Athena Parthenos

"Athena Parthenos" (Greek: Ἀθηνᾶ Παρθένος; literally, "Athena the Virgin") was the title of a massive chryselephantine sculpture of the Greek goddess Athena by Phidias. It was named after an epithet for the goddess herself, and was housed in the Parthenon in Athens. A number of replicas and works inspired by it, both ancient and modern, have been made.

It was the most renowned cult image of Athens, [The "Athena Parthenos" was featured on contemporary reliefs commemorating Athenian treaties and for the next century and a half on coins of Hellenistic monarchs avid to proclaim their Hellenic connections; see Hector Williams, "An Athena Parthenos from Cilicia" "Anatolian Studies" 27 (1977, pp. 105-110), p 108f.] considered one of the greatest achievements of the most acclaimed sculptor of ancient Greece. Phidias began his work around 447 BCE, [Andrew Stewart gives 446.] Lachares removed the gold sheets in 296 BCE to pay his troops, and the bronze was probably gilded thereafter; it was damaged by a fire about 165 BCE but repaired. [W.B. Dinsmoor, "the repair of the Athena Parthenos" "American Journal of Archaeology" 38 (1934) pp 93-106.] It continued to stand in the Parthenon in the fifth century CE, when it may have been lost in another fire. An account mentions it in Constantinople in the tenth century, however. [Gisela Richter, "Sculpture and Sculptors of the Greeks", p 220 with ancient references, noted by Gorham P. Stevens, "Concerning the Parthenos" "Hesperia" 30.1 (January 1961, pp. 1-7) p. 2.]

Description

The ancient historian Pausanias gave a description of the statue:

...The statue itself is made of ivory silver and gold. On the middle of her helmet is placed a likeness of the Sphinx ... and on either side of the helmet are griffins in relief. ... The statue of Athena is upright, with a tunic reaching to the feet, and on her breast the head of Medusa is worked in ivory. She holds a statue of Victory about four cubits high, and in the other hand a spear; at her feet lies a shield and near the spear is a serpent. This serpent would be Erichthonius. On the pedestal is the birth of Pandora in relief. [Pausanias, "Description of Greece", Book I, 24.5–7.]

The general type of the "Athena Parthenos", although not its character and quality, can be assessed from its image on coins [L. Lacroix "Les reproductions des statues sur les monnaies gracques" (Liège) 1949, pp 266-81.] and its reproductions as miniature sculptures, as votive objects, and in representations on engraved gems. [Leipen 1971.]

Athena's head is inclined slightly forward. She stands with her left hand resting on an upright shield. Her left knee is slightly bent, her weight slightly shifted to her right leg. Her chiton is cinched at the waist by a pair of serpents, whose tails entwine at the back. Locks of hair trail onto the goddess's breastplate. The Nike on her outstretched right hand is winged; whether there was a support under it in Phidias' original has been much discussed; [Gisela Richter decided there was not and summarized the discussion in "Was there a vertical support under the Nike of the Athena Parthenos?" "Studi in onore... Calderini e Paribeni" (Milan) 1956, pp 147-54.] evidence in surviving versions is contradictory. The exact position of a spear, often omitted, is also not fully determined, whether held in the crook of Athena's right arm or supported by one of the snakes in the aegis, as N. Leipen restores it, [Leipen 1971:29.] following the "Aspasios" gem.

The sculpture was assembled on a wooden core, covered with shaped bronze plates covered in turn with removable gold plates, save for the ivory surfaces of the goddess's face and arms; the gold weighed 44 talents, the equivalent of about convert|2500|lb|kg; the "Athena Parthenos" embodied a sizeable part of the treasury of Athens. [S. Eddy, "The gold in the Athena Parthenos" "Merican Jopurnal of Archaeology" pp107-11.]

Ancient copies

The Varvakeion votive figure ("illustration, above right") is one of the two versions of "Athena Parthenos" considered most faithful to the original; the other is the uncompleted Lenormant Athena, also in the National Museum, Athens.
*The "Varvakeion Athena", a Roman copy in marble of the second century, is housed in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens. One of the two versions of "Athena Parthenos" considered most faithful to the original. [http://74.125.95.104/u/ur?q=cache:4HJ8k7_FwW8J:oncampus.richmond.edu/academics/classics/students/Liu/parthenon.html+Athena+Parthenos&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&ie=UTF-8]
*Lenormant Athena, uncompleted, of the second to third century, also in the National Museum, Athens. One of the two versions of "Athena Parthenos" considered most faithful to the original.
*. [http://cartelen.louvre.fr/cartelen/visite?srv=car_not_frame&idNotice=809]
* in Rome
*The statue's shield alone (Strangford Collection, British Museum, "illustration, right") [http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/f/fragment_of_a_marble_shield.aspx]

Replica at Nashville

A modern replica by Alan LeQuire stands in the reproduction of the Parthenon in Nashville, Tennessee. Alan LeQuire, a Nashville native, was awarded the commission to produce the Parthenon's cult statue. His work was modeled on descriptions given of the original. The modern version took eight years to complete, and was unveiled to the public on May 20 1990.

The modern version of "Athena Parthenos" is significant because of its scale and its attention to recreating Phidias' work. The statue adds an additional dimension of realism to the replicated Parthenon, whose interior east room (the "naos") was merely a large empty hall prior to the statue's unveiling. The reproduced "Athena Parthenos" gives visitors the impression that they truly are inside an ancient place of worship.

"Athena Parthenos" is made of a composite of gypsum cement and ground fiberglass. The head of Athena was assembled over an aluminum armature, and the lower part was made in steel. The four ten-inch H beams rest on a concrete structure that extends through the Parthenon floor and basement down to bedrock, to support the incredible weight of the statue. LeQuire made each of the 180 cast gypsum panels used to create the statue light enough to be lifted by one person and attached to the steel armature.

Gilding and paint

Painstaking research was performed by LeQuire and the Parthenon staff to ensure the accuracy of the statue's resemblance to the Phidias work. It stood in Nashville’s Parthenon as a plain, white statue for twelve years. In 2002, Parthenon volunteers gilded Athena under the supervision of master gilder Lou Reed. The gilding project took less than four months and makes the modern statue appear that much more like the Phidias' Athena Parthenos would have appeared during its time.

The gold plates on the Athena statue in ancient times weighed approximately convert|1500|lb|kg and were one-sixteenth to one-eighth of an inch (1.6 to 3.2 mm) thick. The 23.75-karat gold leaf on Nashville's Athena Parthenos weighs a total of convert|8.5|lb|kg and is one-third the thickness of tissue paper. The modern extravagance of gilding such a large statue pales in comparison to the lavish spending of the Greeks. In fact, one theory of the original's demise is that Athena Parthenos was decimated and looted to remove the gilding.

In addition to gilding, the project included painting the details of the statue's face, wardrobe, and shield. LeQuire himself applied the paint.

Facts and figures

* Nashville's Athena stands 41 ft 10 in (convert|502|in|m) tall, making her the largest piece of indoor sculpture in the Western World.
* The statue of Nike in Athena's right hand stands 6 ft 4 in (convert|76|in|m) tall.
* There are eleven snakes represented on Athena's breastplate, bracelets, and belt.

Notes

Further reading

*Leipen, N. "Athena Parthenos" (Toronto) 1971.

External links

* [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cl135/Students/Colin_Delaney/fathena.html Colin Delaney, "Pheidias, Sculptor to the Gods"]
* [http://alanlequire.com/athena.html Alan LeQuire Page]
* [http://www.nashville.gov/parthenon/ Nashville Parthenon]