Footnote 24:[ (return) ] DÖRPFELD, XV, p. 480.
Footnote 25:[ (return) ] DÖRPFELD, XII, p. 203 f., argues that these headings show that the treasure was moved after the fire of 406 from the opisthodomos of the old temple into the Παρθενών proper, which was emptied of its contents to make room. But the explanation given above seems equally possible. Dörpfeld, (Mitth., vi, p. 283, ff.) proved conclusively that the Παρθενών was not the eastern cella of the Parthenon. His proof that it was the great western room is based primarily upon the assumption (p. 300) that Der Name Opisthodom bezeichnet hei alien Tempeln die dem Pronaos entsprechende Hinterhalle. But for that assumption the Παρθενών might just as well be the western porch. Since the discovery of the pre-Persian temple, however, Dörpfeld maintains that the opisthodomos κατ εξοχήν was the entire western portion of that temple, consisting of three rooms besides the porch (though he does not expressly include the porch). There is, then, no reason in the nature of things why the whole western part of the Parthenon should not be called opisthodomos.
Let us now compare the nomenclature of the pre-Persian and Periclean temples. Both were temples of Athena and more especially of Athena as guardian of the city, Athena Polias; a pronaos or proneion formed part of each; one temple was called το Έκατόμεδον, and the main cella of the other was called ό Έκατομπεδοs νεως [26], and this name was extended to the whole building. An opisthodomos was a part of each building, and, if I was right in my observations above, the new one, like the old, was called simply ο οπισθόδομος. As soon as the great Periclean temple was completed, the temple burnt by the Persians was quietly removed as had been intended from the first, the treasure was deposited in the great new opisthodomos, the old ceremonies which might still cling to the temple of the sixth century were transferred, along with the old names, to the splendid new building; the greatest temple on the Acropolis was now as before the house of the patron goddess of the land, and contained her treasure and that of her faithful worshippers, but the two temples did not exist side by side. There was, then, no reason for differentiating between the two temples, as, for instance, by calling the one that had been removed ό αρχαίος veas, because the one that had been removed was no longer in existence. That the designation αρχαίος (παλαιός) νεώς is applicable to the Erechtheion has been accepted for many years and has been explained anew by Petersen. [27] If the temple burnt by the Persians had continued to exist alongside of the Parthenon, one might doubt whether it or the Erechtheion was meant by the expression ό αρχαίος νεώς, but if one of the two temples was no longer in existence, the name must belong to the other. It is just possible that in Hesychios, 'Εκατό μπεδος· νεώς ev τη άκροπόλεί τη Παρθενω κατασκευασθείς υπό Αθηναίων, μείζων του εμπρησθεντος υπό των Περσών ποσΐ πεντήκοντα, the expression του έμπρησθεντος υπό των Περσών (yea or possibly 'Εκατόμπέδου νεώ) was originally chosen because the expression αρχαίου νεώ (which would otherwise be very appropriate here) was regularly used to designate the Erechtheion. [28]
Footnote 26:[ (return) ] Or το Έκατόμπεδον. Even after Dörpfeld's arguments, I cannot believe that any great difference in the use of the two expressions can be found.
Footnote 27:[ (return) ] Mitth., XII, p. 63 ff. Comparison of modern with ancient instances is frequently misleading, but sometimes furnishes a useful illustration. There is in Boston, Mass., a church called the Old South church. This became too small and too inconvenient for its congregation, so a new church was built in a distant part of the city. The intention then was to destroy the old building, in which case the new one (though new and in a different part of the city) would have been called the Old South church. The old building was, however, preserved, and the new one now goes by the name of the New Old South church, though I have also heard it called the Old South in spite of the continued existence of the old building. So the new building of the Erechtheion retained the name άρχαιος νεως which had belonged to its predecessor on the same spot.
Footnote 28:[ (return) ] LOLLING (p. 638 ff.) discusses the measurements of the Parthenon and the old Hekatompedon, and finds a slight inaccuracy in the statement of Hesychios. He thinks, however, (p. 641) that Hesychios would not compare the two unless they had both been standing at the same time. Possibly any inaccuracy may be accounted for by the fact that the older temple was no longer standing when the comparison was first made. Possibly, too, the name Hekatompedon was not originally meant to be taken quite literally, but rather, as Curtitis, Stadtgeschichte, p. 72, seems to think, as a proud designation of a grand new building.
At the end of his last article on this subject, Dörpfeld calls attention to the fact that "not only the lower step (Unterstufe) of the temple, but also a stone of the stylobate are still in their old position, and several stylobate-stones are still lying about upon the temple," and says that the whole stylobate, with the exception of the part cut away by the Erechtheion, must therefore have existed in Roman times. I do not see why quite so much is to be assumed. Even granting that we know the exact level of the surface of the Acropolis in classical times at every point, we certainly do not know all the objects--votive offerings and the like--set up in various places. Some small part of the stylobate of the ruined temple may have been used as a foundation for some group of statuary or other offering, [29] or a fragment of the building itself may have been left as a reminder to future generations of the devastations of the barbarians. The existence of these stones is called by Dörpfeld "a fact hitherto insufficiently considered" (eine bishеr nicht genügend beаchtete Thatsache). I cannot believe that the fact would have remained so long "insufficiently considered" by Dörpfeld and others if it were really in itself a sufficient proof that the pre-Persian temple continued in existence until the end of ancient Athens. If I am right in thinking that the temple did not exist during the last centuries of classical antiquity, it must have ceased to exist when the Parthenon was completed. Dörpfeld is certainly justified in saying [30] that "he who concedes the continued existence of the temple until the end of the fourth century has no right to let the temple disappear in silence later" (darf den Tempel nicht spater ohne weiteres verschwinden lassen).
Footnote 29:[ (return) ] Whether the present condition of the stone of the stylobate still in situ favors this conjecture, is for those on the spot to decide. It looks in Dörpfeld's plans (Ant. Denkm., ı, I, and Mitth., XI, p. 337) as if it had a hole in it, such as are found in the pedestals of statues.
Footnote 30:[ (return) ] Mitth., xv, 438. This is directed against the closing paragraph of Lolling's article, where he says: "We cannot determine exactly when this (the removal of the temple) happened, but it seems that the temple no longer existed in the times of Plutarch," etc.