Greece and the Ægean Islands

by Philip Sanford Marden

TEMPLE OF NIKÉ APTEROS

On either side of the stairway by which one climbs to the Propylæa are buttresses of rock, on one of which stands an object worthy of long contemplation. At the right, on a platform leveled from the solid rock, stands the tiny temple of Niké Apteros (the Wingless Victory), “restored” it is true, but nevertheless one of the most perfect little buildings imaginable. At one time entirely removed to make room for a Turkish watch-tower, it has been re-created by careful hands out of its original marbles; and it stands to-day, as it stood of old, on its narrow parapet beside the grand stairway of Athena. The process of rebuilding has not, indeed, been able to give the unbroken lines of the old temple. The stones are chipped at the corners here and there, and there are places where entirely new blocks have been required. But in the main everything, even to the delicately carved frieze around its top, is in place; and for once at least the oft-berated “restorer” of ancient buildings has triumphed and has silenced all his critics. The remnants of the incomparable carved balustrade, which once served as a railing for the parapet, are to be seen in the small museum of the Acropolis, revealing the extreme grace which the Greek sculptors had achieved in the modeling of exquisite figures in high relief. The slab, particularly, which has come to be known as “Niké binding her sandal” seems to be the favorite of all, though the others, even in their headless and armless state, are scarcely less lovely.

As for the isolated pedestal on the other side of the stairway, known as the “pedestal of Agrippa,” it is not only devoid of any statue to give it continued excuse for being, but it is in such a state of decrepitude as to cause the uncomfortable thought that it is about to fall, and seems an object rather for removal than for perpetuation, although it serves to balance the effect produced by the Niké bastion.

Standing on the Niké platform, the visitor finds the noble columns of the Propylæa towering above him close at hand. These Doric pillars give one for the first time an adequate idea of the perfection to which the column was carried by Ictinus and the builders and architects of his time; for although each pillar is built up drum upon drum, it is still true in many cases that the joints between them are almost invisible, so perfect are they, despite the lapse of ages and the ravages of war, not to mention the frequent earthquake shocks to which the whole region has been subjected. Age has been kind also to the Pentelic marble, softening its original whiteness to a golden brown without destroying its exquisite satin texture. Nothing more charming can well be imagined than the contrast of the blue Athenian sky with these stately old columns, as one looks outward or inward through their majestic rows.

The rock rises sharply as one passes within the precinct of the Acropolis, and the surface of it appears to have been grooved to give a more secure footing to pedestrians. Stony as is the place, it still affords soil enough to support a growth of grasses and struggling bits of greenery to cradle the many fallen drums. But one has eyes only for the Parthenon, the western front of which now appears for the first time in its full effect. From its western end, the havoc wrought in its midst being concealed, the Parthenon appears almost perfect. The pedimental sculptures, it is true, are gone save for a fragment or two, having been carried off to England. But the massive Doric columns still stand in an unbroken double row before one; the walls of the cella appear to be intact; the pediment rises almost unbroken above; frieze, triglyphs, and metopes remain in sufficient degree to give an idea of the ancient magnificence of the shrine—and all conspire to compel instant and unstinted admiration. Speculation as to the ethics of the removal of the Parthenon sculptures by Lord Elgin has become an academic matter, and therefore one quite beyond our present purpose. Doubtless to-day no such removal would be countenanced for a moment. It is no longer possible to say, as former critics have said, that the local regard for the treasures of the place is so slight as to endanger their safety. The present custodianship of the priceless relics of antiquity in Athens is admirably careful and satisfactory. If, therefore, Greece had only come into her own a century or so earlier than she did, the famous sculptures of the miraculous birth of Athena, springing full grown from the head of Zeus, and the colossal representation of the strife between Athena and Poseidon for possession of the Attic land, might still adorn as of yore the eastern and western gables of the great temple; or if not that, might still be seen in the very excellent museum at the other end of the city. It is enough for us to know, however, that they are not in Athens but in London, and that there is no probability they will ever return to Greek soil; and to know, also, that had they not been removed as they were, they might never have been preserved at all. That is the one comfortable state of mind in which to view the vacant pediments of the Parthenon. To work up a Byronic frenzy over what cannot be helped, and may, after all, be for the best, is of no benefit.

