concepts: the family and the family's house. Its meaning shifted even within texts. The ''oikos'' was the basic unit of society in most Greek city-states. For regular Attic_G ...

'' (house) referenced in a mid-7th-century BC inscription from the site as having been built by a priest for Aphaia; he hypothesizes that this house of the goddess (temple) was built of stone socles topped with

mudbrick Mudbrick or mud-brick, also known as unfired brick, is an air-dried brick, made of a mixture of mud (containing loam, clay, sand and water) mixed with a binding material such as rice husks or straw. Mudbricks are known from 9000 BCE. From ...

upper walls and wooden

entablature An entablature (; nativization of Italian , from "in" and "table") is the superstructure of moldings and bands which lies horizontally above columns, resting on their capitals. Entablatures are major elements of classical architecture, and ...

. The top of the hill was slightly modified to make it more level by wedging stones into the crevices of the rock.

Archaic phase (Aphaia Temple I)

Ohly detected a (stone socle and mudbrick upper level) ''peribolos'' wall enclosing an area of c. 40 by 45 m dating to this phase. This peribolos was not aligned to the axis of the temple. A raised and paved platform was built to connect the temple to the altar. There was a propylon (formal entrance gate) with a wooden superstructure in the southeast side of the peribolos. A 14 m tall column topped by a sphinx was at the northeast side of the sanctuary. The full study and reconstruction of the temple was done by Schwandner, who dates it to before 570 BC. In his reconstruction, the temple is prostyle- tetrastyle in plan, and has a pronaos and – significantly – an adyton at the back of the

cella In Classical architecture, a or naos () is the inner chamber of an ancient Greek or Roman temple. Its enclosure within walls has given rise to extended meanings: of a hermit's or monk's cell, and (since the 17th century) of a biological cell ...

. As is the case at the temples of Artemis at Brauron and Aulis (among others), many temples of Artemis have such back rooms, which may indicate a similarity of cult practice. The cella of the temple of Aphaia had the unusual feature of having two rows of two columns supporting another level of columns that reached the roof. The

architrave In classical architecture, an architrave (; , also called an epistyle; ) is the lintel or beam, typically made of wood or stone, that rests on the capitals of columns. The term can also apply to all sides, including the vertical members, ...

of this temple was constructed in two courses, giving it a height of 1.19 m versus the frieze height of 0.815 m; this proportion is unusual among temples of the region, but is known from temples in Sicily. A

triglyph Triglyph is an architectural term for the vertically channeled tablets of the Doric frieze in classical architecture, so called because of the angular channels in them. The rectangular recessed spaces between the triglyphs on a Doric frieze are ...

and

metope A metope (; ) is a rectangular architectural element of the Doric order, filling the space between triglyphs in a frieze , a decorative band above an architrave. In earlier wooden buildings the spaces between triglyphs were first open, and ...

frieze is also placed along the inside of the pronaos. These metopes were apparently undecorated with sculpture, and there is no evidence of

. This temple and much of the sanctuary was destroyed by fire around 510 BC.

Late Archaic Phase (Aphaia Temple II)

Construction of a new temple commenced soon after the destruction of the older temple. The remains of the destroyed temple were removed from the site of the new temple and used to fill a c. 40 by 80 m terrace within the overall sanctuary of c. 80 by 80 m. This new temple terrace was aligned on north, west, and south with the plan of the new temple. The temple was a hexastyle peripteral

Doric order The Doric order is one of the three orders of ancient Greek and later Roman architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. The Doric is most easily recognized by the simple circular capitals at the top of t ...

structure on a 6 by 12 column plan resting on a 15.5 by 30.5 m platform; it had a

distyle in antis In classical architecture, distyle in antis denotes a temple with the side walls extending to the front of the porch and terminating with two antae, the pediment being supported by two columns or sometimes caryatids. This is the earliest ty ...

with an opisthodomos and a pronaos. All but three of the outer columns were monolithic. There was a small, off-axis doorway between the cella and the opisthodomos. In similar design but more monumental execution than the earlier temple, the cella of the new temple had two rows of five columns, supporting another level of columns that reached to roof. The corners of the roof were decorated with sphinx ''acroteria'', and the central, vegetal ''acroterion'' of each side had a pair of '' kore'' statues standing one on either side, an unusual feature. The

antefix In architecture, an antefix () is a vertical block which terminates and conceals the covering tiles of a tiled roof (see imbrex and tegula, monk and nun). It also serves to protect the join from the elements. In grand buildings, the face of e ...

es were of marble, as were the roof tiles. Dates ranging from 510 to 470 BC have been proposed for this temple. Bankel, who published the complete study of the remains, compares the design features of the structure with three structures that were near contemporaries: *The

Athenian Treasury The Athenian Treasury (Greek: Θησαυρός των Αθηναίων) at Delphi was constructed by the Athenians to house dedications and votive offerings made by their city and citizens to the sanctuary of Apollo. The entire treasury includin ...

