Problems in Periclean Buildings Part 3

It is almost certain that the original plan of the architect was for a building with an east and west portico equidistant from the north porch as Prof. Dorpfeld has maintained. The east and west facades were to be exactly alike, but, prevented by religious conservatism from building upon the sites of the Cecropium and Pandroseum, and thus compelled to abandon the western half of the original building, the architect sought still to save the similarity of the east and west facades. Since he was unable to build his projected west portico at the line to which he was forced back, he evolved as a subst.i.tute the idea of placing all the essential features of his west portico in one plane--column bases and base moulding of wall, columns and wall with windows, frieze and pediment. The low wall in the southernmost intercolumniation which for some reason was not completely closed was three courses high. The northern intercolumniation was completely closed as in Roman times and in the central ones, the windows rested on three courses equal in height to four normal Greek courses.

It must have been the desire for close similarity between the two facades which prevented both Greek and Roman architect from placing four normal courses beneath the western windows. The change from blocks of standard height led to a complication because there were eleven ordinary courses in the western wall instead of twelve which would have given exactly nine courses of the higher blocks. The eastern windows were simultaneously visible between the columns from points in the axis of the door (Fig. 7). It is natural to a.s.sume that those of the original west facade were to have been so. The curtailment of the plan which compelled the architect to place a compressed west facade on a high socle, eliminated the door. A natural subst.i.tution was a third window.

This theory as to the composition of the west wall suggests an interpretation of the unusual construction at the upper south-west corner of the temple (_A. J. A._, 1908, p. 191, fig. 2, and p. 194, fig. 6; 1910, p. 297, fig. 3). There the south wall was reduced to one half of its regular thickness, and this thinner wall flanked on the east by the metopon which rested in part upon a square horizontal slab. The purpose of this metopon has remained obscure.

As. .h.i.therto remarked, it was the architect's intention to close the southern as well as the northern intercolumniation of the west wall but he was prevented, apparently for some religious reason. Now it seems very probable that the unusual construction at the corner is the result of an attempt to build a subst.i.tute wall for that which could not be placed in the southern intercolumniation. Two considerations favor this explanation. In the first place the horizontal slab inclines toward the opening. The certain purpose of this inclination was to shed rain-water.

Secondly, traces on the south wall show that the metopon was coextensive in height with the opening and projected along the eastern edge of the horizontal slab. The epistyle of the metopon, which appears in the restoration (_A. J. A._, 1908, fig. 6, p. 196) is purely a conjecture and may be eliminated. But how far did this metopon project into the building? Was it coextensive in width as well as in height with the opening? The distance which the metopon projected into the building is not certainly known. In the restoration it is given as one foot but this is a calculation based on a combination of probabilities. The obvious provision to keep out rain-water, if it was to be successful, demands the extension of the metopon to the inner corner of the horizontal slab.

But this slab unsupported could not have carried a marble metopon. This is a difficulty which seems to compel the a.s.sumption that the metopon was in part of lighter material.

Apart from serving the purpose of keeping out rain, the conjectured metopon would also be a counterpart to the northern intercolumniation when the facade was viewed from the west. The increase in weight due to the metopon and the horizontal slab necessitated a counterbalancing reduction in the weight of the south wall because of its insecure foundations. The idea, in short, is simply this. Just as when the architect was not allowed to place the west facade where he wished and retreated to a line at which he was allowed to build it in a necessarily modified form, so when he could not build a wall in the southern intercolumniation of that facade, he withdrew still farther back and built a subst.i.tute at the line allowed. The extra weight thus produced was partly responsible for the thinning of the insecurely founded south wall.

It is Prof. Dorpfeld's theory that the Cecropium compelled the architect to place the present west wall 1 m. east of the line at which it was intended in the original plan to stand (_Ath. Mitt._, 1904, p. 105). He therefore regards that wall as an interior one of the original symmetrical temple. The theory here advanced is that the west wall is the original west facade compressed into one plane and placed at the line up to which the architect was permitted to build. The west wall of the Pre-Persian Erechtheum seems to have stood at about the same line to judge from the representation of it and the olive close by in the archaic pedimental sculpture to which reference has already been made (Petersen, _Burgtempel_, p. 22, abb. 2). Just as the architect of the Propylaea planned to cut through the Pelasgic wall and to build upon the precinct of Brauronian Artemis, but when he came to lay foundations was stopped at the wall, so the contemporary architect of the Erechtheum planned a symmetrical temple the west part of which was to occupy the site of the precinct of Pandrosus and Cecrops, but when he came to actual construction was stopped by the same religious conservatism. The form of the present west wall is as much like the originally planned west facade as the architect could make it. East and west facades were to be equidistant from the north porch and from the Caryatid Porch which would have served to break the monotony of the long rear wall.

Having discovered in the west wall the compressed facade of an originally symmetrically planned Erechtheum, it is desirable to inquire whether the curtailment of that plan caused a crowding of cults within the temple as finally built. It has already been remarked that the feeling which the north porch creates is that it should be, and was intended to be the porch to an interior of larger dimensions than those of the present plan. Now the _thala.s.sa_ and the mark of the trident were fixed, but the paintings of the Butadae and the three altars were movable. It is altogether probable that the congestion in the west half of the present Erechtheum was due to the crowding in of a chamber with the three altars of Poseidon-Erechtheus, Hephaestus and Butes, and the paintings of the Butadae--a chamber which in the original plan was to be placed at the west end of the symmetrical temple (Fig. 12).

