A p h a e a T e m p
l e
(Click the image for a full screen view) The Temple of Athena Aphaea
Pausanias has also left some information about Aphaea, which derived from some traditions of Crete. Zeus and Carme had a girl called Britomartis. She was very fond of hunting, that is why Goddess Diana showed her particular favor. But Minos fell in love with her; trying to escape she jumped into the sea and got tangled in the fishing net of some fishermen who took her onboard their ship. Then a sailor fell in love with her. Trying to escape again, she jumped into the sea and swam till she reached Aegina. She immediately took the way towards northeast where the grove of the island was. The sailors watched her vanishing little by little as if by a divine means, that is why they called her Aphaea = Aphande (vanished), and from what the legend says, she hid herself in a cave in the enclosure of the archaic Temple. During the excavation that were made there in 1901 many Mycenaean findings came to light. So we can conclude that the inhabitants of that area worshipped that deity from the prehistoric era. Cretans called Aphaea "Dictynna". Aphaea and Athena
The Temple
Nobody can determine exactly when the Temple was built. It was formerly supposed that it was a place of cult of the Goddess Athena. In 1901, however, the archaeologist Furtwangler found in the foundations of the Temple an archaic inscription where it was mentioned that the Temple was dedicated to the Goddess Aphaea and that a priest named Cleaetias was there. The inscription is on exhibition at the Museum of Aegina. The Temple of Aphaea was built almost simultaneously with that of Apollo in Corinth and very probably in a period during which Aegina had acquired lots of wealth from the booties collected after the victory of Plataeae. That the Temple was erected in a period of great economic prosperity was a fact anyway. Besides it was comparable with the Temples of Zeus in Syracuse, of Poseidon in Samos and of Juno in Egista, Sicily. The Temple is at the same distance from the Acropolis of Athens and from the Temple of Poseidon in Sounium. The three Temples of Parthenon, Poseidon and Aphaea form an imaginary equilateral triangle. In the area where Aghia Marina is nowadays there was a habitation of fishermen, so it is very probable for the cult of Aphaea to have started from that very habitation. According to tradition the nymph Aphaea had relation with the fishermen and the sea, from where she came and chose that very part of the island for dwelling. It is on the big rock which slopes steeply in many points where the Goddess dwelt. Standing on that rock southeast one can view the open sea, and to the north, the coast of Attica and the Acropolis of Athens. The area in which the Temple was built was closed around and was characterized as a sacred place, retired from the free nature. The Temple of Athena Aphaea (the second Temple) was given its definite shape about 500-480 BCE and from then onwards no addition was made to it. This is probably due to the economic and political fall of Aegina as well as to political destructions. The sacred rock on which the Temple was built, remained from the very beginning a natural sacred rock that, for many centuries, gave the landscape the individual characteristic of natural monuments. So, in their effort to remove certain irregularities of the area Aeginetans erected counterprops, carried soil to the site and created a plateau.
1: Temple, of the foundations. 2: Altar, with front yard and pathway covered with flagstones. 3: suppating wall for the Altar's front yard 4: Sphinx column and Cistern. 5: Old enclosing of the Sanctuary. 6: New enclosing. 7: Propylaea (Gate construction II, reconstructed). 8: Uphill road to the Altar's front yard. 9/10: Old and new Amphipoleion (priest's and administration's building). (Click the image for a full screen view)
A brick wall erected on stone foundations set the boundaries of the new ground from one rock in the north to the other rock in the south so as to form a big arc.