Delphi Delphi (; ), in legend previously called Pytho (Πυθώ), was an ancient sacred precinct and the seat of Pythia, the major oracle who was consulted about important decisions throughout the ancient Classical antiquity, classical world. The A ...

*The Doric Temple in the Marmaria area of Delphi *The temple of Artemis at Delion on Paros Bankel states that the temple of Aphaia is more developed than the earlier phase of this structure, giving it a date of around 500 BC. The metopes of this temple, which were not found, were slotted into the triglyph blocks and attached to backer blocks with swallowtail clamps. If they were wooden, their lack of preservation is to be expected. If they were stone, then they may have been removed for the ancient antiquities market while the structure was still standing. The altar was redone for this phase as well.

Pedimental sculptures

The marbles from the Late Archaic temple of ''Aphaia'', comprising the sculptural groups of the east and west pediments of the temple, are on display in the

of Munich, where they were restored by the Danish neoclassic sculptor

Bertel Thorvaldsen Albert Bertel Thorvaldsen (; sometimes given as Thorwaldsen; 19 November 1770 – 24 March 1844) was a Danes, Danish-Icelanders, Icelandic Sculpture, sculptor and medallist, medalist of international fame, who spent most of his life (1797–183 ...

. These works exerted a formative influence on the local character of

Neoclassicism Neoclassicism, also spelled Neo-classicism, emerged as a Western cultural movement in the decorative arts, decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that drew inspiration from the art and culture of classical antiq ...

in Munich, as exhibited in the architecture of

Leo von Klenze Leo von Klenze (born Franz Karl Leopold von Klenze; 29 February 1784 – 26 January 1864) was a German architect and painter. He was the court architect of Ludwig I of Bavaria. Von Klenze was a devotee of Neoclassicism and one of the mo ...

. Each pediment centered on the figure 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 ...

, with groups of combatants, fallen warriors, and arms filling the decreasing angles of the pediments. The theme shared by the pediments was the greatness of ''Aegina'' as shown by the exploits of its local heroes in the two

Trojan war The Trojan War was a legendary conflict in Greek mythology that took place around the twelfth or thirteenth century BC. The war was waged by the Achaeans (Homer), Achaeans (Ancient Greece, Greeks) against the city of Troy after Paris (mytho ...

s, one led by

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 ...

against

Laomedon In Greek mythology, Laomedon (; , ''Lāomédōn'', "ruler of the people") was a Troy, Trojan king, son of Ilus (son of Tros), Ilus and thus nephew of Ganymede (mythology), Ganymede and Assaracus. Laomedon was variously identified with differe ...

and a second led by

Agamemnon In Greek mythology, Agamemnon (; ''Agamémnōn'') was a king of Mycenae who commanded the Achaeans (Homer), Achaeans during the Trojan War. He was the son (or grandson) of King Atreus and Queen Aerope, the brother of Menelaus, the husband of C ...

against

Priam In Greek mythology, Priam (; , ) was the legendary and last king of Troy during the Trojan War. He was the son of Laomedon. His many children included notable characters such as Hector, Paris, and Cassandra. Etymology Most scholars take the e ...

. According to the standard myths, Zeus raped the nymph ''Aegina'', who bore the first king of the island, Aiakos. This king had the sons

Telamon In Greek mythology, Telamon (; Ancient Greek: Τελαμών, ''Telamōn'' means "broad strap") was the son of King Aeacus of Aegina, and Endeïs, a mountain nymph. The elder brother of Peleus, Telamon sailed alongside Jason as one of his Argon ...

(father of the Homeric hero

Ajax Ajax may refer to: Greek mythology and tragedy * Ajax the Great, a Greek mythological hero, son of King Telamon and Periboea * Ajax the Lesser, a Greek mythological hero, son of Oileus, the king of Locris * Ajax (play), ''Ajax'' (play), by the an ...

) and

Peleus In Greek mythology, Peleus (; Ancient Greek: Πηλεύς ''Pēleus'') was a hero, king of Phthia, husband of Thetis and the father of their son Achilles. This myth was already known to the hearers of Homer in the late 8th century BC. Biogra ...

(father of the Homeric hero

Achilles In Greek mythology, Achilles ( ) or Achilleus () was a hero of the Trojan War who was known as being the greatest of all the Greek warriors. The central character in Homer's ''Iliad'', he was the son of the Nereids, Nereid Thetis and Peleus, ...

). The sculptures preserve extensive traces of a complex paint scheme, and are crucial for the study of painting on ancient sculpture. The marbles are finished even on the back surfaces of the figures, despite the fact that these faced the pediment and were thus not visible. Ohly had contended that there were four total pedimental groups (two complete sets of pediments for the east and west sides of the temple); Bankel uses the architectural remains of the temple to argue that there were only three pedimental groups; later in his life, Ohly came to believe that there were only two, which was shown persuasively by Eschbach. There were shallow cuttings and many dowels used to secure the plinths of the sculptures of the west pediment (the back of the temple). The east pediment used deep cuttings and fewer dowels to secure the plinths of the statues. There were also a number of '' geison'' blocks that had shallow cuttings and many dowels like the west pediment, but that did not fit there. Bankel argues that sculptures were set on both the east and the west pediments with these shallow cuttings, but that the sculptures of the east pediment were removed (along with the ''geison'' blocks cut to receive them) and replaced with a different sculptural group. This replacement appears to have been carried out before the raking ''geisa'' were installed on the east pediment, since the corner geisa were not cut down to join to the raking ''geisa'': i.e. the 1st phase of the east pediment was replaced with the 2nd phase before that end of the temple was completed. As the eastern facade of the temple (the front) was the most important visually, it is not surprising that the builders would choose to focus additional efforts on it.