Within the original Erechtheum at the east end marked off by a part.i.tion-wall was to be the shrine of Athena Polias. The western chamber of Poseidon-Erechtheus, the exact counterpart of the eastern, was to receive the altars and paintings. The intervening central chamber of proportions in harmony with those of the north porch was to contain the _thala.s.sa_ and the sacred olive, which would require that the temple be in part hypaethral. Furtw.a.n.gler (_Sitzb. Mun. Akad._, 1904, p. 371) rightly indeed objects to Dorpfeld's theory that the western cella in the original temple was to be an opisthodomus, on the ground that if the eastern cella contained a divinity, the western ought also. Furthermore, for those who believe that the magnificent north porch determines the front of the Erechtheum, the western cella would have been situated on the side, not at the rear of the temple. The interior wall-pilasters on either side of the doors were intended in the original to carry heavy cross-beams. In the temple as built, the eastern pair were carried up only five courses above the orthostates, i.e. as high as the part.i.tion-walls. Their completion was rendered unnecessary when the builders decided to put in the ?ap??? se???.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIGURE 12

THE ORIGINAL PLAN OF THE ERECHTHEUM.]

When this original plan had to be abandoned, not only was the large central chamber reduced in breadth, but was divided into a front and rear cella. In the first of these, which one entered immediately from the north porch (?se????s?) were placed the three altars and on the walls, the paintings of the Butadae. In the inner cella (??d??) were the trident-mark and the _thala.s.sa_. It is perfectly clear why Pausanias found no door leading from the first chamber of the d?p???? ????a into the ?a?? t?? ??????. In the original plan, the cella of Athena and the large central chamber of the tokens were connected by a door in the middle of their part.i.tion-wall, while the cellae of Athena and Poseidon-Erechtheus were not to be in immediate connection. These relations were preserved in the curtailed plan. The meaning of the door in the west wall is also simple. In the original plan the sacred olive tree and the _thala.s.sa_ were to stand in the large central chamber, but in the curtailed plan the sacred olive was left outside the temple and in the Pandroseum. A closed wall between the two tokens would have separated them completely. They belonged together, and a door was a poor subst.i.tute for a common chamber but it was the only means of connection possible.

The north porch in the original plan was to admit to both _thala.s.sa_ and sacred olive, but in the curtailed temple which left the olive outside, it could admit directly to the latter only by the addition of the little door in the southwest corner. The extreme simplicity of this door which is without such simple ornamentation as that of the south door suggests that in the original plan it was not intended to stand beside the elaborate north door. The little door as well as the one in the west wall were not features of the original Erechtheum, and their presence was therefore not made more noticeable by the addition of mouldings of any kind.

This interpretation, if correct, warrants the statement of the general principle that the Greek architect sought, in case of curtailment of his plan, to preserve as far as possible the essential features, and the relations of the parts to one another, of the original. The builder of the Erechtheum saved his west facade in modified form and found a place for the west cella in the reduced central chamber.

The Erechtheum as originally planned was an altogether symmetrical structure. The splendid north portal was to lead immediately into the cella of the tokens, on either side of which were the shrines of the divinities that had contended for the land of Attica. The balance of structure would have reflected a balance of cults. The original Erechtheum, in short, was an architectural sentence finely ill.u.s.trating the ?? and d? of Greek feeling. With the Parthenon and the Propylaea, it was to form a group of symmetrical monuments to crown the Athenian acropolis in a manner worthy of the Periclean Age.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] A drawing of the facade as seen from this point is much needed.

[2] See Dorpfeld, _Ath. Mitt._, 1911, p. 59, for latest discussion of the struggle.

[3] The few known facts about the Arrephoroi are conveniently gathered together by Frazer, _op. cit._, II, p. 344.

[4] I am indebted to Dr. L. D. Caskey of the Museum of Fine Arts at Boston for the photograph. He has also very kindly given me the benefit of his intimate knowledge of the Erechtheum in various suggestive criticisms. I take this occasion to express my sense of obligation.

[5] Pausanias seems to have been mistaken in speaking of two. So Frazer, _op. cit._, II, p. 574, note 6.

[6] Cf. the disc with octopus ornament on the dress of one of the maidens with that published by Schliemann, _Mykenae_, p. 194, no. 240.

[7] The origin and the meaning of the term pa?ast?? is clear. A pa?ast??

is that which stands pa?? a door or opening, i.e. a jamb. A pa.s.sage in the inscription which gives specifications for Philon's a.r.s.enal (_I. G._ II, 2 1054) is important in this connection. After prescribing the dimensions of the door of the a.r.s.enal, the material of the lintel, the inscription adds pa?ast?da? st?sa? ????? pe?te?????? ?. t. ?. The pa?ast?de? are clearly the door jambs which stand pa?? the door. By an easy and simple extension the word came to designate not only the jamb but the wall of which the jamb was a part.