Pausanias' description of Greece, Volume I.

by active approximately 150-175 Pausanias

CHAPTER X.

Many various wonders may one see, or hear of, in Greece: but the Eleusinian mysteries and Olympian games seem to exhibit more than anything else the divine purpose. And the sacred grove of Zeus they have from old time called Altis, slightly changing the Greek word for grove[69]: it is indeed called Altis also by Pindar, in the Ode he composed for a victor at Olympia. And the temple and statue of Zeus were built out of the spoils of Pisa, which the people of Elis razed to the ground, after quelling the revolt of Pisa and some of the neighbouring towns that revolted with Pisa. And that the statue of Zeus was the work of Phidias is shown by the inscription written at the base of it,

“Phidias the Athenian, the son of Charmides, made me.”

The temple is a Doric building, and outside it is a colonnade. And the temple is built of stone of the district. Its height up to the gable is 68 feet, its breadth 95 feet, and its length 230 feet. And its architect was Libon a native of Elis. And the tiles on the roof are not of baked earth, but Pentelican marble to imitate tiles. They say such roofs are the invention of a man of Naxos called Byzes, who made statues at Naxos with the inscription,

“Euergus of Naxos made me, the son of Byzes, and descended from Leto, the first who made tiles of stone.”

This Byzes was a contemporary of Alyattes the Lydian and Astyages (the son of Cyaxaras) the king of Persia. And there is a golden vase at each end of the roof, and a golden Victory in the middle of the gable. And underneath the Victory is a golden shield hung up as a votive offering, with the Gorgon Medusa worked on it. The inscription on the shield states who hung it up, and the reason why they did so. For this is what it says.

“This temple’s golden shield is a votive offering from the Lacedæmonians at Tanagra and their allies, a gift from the Argives the Athenians and the Ionians, a tithe offering for success in war.”

The battle I mentioned in my account of Attica, when I described the tombs at Athens. And in the same temple at Olympia, above the zone that runs round the pillars on the outside, are 21 golden shields, the offering of Mummius the Roman General, after he had beaten the Achæans and taken Corinth, and expelled the Dorians from Corinth. And on the gables in bas relief is the chariot race between Pelops and Œnomaus, and both chariots in motion. And in the middle of the gable is a statue of Zeus, and on the right hand of Zeus is Œnomaus with a helmet on his head, and beside him his wife Sterope, one of the daughters of Atlas. And Myrtilus, who was the charioteer of Œnomaus, is seated behind the four horses. And next to him are two men whose names are not recorded, but they are doubtless Œnomaus’ grooms, whose duty was to take care of the horses. And at the end of the gable is a delineation of the river Cladeus, next to the Alpheus held most in honour of all the rivers of Elis. And on the left of the statue of Zeus are Pelops and Hippodamia and the charioteer of Pelops and the horses, and two men who were Pelops’ grooms. And where the gable tapers fine there is the Alpheus delineated. And Pelop’s charioteer was according to the tradition of the Trœzenians Sphærus, but the custodian at Olympia said that his name was Cilla. The carvings on the gables in front are by Pæonius of Mende in Thracia, those behind by Alcamenes, a contemporary of Phidias and second only to him as statuary. And on the gables is a representation of the fight between the Lapithæ and the Centaurs at the marriage of Pirithous. Pirithous is in the centre, and on one side of him is Eurytion trying to carry off Pirithous’ wife and Cæneus coming to the rescue, and on the other side Theseus laying about among the Centaurs with his battle-axe: and one Centaur is carrying off a maiden, another a blooming boy. Alcamenes has engraved this story, I imagine, because he learnt from the lines of Homer that Pirithous was the son of Zeus, and knew that Theseus was fourth in descent from Pelops. There are also in bas relief at Olympia most of the Labours of Hercules. Above the doors of the temple is the hunting of the Erymanthian boar, and Hercules taking the mares of Diomede the Thracian, and robbing the oxen of Geryon in the island of Erythea, and supporting the load of Atlas, and clearing the land of Elis of its dung. And above the chamber behind the doors he is robbing the Amazon of her belt, and there is the stag, and the Cretan Minotaur, and the Stymphalian birds, and the hydra, and the Nemean lion. And as you enter the brazen doors on the right in front of the pillar is Iphitus being crowned by his wife Ecechiria, as the inscription in verse states. And there are pillars inside the temple, and porticoes above, and an approach by them to the image of Zeus. There is also a winding staircase to the roof.