Tempe of Olympian Agrigentum are the ruins of seve ral temples, of which that of Olympian Zeus (fig. 5) is especially interesting because the columns are not detached; but the temple is enclosed by a wall to which half-cohnnns are attached, seven in front and fourteen on the longer sides: these carry the entablature. So firmly established was the conception of a temple as a sacred tradition that the portico was here carried up as an attached screen, though the necessities of the construction demanded the erection of enclosing walls. The pedi ment was formerly decorated with statues, one series representing the bat tle of the gods with the giants, the other the surrender of Troy. The interior is divided into a nave and two aisles by two walls set on each side with pilasters; the upper part of these walls bears figures of giants. The dimensions of this temple are 104 metres (340 feet) by 52 metres (r7o feet), and the height reaches 36 metres feet). This temple had not been finished at the time when the city was destroyed by the Cartha ginians, in the year 400 B. C.
Not much smaller was the Temple of Zeus at Selinus, a pseudodip teros with eight columns in front and seventeen along each side, each column nearly 15 metres (49 feet) high by 3 metres (to feet) in diam eter at the bottom, and about 2 metres (nearly 7 feet) at the top. This temple also was left unfinished through the destruction of the city by the Carthaginians.
Temple of ruins of several temples are still extant in Poseidon's city of Plestum (Poseidonia). The most important is that of Poseidon (A/. 6, fig. 7; fi/. 7, jigs. 1, 2, 6), a dipteros of six columns by fourteen—smaller, indeed, than the great temples just described, but nevertheless impressive through the earnestness of its simple forms and the harmony which reigns throughout. The interior is divided into a nave and two aisles by columns, and there is a second row of columns upon the first. The centre of the roof was open. This is, on the whole the most complete Greek temple now existing, and, judging from other specimens of the Doric style, can hardly be later than Soo B. c.
At Metapontmn, upon the Gulf of Taranto, are still standing the ruins of two temples, one of which is remarkable because it shows frag ments of a former richly-painted covering of baked clay.
of Greece, particularly in Athens, architec tural activity received a new impulse after the close of the Persian war. Themistokles, and after him Kimon, restored the partly-destroyed walls, and by means of the " long walls" united the fortifications of Athens with the harbor of Peiraieus and the citadel of Munychia. Kimon built at
the north-west end of the market-place a magnificent hall the wall-paint ings of which celebrated the heroic deeds of the Athenians; he also erected the Temple of Theseus at Athens (bl. 6, fig. 5) of the Doric order, and a small temple in the Ionic on the Ilissos; also, probably, the small Ionic Temple of Nike Apteros (the Wingless Victory) in front of the Propylaea.
Under Perikles, Athenian art reached its climax. He finished the fortifications commenced by Themistokles and Kituon, built the Odeion, dedicated to the Muses, and restored with the utmost magnificence the sanctuaries on the Acropolis, which had been overthrown in the Persian war.
New all, Perikles must be credited with the erec tion of the new Parthenon (p. 6, figs. 2; /5/. 7, figs. 3, 8), that noblest and most harmonious of Doric temples, which the architects Iktinos and Kallikrates completed in the year 438 after sixteen years of labor. As is shown in the view of the Acropolis (i5/. 6,fig. 12), the structure rises high above the walls, dominating the entire group of buildings. It is even to-day—at least, in its exterior—except the Temple of Theseus, the best-preserved and most complete Grecian structure, and is distinguished both by the nobility of its proportions and by the delicacy of all its forms. It is a periptcral temple of eight columns by seventeen, 69 by 31 metres (226 feet long by IOI in width). The interior, indeed, does not now permit the ancient architecture to be clearly recognized. and the sectional view 2) rests only oil conjecture. As in no case does the hypmthral arrangement of a temple now exist in a complete state, the attempted restorations differ widely from one another, and it may perhaps be questionable whether the arrangement corresponds to that shown on Plate 7 (fig. 4;.
The also built the Propylaea on the Acropolis (pi. 6, figs. II, i 2)—that noble )cork in which temple-architecture was applied to a partially profane purpose; for, though the Prouykea formed a portion of the ramparts of the Acropolis, it yet constituted the entrance to the sacred temple-enclosure. As the entrance to the sanctuary, it was necessary that it should wear a sacred form, and as the gateway to the majestic buildings which adorned the AcrOpolis it had to be a noble work of art. The architect, Mnesikles, executed the work in 437-433 B. c. Although the exterior is Doric, the interior has Ionic columns. The splendid ceiling of the hall excited the highest admiration of contem poraries by its immense lintels and its rich sculptural and painted adornment.