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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 the goddess Athena on the Acropolis, Athens, Athenian Acropolis, namely the ''Athena Parthenos'' inside the Parthenon, and the ''Athena Promachos'', a colossal bronze which stood between it and the Propylaea (Acropolis of Athens), Propylaea, a monumental gateway that served as the entrance to the Acropolis in Athens. Phidias was the son of Charmides of Athens. The ancients believed that his masters were Hegias of Athens, Hegias and Ageladas. Plutarch discusses Phidias's friendship with the Greek statesman Pericles, recording that enemies of Pericles tried to attack him through Phidias – who was accused of stealing gold intended for the Parthenon's statue of Athena, and of impiously portraying himself and Pericles on the shield of the sta ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Statue Of Zeus At Olympia
The Statue of Zeus at Olympia was a giant seated figure, about tall, made by the Greek sculptor Phidias around 435 BC at the sanctuary of Olympia, Greece, and erected in the Temple of Zeus there. Zeus is the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion, who rules as king of the gods on Mount Olympus. The statue was a chryselephantine sculpture of ivory plates and gold panels on a wooden framework. Zeus sat on a painted cedarwood throne ornamented with ebony, ivory, gold, and precious stones. It was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The statue was lost and destroyed before the end of the 6th century AD, with conflicting accounts of the date and circumstances. Details of its form are known only from ancient Greek descriptions and representations on coins and art. History The statue of Zeus was commissioned by the Eleans, custodians of the Olympic Games, in the latter half of the fifth century BC for their newly constructed Temple of Zeus. Seeking to out ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 cella, naos of the Parthenon on the acropolis of Athens was designed exclusively to accommodate it. Many artists and craftsmen worked on the realization of the sculpture, which was probably built around a core of cypress wood, and then paneled with gold and ivory plates. At about 13 meters high, the statue reflected the established aesthetic Artistic canons of body proportions, canon of the severe style (Peplos, clothing) while adopting the innovations of the high classical (Contrapposto, leg position). She was helmeted and held a large round shield and spear, placed on the ground to her left, next to her sacred snake. Clothes, jewellery, accessories, and even the statue base were decorated, mainly with the snake and gorgon Motif (visual ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 classical Art in Ancient Greece, Greek art, and the Parthenon is considered an enduring symbol of Ancient Greece, democracy, and western culture, Western civilization. The Parthenon was built in the 5th century BC in thanksgiving for the Greek victory over the Achaemenid Empire, Persian invaders during the Greco-Persian Wars. Like most Greek temples, the Parthenon also served as the city treasury. Construction started in 447 BC when the Delian League was at the peak of its power. It was completed in 438 BC; work on the artwork and decorations continued until 432 BC. For a time, it served as the treasury of the Delian League, which later became the Athenian Empire. In the final decade of the 6th century AD, the Parthenon was converted into ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pericles
Pericles (; ; –429 BC) was a Greek statesman and general during the Golden Age of Athens. He was prominent and influential in Ancient Athenian politics, particularly between the Greco-Persian Wars and the Peloponnesian War, and was acclaimed by Thucydides, a contemporary historian, as "the first citizen of Athens".Thucydides, s:History of the Peloponnesian War/Book 2#2:65, 2.65 Pericles turned the Delian League into an Athenian empire and led his countrymen during the first two years of the Peloponnesian War. The period during which he led Athens as Archon (ruler), roughly from 461 to 429 BC, is sometimes known as the "Age of Pericles", but the period thus denoted can include times as early as the Persian Wars or as late as the following century. Pericles promoted the arts and literature, and it was principally through his efforts that Athens acquired the reputation of being the educational and cultural center of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek world. He started an ambitious ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Athena Promachos
The ''Athena Promachos'' (, "Athena who fights in the front line") was a colossal bronze statue of Athena sculpted by Pheidias, which stood between the Propylaea and the Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens. Athena was the tutelary deity 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") cult image of ''Athena Parthenos'' 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 approa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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 regarded as the patron and protectress of various cities across Greece, particularly the city of Athens, from which she most likely received her name. The Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens is dedicated to her. Her major symbols include Owl of Athena, owls, olive trees, snakes, and the Gorgoneion. In art, she is generally depicted wearing a helmet and holding a spear. From her origin as an Aegean tutelary deity, palace goddess, Athena was closely associated with the city. She was known as ''Polias'' and ''Poliouchos'' (both derived from ''polis'', meaning "city-state"), and her temples were usually located atop the fortified acropolis in the central part of the city. The Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis is dedicated to her, along with numero ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ancient Greek Sculptor