Half of the back section of the Temple projected towards the western slope and the foundations formed a pedestal, so an extension of the Sanctuary should be made. That Temple, built according to the doric order, had a lot of common characteristics with the second and last Temple to Goddess Athena Aphaea. Before the eastern facade the stoneTemple had an oblong enlarged third Altar (ca. 550 BCE) positioned parallel to the longitudinal axis of the Temple with paved forecourt approximately on the same spot as the ca. 600 BCE second altar was. The rocks that were between the Temple and the Altar formed a flat slab paving which was used for the various ceremonies. Some time after the restoration of the Sanctuary by the erection of the first stoneTemple the pillar bearing the marble Sphinx was built. The pillar was the highest construction in the area and its height exceeded even that of the last Temple of Aphaea and that was exactly what the pillar symbolized. It stood there, as if pointing towards the sky, bearing the winged creature, a kind of cherubguardian of the Temple, exactly as in the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. Pedestal and statue of Aphaea The statue of Aphaea, probably of archaic technique, was made of ivory and was erected on an invisible wooden core. The pedestal itself has not been preserved and it is only its traces that have been found. Four square holes on the floor of the cella prove the existence of the old latticework. Also, an inscription belonging to the Temple and discovered in the 1811 at the Pronaos speaks about "the latticework round the statue". One can imagine the whole statue from the right marble hand of acrolithic technique, that is on exhibition at the National Museum of Athens. The hand, untouched, with no traces of corrosion, was attached on the trunk and fastened to the sleeve of the bronze garment that was found on the boundary of the ruins of the Temple. The simple limestone pedestal discovered by the first topographical survey where it was, that is at the end of the cella, bears a deep square opening which served to hold strong wooden bolts necessary for fixing wooden statues. The shade of the small statue could hardly be distinguished at the back of the cella, close to a small wooden door. On the reddish section of the wall there was a shelf which was probably used as a base for a very big votiveoffering perhaps for a stone relief or a bronze head of Gorgo with ivory eyes. That figure, which must have had a very sharp look, may have probably been the prevailing subject for the decorations of a Temple of Aphaea in older times. Gorgo represented on the Pediment In 1811, in the site of the cella there was found a finished middlesized left eye made of ivory intended to be placed on a head, which must have been huge. A piece of ivory was also discovered there, which most probably belonged to the right eye. No traces of the head to which they belonged were found however. The iris of the eye was probably made of glass. Placed in the center of the gable of the old Temple the head of Gorgo symbolized the sovereignty of the mistress of the Temple and her power over life and death. On the pediment of a Temple in Selinunte, Sicily, there was a similar huge head made of terracotta. A marblefigure of Gorgo which decorated the center of the pediment of the Temple of Diana in Corfu has also been found. Both those Temples were of Doric order and belonged chronologically to the same period as the Temple of Aphaea in Aegina. The inscriptions of the Temple The monumental inscription of a big slate that was found broken on its left and lower sides makes mention, among others, of the "home" that had been built in honour of Aphaea, of the Altar and of the ivory. The chronological interpretation of the official text and the analysis of its contents has led to the conclusion that it refers to the construction of the first big stoneTemple of the Goddess Aphaea as well as to the Great Altar and the wall that surrounded the Sanctuary. From that very text and from the order of the works we conclude that what they meant by "ivory" was the statue of worshipping the Goddess, which had been made of that material. Besides, the Sanctuary of Aphaea was placed under the responsibility of a priest and not of a priestess, while all the events and activities related to the Temple were registered according to his own diary that was based on the time of the service of the priests. An inscription found recently made it possible also to correct the time measurement. Destruction of the first Temple In 510 BCE, a great fire destroyed the roof of the first Temple almost completely that is why Aeginetans decided to demolish it. Similarly, the remaining parts of the Temple except the entrance and the great Altar were little by little demolished.
Temple of Athena Aphaea (the second Temple)
(Click the image for a full screen view)
The eastern boundary of the Sanctuary was not in conformity to the axial symmetry of the Temple, of the Sanctuary and of the Altar. A new straight counterprop that was erected at this point, followed the sloping edge of the rock. So a sinking that the rock presented there disappeared and at the same time some more area was added to the Sanctuary. On that very counterprop there was built, as if it were an outwork, the Peribolos, the circular wall that enclosed the entire holy site. The Peribolos was made up of a stone base of smaller blocks that supported tiles that had been dried in the air, while its top was covered with fired tiles. A little farther from the uphill lane westwards, on the elevated rocky surface, there was the building that served as a place of work for the priests, the managing commissary of the Temple and his colleagues. When the Temple was built that surface was within the Sanctuary, inside the Peribolos. A low addition to the building with its door served as a bathroom. It contained three fixedbuilt sitting baths, a built washbowl and a stoneseat. That stoneseat which was found in the ruins of the small bathroom in Amphipoleion and stolen a long time ago had been excavated in 1901.
(Click the image for a full screen view) The Altar
At the western edge of the platform of the Altar there were 4 pedestals, which were probably used as bases for statues. South and north of the Altar there were two large rooms where various votiveofferings and groups of marble figures were kept. The latter were probably destined for the gables but they were finally left in that room.