Eastern pediment

The first

Trojan War The Trojan War was a legendary conflict in Greek mythology that took place around the twelfth or thirteenth century BC. The war was waged by the Achaeans (Homer), Achaeans (Ancient Greece, Greeks) against the city of Troy after Paris (mytho ...

, not the one described by

Homer Homer (; , ; possibly born ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Despite doubts about his autho ...

but the war of

against the king of

Troy Troy (/; ; ) or Ilion (; ) was an ancient city located in present-day Hisarlik, Turkey. It is best known as the setting for the Greek mythology, Greek myth of the Trojan War. The archaeological site is open to the public as a tourist destina ...

is the theme, with

figuring prominently as he fights alongside Heracles against king Laomedon. This pediment is thought to be later than the west pediment and to show a number of features appropriate to the Classical period: the statues show a dynamic posture especially in the case of Athena, chiastic composition, and intricate filling of the space using the legs of fallen combatants to fill the difficult decreasing angles of the pediment. Part of the eastern pediment was destroyed during the

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

, possibly by a thunderbolt. The statues that survived were set up in the sanctuary enclosure, and those that were destroyed, were buried according to the ancient custom. The old composition was replaced by a new one with a scene of a battle, again with

at the center.Leaflet "The Sanctuary of Aphaia on Aegina", Greek Ministry of Culture, Archaeological Receipts Fund, Athens 1998.

Western pediment

Panorama of the west pediment of the temple of Aphaia in the Glyptothek Munich n1

The second

– the one described by

– is the theme, with

(son of

) figuring prominently. The style of these sculptures is that of the Archaic period. The composition deals with the decreasing angles of the pediment by filling the space using a shield and a helmet.

References

Sources

*Bankel, Hansgeorg. 1993. ''Der spätarchaische Tempel der Aphaia auf Aegina. Denkmäler antiker Architektur 19''. Berlin; New York: W. de Gruyter. . *Cartledge, Paul, Ed., 2002. ''The Cambridge Illustrated History of Ancient Greece'', Cambridge University Press, p. 273. *Cook, R. M. 1974. The Dating of the Aegina Pediments. ''Journal of Hellenic Studies'', 94 pp. 171. *Diebold, William J. 1995. "The Politics of Derestoration: The Aegina Pediments and the German Confrontation with the Past." ''Art Journal'', 54, no2 pp. 60–66. *Furtwängler, Adolf, Ernst R. Fiechter and Hermann Thiersch. 1906. ''Aegina, das Heiligthum der Aphaia''. München: Verlag der K. B. Akademie der wissenschaften in Kommission des G. Franz’schen Verlags (J. Roth). *Furtwängler, Adolf. 1906. ''Die Aegineten der Glyptothek König Ludwigs I, nach den Resultaten der neuen Bayerischen Ausgrabung''. München: Glyptothek: in Kommission bei A. Buchholz. *Glancey, Jonathan, ''Architecture'', Doring Kindersley, Ltd.:2006, p. 96. *Invernizzi, Antonio. 1965. ''I frontoni del Tempio di Aphaia ad Egina''. Torino: Giappichelli. *Ohly, Dieter. 1977. ''Tempel und Heiligtum der Aphaia auf Ägina''. München: Beck. *Pilafidis-Williams, Korinna. 1987. The Sanctuary of Aphaia on Aigina in the Bronze Age. Munich: Hirmer Verlag. *Schildt, Arthur. ''Die Giebelgruppen von Aegina''. Leipzig : . Meyer 1895. *Schwandner, Ernst-Ludwig. 1985. ''Der ältere Porostempel der Aphaia auf Aegina''. Berlin: W. de Gruyter. . *Webster, T. B. L. 1931. "The Temple of Aphaia at Aegina," ''Journal of Hellenic Studies'', 51: 2, pp. 179–183.

External links

*
Pedimental SculptureTemple of Aphaia Photographs(Hellenic Ministry of Culture) Archaeological site of Aphaia on Aigina
* German Wikipedia page for Dieter Ohly
Ferdinand Pajor, "Cockerell and the 'Grand Tour'"Perseus website: "Aegina, Temple of Aphaia"
Extensive photo repertory

{{Authority control Aphaia Ancient Greek sanctuaries in Greece 6th-century BC religious buildings and structures Ancient Aegina Staatliche Antikensammlungen 6th-century BC establishments in Greece