Ancient Greek Temples: Doric-Ionic Architecture and Religious Significance

Greek temples were the earthly home and a sacred area for the gods and goddesses. With the temple normally facing east, the rising sun often would illuminate it as the main source of light, supplemented by the occasional oil lamp. Some temples such as the Parthenon at Athens had marble tiles for the roof, potentially allowing some diffusion and reflection of the existing light. Cult statues were made of a variety of materials; at first, they were probably wood or terra-cotta, and later statues were marble. Often, the statue was covered with clothes and other accoutrements made of ivory and gold. The most famous statues were Phidias’s Athena at Athens and Zeus at Olympia. Typically, the statue was life size, but occasionally it could be larger, such as at Athens and Olympia.

The temples housed the cult statue of a god that gave the earthly, physical representation of that god. Since gods could move throughout the world, their representation in temples allowed them to be present in a particular place. The temple was part of a complex system or sanctuary for the worship of a god. The entire complex was usually enclosed by a wall or fence called a peribolos. This wall enclosed the temenos, which the city officially designated as being owned by or otherwise belonging to the god. The temenos could also be part of a sacred grove, which would not have a peribolos in the same form and perhaps only had boundary stones or marker instead of a wall or fence.

Temple of Hephaestus in an ancient agora in Athens

A Greek temple had a cella or naos, a room where the cult statue was kept. This was the most important room in the temple. Often goods were placed in the naos for the god. The naos would have columns on either side of the walls that created three corridors, with the central one axially moving from the front door to the cult statue. In many later temples, there was another room off the naos, the adyton, a restricted area where the cult statue was kept. In this case, the naos would be used to house votive goods. This room would be farthest from the main entry and accessible only from the naos. These rooms were accessible only to the priests, priestesses, and oracles, not the general public.

In front of the naos, toward the main entry was the pronaos, where the walls of the naos were extended on either side. It was the inner room of a portico between the naos and the entry colonnade, usually with two columns between the walls. It could often be as long as the naos and could be open such that the walls were replaced with columns. Sometimes there was a door on the far side of the pronaos that could seal off the naos. Many of the Greek temples had a similar room in the rear, an opisthodomos (back porch), which had no connection to the adyton or naos and was present only for aesthetic reasons, to give proportion. Often this room, which had a door between the two columns, could be closed off to make it secure, such as in the Parthenon, where it was used as a treasury.

Greek temples are known for their styles often being designed with mathematic proportions. They came in a variety of shapes and styles. There were round temples, a tholos, and rectangular structures of varying sizes. The simplest temple had four walls, creating a naos or cella. This was then augmented by antae (pillars) on either side of a doorway. The antae often were elongated from the side walls of the cella, creating a pronaos. If the temple also had an opisthodomos, it would be called a double anta temple. The entire system of the temple, with the naos, adyton, pronaos, and opisthodomos, would then be surrounded by columns on all four sides, forming an entity called the peristasis; if there were two rows of columns, it was called a dipteros.

These columns were usually in a single row around the perimeter of the structure, producing a porch or portico. If there was not a set of columns around the temple but only in the front, it was called a prostyle; when the same also occurred in the rear of the temple, it was called amphiprostyle. A further delineation was the number of columns in the front and/or back. Two columns were called distyle, four as tetrastyle, six as hexastyle, eight as octastyle, and ten as decastyle. Most of the temples had an even number of columns, although some with odd numbers exist, such as the one dedicated to Hera at Paestum.

The number of columns was often determined by a formula where the number of side columns was one more than twice the number on the front, so four columns in the front had nine columns on each side. Temples could reach a height of 60 feet with some large temples measuring over 100 feet wide by 300 feet long. To prevent the optical illusion that the center was sagging, it was common to raise the center column by a few inches or have the columns swell out a bit.