The base of the Temple was a flight of three steps. The foundations were surrounded with walls and consisted of one or more layers depending on the irregularities of the rocky subbase. The upper layer of the foundations - euthynteria was constructed horizontally as much as that was possible and projected from the outside surface as much as required for the stepped sub-base of the sacred place to be visible over the small irregularities or the lawn. The third and last step of the subbase was the stylobate which supported the columns enclosing the Temple all around its four sides. The dimensions of the stylobate were 13.80 x 28.80 m. There were 32 columns in total; 12 in the sides and 6 at the front and back. The narrow sides of the Temple formed the façades. The gables and the metopes of the roof were adorned with sculptures made of marble as well as with the two groups of gables, with the decoration of the acroteria and a figure representing the Sphinx on each side of the roof. However, it was the eastern facade that was the main entrance of the Temple. From the facade a paved ramp led above the steps. The columns of the Temple were cut into vertical flutes. Thus, together with the dynamically elastic and strong echinos and the intermediary abacus between architrave and echinos the columns resisted the load of the supports and of the roof, by taking the load of the first layer of the supports at the joints of two blocks. A narrow projecting strip made of stone covered the architrave on top. Over the architrave there were the triglyphs where they alternated with the flat metopes. The metopes which were not building surfaces but they simply filled the gaps between the triglyphs, were most probably composed of stuccoed wood, either colored or white, slabs. Metopes made of stone, or square shaped, seem to be absent from the Temple of Athena Aphaea though existing in doric Temples. The first Temple, however, did have metopes stuccoed white. Over the triglyphs there was the eave overhanging around the Temple. The eave had on its upper end a frame, the underlying surface of which was covered with slabs. On the front and rear sides the cornices, inclined and confined to a frame, went up to the acroteria. Together with the cornices, there was situated in the frame the tympanum that is the triangular face of the pediment which was separated from the roof by a wall made of large blocks. In front of the tympanum there was a narrow space, a kind of panel where various sculptured groups were placed. The roof was covered with flat tiles. Apart from them, however, there were also used others, narrow and sloping on both sides, which served to cover the joints of the flat tiles that had been placed one next to the other. The protecting tiles were decorated with upright colorful anthemia so that they crowned the top of the roof throughout like a crest.
(Click the image for a full screen view)
The marble tiles of the four corners of the roof were carved into square pedestals to support each of the acroteria that were Sphinxshaped. Those four figures were also made of marble. On the outside there were four heads of lions placed on their pedestals. The rainwater flowing from the Sima poured out through their open mouths. On the acroterion of the roof over the two pediments there was standing a magnificent anthemion with two branches from where spirals of palm three leaves were starting. The Temple, including the acroteria of the eastern side of the roof, was 12,4 m high from its base.
(Click the image for a full screen view)
From the technique of those sculptures it seems that the groups of the representations belonging to the Altar as well as to the Temple were works of 500 BCE approx. and covered a 15 years period. The gables of the Altar must have been constructed first, then the western gable and last the eastern gable. Close to the acroteria of the roof of the completed Temple there were representations of plants having on either side two female figures. There was also a third acroterion constructed in the same way but without the figures. That acroterion was discovered in front of the eastern facade of the Temple. The fact that this acroterion as well as the corresponding one of the eastern gable, had a big blossom as a crown makes us think that it was originally destined for the main facade of the Temple, which was the eastern gateway. The sculptures that were found near the Altar, as well as the acroterion mentioned above were supposed to be ornaments of the Temple. A series of sculpture representations of facades of the Temple were abandoned in order that others would be used in their place. The sculptures, as they belonged to the Goddess, were finally placed in front of her Temple. Description of the representations of the new gables The gables were full of scenes concerning the siege, the defense and the capture of Troy. The godlike ancestors of the Aeginetan noblemen had been glorified in the two mythical expeditions which, yet, led their city to destruction.
(Restoration) (Click the image for a full screen view)
The poet Pindar praised in hymns the cult of Aphaea at the time of its climax, the double heroic adventure and the combating virtue of the ancestors that were proved by their expeditions. The Temple was given particular splendor by the double presentation of one of these subjects on the eastern gable and western gable where Athena stood in the middle as a protector of Aeginetans. The Aeginetan heroes of Troy are called to discharge a double duty; in other words, to become a good example of the present time and to protect the institution of oligarchy from the danger of the Athenian Democracy.
1: Inner Walls. 2: The roof. 3: Inner Columns. 4: Opistodomos or rear porch. 5: View of the Cella. 6: Cult Statue of the Goddess Athena Aphaea. 7: The Pool of Olive Oil. 8: Ramp from Altar to Temple. 9: Corner Columns. 10: Metope. 11: Triglyph. 12: The East Pediment Sculptures. (Click the image for a full screen view)
The walls of the Temple, the outside dimensions of which were 8 x 25 m, were erected on a base formed by big vertical stoneblocks covered with a regular layer of parallelepiped. Eastwards and westwards the walls projected so as to form two additional aisles which had a pair of columns on their open side.