The sculpture of ancient Greece is the main surviving type of fine ancient Greek art as, with the exception of painted ancient Greek pottery, almost no ancient Greek painting survives. Modern scholarship identifies three major stages in monumental sculpture in bronze and stone: Archaic Greek sculpture (from about 650 to 480 BC), Classical (480–323 BC) and Hellenistic thereafter. At all periods there were great numbers of Greek terracotta figurines and small sculptures in metal and other materials. The Greeks decided very early on that the human form was the most important subject for artistic endeavour. Since they pictured their gods as having human form, there was little distinction between the sacred and the secular in art—the human body was both secular and sacred. A male nude of Apollo or Heracles shows only slight differences in treatment from a sculpture of that year's Olympic boxing champion. The statue (originally single, but by the Hellenistic period often in group ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ageladas
Ageladas ( ''Agelā́dās'') or Hagelaedas ( ''Hagelā́idās'') was a celebrated Greek ( Argive) sculptor, who flourished in the latter part of the 6th and the early part of the 5th century BC. Ageladas' fame is enhanced by his having been the instructor of the three great masters, Phidias, Myron, and Polykleitos. The determination of the period when Ageladas flourished has given rise to a great deal of discussion, owing to the apparently contradictory statements of the writers who mention his name. Pausanias states that Ageladas cast a statue of Cleosthenes (who gained a victory in the chariot-race in the 66th Olympiad) with the chariot, horses, and charioteer placed at Olympia. Also at Olympia, there were statues by Ageladas of Timasitheus of Delphi and Anochus of Tarentum. Timasitheus was put to death by the Athenians for his participation in the attempt to overthrow the tyrant Isagoras during the 68th Olympiad in 507. According to Eusebius, Anochus was a victor in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Acropolis, Athens
The Acropolis of Athens (; ) is an ancient citadel located on a rocky outcrop above the city of Athens, Greece, and contains the remains of several ancient buildings of great architectural and historical significance, the most famous being the Parthenon. The word ''Acropolis'' is . The term acropolis is generic and there are many other acropoleis in Greece. During ancient times the Acropolis of Athens was also more properly known as Cecropia, after the legendary serpent-man Cecrops, the supposed first Athenian king. While there is evidence that the hill was inhabited as early as the 4th millennium BC, it was Pericles (–429 BC) in the fifth century BC who coordinated the construction of the buildings whose present remains are the site's most important ones, including the Parthenon, the Propylaea, the Erechtheion and the Temple of Athena Nike. The Parthenon and the other buildings were seriously damaged during the 1687 siege by the Venetians during the Morean War when gunpowd ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hegias Of Athens
Hegias or Hegesias of Athens () was a famous sculptor of Athens, a member of the Late Archaic school of the generation before Pheidias. No surviving work can be securely identified as his, though Pliny mentions a ''Pyrrhus Supported by Pallas Athena''.Smith points out that Pliny mistook Pyrrhus son of Achilles, the hero, with Pyrrhus the king. Pausanias (8.42.4 and 8.42.10) mentions Hegias as the contemporary of Onatas and of Agelatus of Argos. Lucian of Samosata mentions Hegesias, in common with Kritios and Nesiotes, as belonging to the Archaic school, whose productions were constrained, harsh, stiff and rigid, though accurate in the outline. Quintilian says of Hegesias and Callon that their works were harsh and resembled the Etruscan style. (Smith). Pliny's Natural History The ''Natural History'' () is a Latin work by Pliny the Elder. The largest single work to have survived from the Roman Empire to the modern day, the ''Natural History'' compiles information gleaned fro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Varvakeion Athena
The Varvakeion Athena is a Roman-era statue of Athena Parthenos now part of the collection of the National Archaeological Museum of Athens. It is generally considered to be the most faithful reproduction of the chryselephantine statue made by Phidias and his assistants, which once stood in the Parthenon. It is dated to 200–250 AD. Description The statue is tall, approximately one twelfth the estimated height of the original. It is carved of pentelic marble and bears traces of red and yellow paint. Athena is dressed in a peplos belted with a zone in the form of two snakes; over this she wears the aegis, decorated with snakes and with the gorgoneion in the center. She wears an Attic helmet with the cheek guards upturned; it has three crests, the center sporting a sphinx and those on the sides a pegasus. Her left hand rests on the rim of a shield which also bears the gorgoneion; the shield rests against the ''oikouros ophis'' (guardian snake) identified with Erichthonios, the city ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aphrodite
Aphrodite (, ) is an Greek mythology, ancient Greek goddess associated with love, lust, beauty, pleasure, passion, procreation, and as her syncretism, syncretised Roman counterpart , desire, Sexual intercourse, sex, fertility, prosperity, and victory. Aphrodite's major symbols include seashells, Myrtle (common), myrtles, roses, doves, sparrows, and swans. The cult of Aphrodite was largely derived from that of the Ancient Canaanite religion, Phoenician goddess Astarte, a cognate of the East Semitic goddess Ishtar, whose cult was based on the Sumerian religion, Sumerian cult of Inanna. Aphrodite's main cult centers were Kythira, Cythera, Cyprus, Corinth, and Athens. Her main festival was the Aphrodisia, which was celebrated annually in midsummer. In Laconia, Aphrodite was worshipped as a warrior goddess. She was also the patron goddess of Prostitution in ancient Greece, prostitutes, an association which led early scholars to propose the concept of sacred prostitution in Greco-Rom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