Temples were usually elevated from the ground level through the creation of an underground foundation (stereobate); the upper level of the foundation layer was the euthynteria, which protruded from the ground and allowed the temple’s building to be constructed (usually of local stone). On top of this was the crepidoma, an elevated platform of three levels, each decreasing in size so they resembled steps. On the top was the stylobate, a platform where the columns were placed. The columns placed on this level tapered toward the top. Each column with made from separate drums placed on top of each other. The columns had cut grooves or flutings, the Doric with eighteen to twenty and the Ionic with twenty- four. The Doric column stood on the stylobate itself, while the Ionic rested on a base on the stylobate. The top of the column had the capital, which supported the entablature.

The Doric order had an entablature with two parts: the architrave, resting between the columns, and the frieze above the architrave, which was sometimes plain and sometimes decorated. The frieze often contained representations of battle scenes in a continuous form around the temple. There were triglyphs, or channeled tablets of the frieze. Between these triglyphs was the metope, an architectural sculpture that was usually self-contained, unlike the frieze. The metope and triglyph should be viewed as a single unit. The frontal decorative portion, the triangle gable on the lintel, became an important component for the decoration of the temple. On the roof were an acroterion on the corner and ridges that could be statues or simple architectural forms. The friezes and metopes, as well as columns and other parts, were painted in various colors, usually blue, red, and white.

Temples were probably open to city residents, with some restrictions based upon the particular cult. For example, virgins might have been accepted into one temple and married women into another. Slaves were probably allowed at certain times, while elected officials probably had more regular access and priests had almost complete freedom to enter. In antiquity, some temples had prostitutes in their service, such as the one for Aphrodite at Corinth. However, most temples probably did not offer such services.

Some of the famous and notable Doric temples included the Parthenon in Athens, built under Pericles’ legislation to glorify the city. It was laid out in eight columns by seventeen columns, again in traditional proportions, and was considered a pure peripteros. Its pronaos had six columns at the entryway. It also had a shortened antae wall for the pronaos. The Temple of Hera, or Heraion, at Olympia, the oldest temple, was once also associated with Zeus. The Doric temple was built in 590. It had six columns in front and rear, and sixteen on each side that created a narrower view. It was constructed of wood initially, and only later made of stone. The temple to Zeus at Olympia was built in 460 being six by thirteen columns. This temple is known for its canonical proportions.

Other well-preserved temples are located at Paestum in Italy and Agrigento in Sicily. A number of famous Ionic temples existed at Ephesus, including the Artemision, which was a marble dipteros that was 151 feet wide and 377 feet long, the largest temple in antiquity. Another Ionic temple was at Didyma, dedicated to Apollo; it also was a dipteros, and its construction was begun in 540 and stopped in 500, only to be restarted in 331.

Most of the Classical temples were constructed and paid for by cities or by a ruler such as the tyrant Pisistratus. The financial strain on cities that wanted to build temples could be immense; usually the projects were paid for by taxes, special levies, or gifts. In Athens, the construction of the Parthenon and its financing were approved through the public vote of the assembly, and the funds came from the subject’s tribute. Architects were asked to submit plans, and a committee created by the assembly selected the winner.

The supervision of the actual building and the awarding of contracts for various aspects of the building were then the responsibility of another committee, whose members would make sure that the construction of the various elements met the necessary standards and that the workers were paid. Since many of the contractors were small shops, each one was responsible for only part of the construction. The workers were paid by the day.

The temples were central parts of the community. They allowed the celebration of cults to protect a city. Since religion was a communal affair for the safety of the city and not for the individual’s salvation, temples were crucial for both the public and the city. The actual sacrifice of goods, slaughtered animals, or grain/vegetables, burnt offerings, was done outside the temple on an altar in front of the temple. The priests and priestesses would offer burnt offerings to the god or goddess, and the people would then partake in a sacred meal.

The celebrations of the temple allowed not only the protection of the city, but the glorification of the city. The great festival to Athena, the Panathenaia, allowed the glorification of Athens, especially during the time of Pericles. The temple became the central point of the celebration, when subject states brought their tribute to Athens. The very act was partly designed to humiliate the subjects to show that they were dependent not only upon the goddess Athena, but on her favored city, Athens.