The wonder and mystery of the Parthenon: the world's most iconic temple

The Parthenon was a temple dedicated to Athena Parthenos, the patron goddess of Athens, and it replaced an earlier structure destroyed by the Persians in 480 BCE.

Its architects were Ictinus and Callicrates, and the sculptor Phidias designed the decoration and the main statue inside the temple.

The Parthenon measured about 69.5 metres long and 30.9 metres wide and had 46 outer columns built in the Doric order, each of which rose about 10.4 metres in height.

Inside the cella stood two tiers of columns that supported the roof, which amounted to far fewer than the 23 sometimes misattributed to the interior layout.

The building dominated the Athenian skyline, which made it visible to anyone approaching the city by land or sea. 

Inside the temple stood the chryselephantine statue of Athena Parthenos, which was made of ivory and gold plates fixed to a wooden core.

The statue depicted Athena in full armour holding Nike in her right hand and a spear in her left.

Ancient writers described how the statue’s gold plates could be removed and reused, which suggests that the Athenians may have seen it as a reserve of wealth in times of crisis.

Athenians constructed the Parthenon to honour their goddess and to celebrate their power after the Persian Wars.

Victory at Salamis in 480 BCE and Plataea in 479 BCE had given Athens great prestige, and by 454 BCE the treasury of the Delian League had been moved to the city.

Tribute collected from the League’s members funded much of the construction, which meant that the building acted as both a sacred dedication and a demonstration of Athenian control over its allies. 

The decision to build a temple on a scale greater than anything previously attempted in Athens reflected the city’s desire to display its recovery after the devastation of the Persian invasion.

By including a giant gold and ivory statue of Athena, the designers strengthened the connection between divine favour and Athenian power.

The Parthenon therefore combined religious ceremonies and political messages. 

The Parthenon showed the great skill of its architects and builders, who used small mathematical adjustments to correct visual distortions.

The stylobate had a slight upward curve, the columns leaned inward, and the corner columns were made slightly thicker than the rest, which created the feeling of perfect straightness and balance when viewed from a distance.

Such precision depended on clear geometric techniques supported by skilled work and organised labour. 

The marble used for construction came from Mount Pentelicus. The process of moving and shaping the blocks required special lifting machines and joints that fit precisely.

Sculptors carved the friezes and metopes, combining scenes from mythology with images of civic life in Athens.

The statue of Athena Parthenos itself was a technical wonder, as it required an internal wooden framework to support the ivory and gold plates without collapsing under their weight. 

The Parthenon’s decoration communicated messages about Athenian identity, power, and values.

The metopes showed Greeks fighting centaurs, Amazons, giants, and Trojans, which celebrated the victory of civilisation over barbarism.

The continuous frieze depicted the Panathenaic procession, a festival held in honour of Athena. 

The statue of Athena reinforced these ideas, since her armour presented her as a warrior goddess while the small figure of Nike in her hand celebrated victory.

As such, every visitor to Athens could see that the city possessed the necessary resources and a skilled workforce to undertake a monument of unprecedented scale 

Pericles directed the programme that produced the Parthenon, and his leadership in the mid-fifth century BCE ensured that Athens became a centre of art and architecture.

As the leading statesman of the city, he argued that Athens had earned the right to spend League funds on construction because it had made the greatest sacrifices in the Persian Wars.

His critics accused him of misusing allied tribute, yet Pericles defended the spending as a just reward for Athens’ efforts and leadership. 

Pericles recognised that monumental architecture could inspire civic pride. If executed well, it would strengthen democratic identity, and impress allies and rival.

His oversight of Parthenon construction resulted in a structure that displayed Athens’ cultural and political pre-eminence 

The Parthenon underwent many changes after antiquity, and each stage of its history added to the damage that has left it in partial ruin.

It became a Christian church in the sixth century CE, and under Ottoman rule it was converted into a mosque.

In 1687 a Venetian bombardment caused a catastrophic explosion when gunpowder stored inside ignited, which destroyed much of the central structure and scattered many of its sculptures. 

During the early nineteenth century Lord Elgin removed many of the surviving sculptures, which later became part of the British Museum’s collection.

Interest in classical Greece grew in Europe during the same period, and architects studied the Parthenon to guide neoclassical design in public buildings.

Today it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and major restoration projects aim to protect what remains of its structure.

Visitors from across the world travel to Athens to view a building that demonstrated the wealth, ambition, and artistic achievements of the Athenian state at the height of its power.