Writers on Athens have often called attention to the curved stylobate of the Parthenon—a feature which is by no means confined to this temple, but which is to be noticed in almost every considerable ruin of the sort. The base of the building curves sufficiently to make the device visible, rising from either end to the centre of the sides; and the curious may easily prove it by placing a hat at one extremity and trying to see it from the other, sighting along the line of the basic stones. The curve was necessary to cure an optical defect, for a straight or level base would have produced the illusion of a decided sagging Similarly it has long been recognized that the columns must swell at the middle drums, lest they appear to the eye to be concaved. In fact, as Professor Gardner has pointed out, there is actually hardly a really straight line in the Parthenon—yet the effect is of absolute straightness everywhere.

Obviously this curvature of the base, slight though it was, imposed some engineering problems of no inconsiderable nature when it came to setting the column drums; for the columns must stand erect, and the bottom sections must be so devised as to meet the configuration of the convex stylobate. The corner columns, being set on a base that curved in both directions, must have been more difficult still to deal with. But the problem was solved successfully, and the result of this cunningly contrived structure was a temple that comes as near architectural perfection as earthly artisans are ever likely to attain. The columns were set up in an unfluted state, the fluting being added after the pillar was complete. Each drum is said to have been rotated upon its lower fellow until the joint became so exact as to be to all intents and purposes indistinguishable. In the centre of the fallen drums will be seen always a square hole, used to contain a peg of wood designed to hold the finished sections immovable, and in many cases this wooden plug has been found intact. All along the sides of the Parthenon, lying on the ground as they fell, are to be seen the fallen drums that once composed the columns of the sides, but which were blown out of position by the bomb from the Venetian fleet of Admiral Morosini. They lie like fallen heaps of dominoes or children’s building blocks, and the entire centre of the temple is a gaping void. Here and there an attempt has been made to reconstruct the fallen columns from the original portions, but the result is by no means reassuring and seems not to justify the further prosecution of the task. Better a ruined Parthenon than an obvious patchwork. The few restored columns are quite devoid of that homogeneity that marks the extant originals, and their joints are painfully felt, being chipped and uneven, where the old are all but imperceptible; so that the whole effect is of insecurity and lack of perfection entirely out of harmony with the Parthenon itself. Opinions, however, differ. Some still do advocate the rebuilding of the temple rather than leave the drums, seemingly so perfect still, lying as they now are amid the grasses of the Acropolis. It is one of those questions of taste on which debate is traditionally idle and purposeless.

THE PARTHENON, WEST PEDIMENT

For those who must demand restorations other than those constructed by the mind’s eye, there are models and drawings enough extant, and some are to be seen in the Acropolis Museum. Most interesting of the attempts are doubtless the speculations as to the pedimental sculptures, the remains of which are in the British Museum, but which are so fragmentary and so ill placed in their new home that much of the original grouping is matter for conjecture. With the aid of drawings made by a visitor long years ago, before Lord Elgin had thought of tearing them down, the two great pediments have been ingeniously reconstructed in miniature, showing a multitude of figures attending on the birth of the city’s tutelary goddess, as she sprang full armed from the head of Zeus assisted by the blow of Hephaistos’s hammer, or the concourse of deities that umpired the contest between Athena and Poseidon for the land. The Acropolis Museum has only casts of the Elgin marbles, but there is still to be seen a good proportion of the original frieze. It would be out of place in any such work as this to be drawn into anything like a detailed account of these famous sculptures, the subjects of a vast volume of available literature already and sources of a considerable volume also of controversial writing involving conflicts of the highest authority. It must therefore suffice to refer the reader interested in the detailed story of the Parthenon, its external adornment, its huge gold-and-ivory statue within, and the great Panathenaic festival which its frieze portrayed, to any one of those learned authors who have written of all these things so copiously and clearly—doubtless none more so than Dr. Ernest Gardner in his admirably lucid and readable “Ancient Athens,” or in his “Handbook of Greek Sculpture,” without which no one should visit the museum in that city.