Matthew Foley October 22, 2002

AP Art History Greek Architecture

The Erechtheum, which is located on the northern side of the Acropolis across

from the Parthenon, was named after Erechteus, a legendary king of Athens who was

worshipped with Athena and various other gods and ancestors. The Erechtheum is an

Ionic building that was built on an uneven site. The building is complex for a Classical

Greek temple due to the large number of gods and ancestors it is dedicated too. The

structure replaced an old temple dedicated to Athena, which had a wooden, Archaic

statue of the goddess. The Persians destroyed the temple, but the Athenians left the ruins

to remind citizens of the sacrilegious action committed by the Persians as the sacked the

Acropolis. The eastern room of the city was dedicated to the goddess Athena.

The Erechtheum uses Ionic columns throughout the structure. The Erechtheum

was a more complex Ionic building than the Temple of Athena Nike. A main reason for

this due to the presence of the “porch of maidens,” which contains six carytids. Another

reason is the numerous number of gods and ancestors to whom the temple is dedicated, as

the temple is named after a legendary king, while various parts of the building are

dedicated to many different gods and ancestors. The Temple of Athena Nike is a simple

structure compared to the Erechtheum because the temple is small in size, while the

Erechtheum is rather large due to the fact that it was built on uneven ground.

A main part of the Erechtheum is the “porch of maidens” due to its uniqueness

and stylization. The use of carytids was not first used by the architects of the Erechtheum

but the use of the contrapposto pose was unique. The drapery defines the body in an ideal

form characteristic of the Classical style. In the capital of the column, the echinos has

been retained in the molded headdress, creating a transition from the head to the abacus.

The carytids are positioned so that they are aligned with the front figures when being

viewed from the front and with the side figures when viewed from the sides.

I choose to write about this piece of art because I found the “porch of maidens” to

be rather interesting, as the form of women is used to replace the usual columns used to

create temples. The noticed that the women were highly idealized, which made sense as

the Erechtheum was created during the 5th century Classical period. Also, I was read

about the Erechtheum, I found it interesting that it was dedicated to more then one god or

ancestor, which was different then most of the temples that we have looked at so far

during class.