The Parthenon

East to west

Is the direction of the sun rise. But the first thing you see is the west facade.

Base

A column that carries the load down to a foundation must have means to transfer the load without overstressing the foundation material.

Shaft

Rests upon the base, is a long, narrow, vertical cylinder that in some orders is articulated with fluting (vertical grooves). May also taper inward slightly so that it is wider at the bottom than at the top.

What kind of Greek architectural orders do we see/not see in the Parthenon?

See: Doric and Ionic Do not see: Corinthian An innovation in the Parthenon was the mixing of Doric and Ionic orders.

Column (fluted)

The shallow grooves running vertically along a surface. The term typically refers to the grooves running on a column shaft or a pilaster, but need not necessarily be restricted to those two applications. If the hollowing out of material meets in a point, the point is called an arris. If the lower half of the hollowed-out grooves appear to have been re-filled with a cylindrical element, it may be referred to as "cabled fluting."

Propylaea Mnesikles, 437-432 BCE

Monumental gateway that serves as the entrance to the Acropolis.

Erechtheion East Façade, 421-405 BCE

An ancient Greek temple on the north side of the Acropolis of Athens in Greece which was dedicated to both Athena and Poseidon.

Ionic Order

Came from eastern Greece. It is distinguished by slender, fluted pillars with a large base and two opposed volutes (also called scrolls) in the echinus of the capital. The echinus itself is decorated with an egg-and-dart motif. The Ionic shaft comes with four more flutes than the Doric counterpart (totalling 24). The Ionic base has two convex moldings called tori which are separated by a scotia. The Ionic order is also marked by an entasis, a curved tapering in the column shaft. A column of the ionic order is nine times its lower diameter. The shaft itself is eight diameters high. The architrave of the entablature commonly consists of three stepped bands (fasciae). The frieze comes without the Doric triglyph and metope. The frieze sometimes comes with a continuous ornament such as carved figures instead.

Doric order The Doric order was one of the three orders of ancient Greek or classical architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. The Doric was the earliest and in its essence the simplest, though still with complex details in the entablature above. The Greek Doric column was fluted, and had no base, dropping straight into the stylobate or platform on which the temple or other building stood. The capital was a simple circular form under a square cushion, very wide in early versions, but later more restrained. Above a plain architrave, the complexity comes in the frieze, where the two features originally unique to the Doric, the triglyph and guttae, are skeuomorphic memories of the beams and retaining pegs of the wooden constructions that preceded stone Doric temples. In stone they are purely ornamental. The relatively uncommon Roman and Renaissance Doric retained these, and often introduced thin layers of moulding or further ornament, as well as often using plain columns. More often they used versions of the Tuscan order, elaborated for nationalistic reasons by Italian Renaissance writers, which is in effect a simplified Doric, with un-fluted columns and a simpler entablature with no triglyphs or guttae. The Doric order was much used in Greek Revival architecture from the 18th century onwards; often earlier Greek versions were used, with wider columns and no bases to them. Since at least Vitruvius it has been customary for writers to associate the Doric with masculine virtues (the Ionic representing the feminine).It is also normally the cheapest of the orders to use. When the three orders are used one above the other, it is usual for the Doric to be at the bottom, with the Ionic and then the Corinthian above.

Columns on the outside.

Temple

Greek Temples were structures built to house deity statues within Greek sanctuaries in ancient Greek religion. The temple interiors did not serve as meeting places, since the sacrifices and rituals dedicated to the respective deity took place outside them. Temples were frequently used to store votive offerings. They are the most important and most widespread building type in Greek architecture. Most Greek temples were oriented astronomically.

Post-and-lintel structural system

In building construction, a system in which two upright members, the posts, hold up a third member, the lintel, laid horizontally across their top surfaces. All structural openings have evolved from this system, which is seen in pure form only in colonnades and in framed structures, because the posts of doors, windows, ceilings, and roofs normally form part of the wall.

Contrapposto

It is an Italian term that means counterpose. It is used in the visual arts to describe a human figure standing with most of its weight on one foot so that its shoulders and arms twist off-axis from the hips and legs. This gives the figure a more dynamic, or alternatively relaxed appearance. It can also be used to refer to multiple figures which are in counter-pose (or opposite pose) to one another. As regards Doryphoros, creates an idealized human being that is also alive. Animated perfection.

Optical refinement theory

Let's make it look perfect and in order to do so we have to adjust it. To loosen up the mathematical strictness and to counteract distortions of human visual perception, a slight curvature of the whole building, hardly visible with the naked eye, was introduced. The ancient architects had realised that long horizontal lines tend to make the optical impression of sagging towards their centre. To prevent this effect, the horizontal lines of stylobate and/or entablature were raised by a few centimetres towards the middle of a building. This avoidance of mathematically straight lines also included the columns, which did not taper in a linear fashion, but were refined by a pronounced "swelling" (entasis) of the shaft. Etc. Your sense experience calculated into the effect of the building.

Sculpted Metopes Finished by 440 BCE Part of the Doric Frieze In classical architecture, a metope is a rectangular architectural element that fills the space between two triglyphs in a Doric frieze, which is a decorative band of alternating triglyphs and metopes above the architrave of a building of the Doric order. Metopes often had painted or sculptural decoration; the most famous example are the 92 metopes of the Parthenon marbles some of which depict the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapiths. The painting on most metopes has been lost, but sufficient traces remain to allow a close idea of their original appearance Sculptural decoration supervised by Phidias.

South metope: struggle between Lapith and Centaur Sculpted in relief, carved almost in the round Polychromy; examine the composition

The Acropolis of Athens

The Acropolis of Athens (Ancient Greek: Ἀκρόπολις; Modern Greek: Ακρόπολη Αθηνών Akrópoli Athinón) is an ancient citadel located on a high rocky outcrop above the city of Athens and contains the remains of several ancient buildings of great architectural and historic significance, the most famous being the Parthenon.

Entasis

The application of a convex curve to a surface for aesthetic purposes. Its best-known use is in certain orders of Classical columns that curve slightly as their diameter is decreased from the bottom upwards. In the Hellenistic period, some columns with this are cylindrical in their lower parts. The word derives from the Greek word εντείνω (enteino), "to stretch or strain tight".

Capital

The topmost member of a column. It mediates between the column and the load thrusting down upon it, broadening the area of the column's supporting surface. Projecting on each side as it rises to support the abacus, joins the usually square abacus and the usually circular shaft of the column. May be convex, as in the Doric order; concave, as in the inverted bell of the Corinthian order; or scrolling out, as in the Ionic order. These form the three principal types on which all capitals are based. From the highly visible position it occupies in all colonnaded monumental buildings, the capital is often selected for ornamentation; and is often the clearest indicator of the architectural order. The treatment of its detail may be an indication of the building's date.