Each column of the Pronaos, as well as the outer columns, had an architrave, and a frieze of triglyphs and metopes. The ground of the Pronaos covered with heavy stone slates was decorated with red floor. It was that very room which was the home of the Goddess. Upon opening the heavy wooden door with the bronzereinforced leaves one could see the main part of the Temple the cella. It had no windows and was continuously illuminated by small oillamps. The various colors of the architectural details and the walls glowed in the lamp light.
The beams of the columns extended to the roof of the cella and supported it. The Temple had 56 columns in total, of which twenty were in the interior, two at front and back, and thirtytwo in the interior. Between the columns and the walls of the cella at the height of the intermediate architraves wooden platforms were constructed, which could be reached through a sloping surface. The wooden platforms of the Cella The presence of the wooden platforms in the Temple is evidenced by the holes of the beams on the intermediate architrave. We can also locate their steps on the incisions found on the floor of the cella. These platforms were constructed just behind the open doorleaves of the high gateway. The wooden platforms were not used by the people who participated in the religious ceremonies, but most probably served as places for storing various articles and votive offerings. The statue of Athena Aphaea The Temple of Athena Aphaea was a work of art of national prestige. The image of the gables was most probably predominating also in the cella of the Temple that was a big statue of champion Athena holding a raised spear.
(Click the image for a full screen view)
The votive offerings that were stored in the Temple Valuable presents, such as claypots, were preserved for a long time. This has been proved by the findings of the first stoneTemple of Aphaea. In the middle of the cella there stood the statue of Athena, the size of which little exceeded the regular size. The clothes, the helmet, the raised spear and the hair were made of bronze. The face, the hands, the palms and the feet were of marble. The statue stood on a pedestal enclosed with a low latticework which protected the statue from the visitors who wanted to go too close to it. However, representations showing Athena, who was the protectress of Aeginetans during the mythical period could be found only in the center of the western and eastern pediments. By these figures purposely placed on the two pediments by the rulers of Aegina who were also sponsors of the work intended to show that Aeginetans had shown bravery in the wars and that it was the Goddess Athena who had protected them. In the period during which the Temple was under construction, Aegina was involved in incessant disputes with Athens that was politically rising at the time. It was not only on the pediments that Athena appeared as "ProtectorGoddess" but also in the interior of the Temple, and what is more in the most privileged place of the Temple which was its central axis.
The door which was opened later on the western wall was contrary to the rules of the conventional doric order, according to which the cella was closed at the back and the Opisthodomos was open only on its external side. The Opisthodomos had been transformed to an auxiliary room of the cella a shrine which was accessible only by that door. It was not rarely the shrine was an auxiliary room of the cella which had been planned so in advance. The change of the western wall of the cella, various objects and ornaments, as well as the closing of the Opisthodomos are justified only if we consider them as resulting from a need for worship that started when the Temple was built. The congregational worship took place, as the habit was, in the open air east of the Temple. People gathered in front of the Altar where the priests and their assistants offered sacrifices, said prayers and sang choral songs. The choral song of the worship of Aphaea has not survived. It was the famous poet Pindar who had written it, and it seems very probable that he conducted the choir himself on an occasion. On the stone Altar of the Opisthodomos there was permanently placed, as if it were something used in the ceremonies, a precious basin made by the hand of a skilled artist. Its interior represented on a white ground the scene of the abduct of Nymph Europe by Zeus who, transformed into a bull, pulled her above the sea. The basin had remained on the table of the Altar for at least 200 years. In the 3rd century BCE the cult of Aphaea which had already started to wane, stopped almost completely. It was also at that time when the destruction of the Temple started as a consequence of its old age, but also, perhaps, as a result of vandalism by pirates.
The second group of the gables represented various scenes of war, but it has not been possible to make a precise interpretation only from the pieces that were discovered. Nevertheless, among the Aeginetan legends there was also one that speaks about the expedition of Telamon and of his friend Hercules against the army of Amazones. Near the pillar of Sphinx there was a round opening of a deep cistern used for the collection of rainwater. The waters that dripped from the northern end of the roof concentrated in a ditch that ended in the cistern. Just before the waters entered the cistern they were purified in an oval collection basin. Tourist Information:
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