Temple of Hera, Olympia

Restored ruins of the temple.

Olympia site map: #4 Temple of Hera is in dark purple (top center). The long ancient Olympic stadium is at far right.

The Temple of Hera, or Heraion, is an ancient Archaic Greek temple at Olympia, Greece, that was dedicated to Hera, queen of the Greek Gods.^[1] The temple was built in approximately 590 BC, but was destroyed by an earthquake in the early 4th century AD.

In the Archaic Greek time period, the temple stored items important to Greek culture, and other offerings of the people. In modern times, the torch of the Olympic flame is lit in its ruins.^[2]

History

Plan of the Temple of Hera. (A: Peristyle; B: Pronaos; C: Naos; D: Opisthodomos; E: Base of Statue of Hermes).

The Heraion at Olympia, located in the north of the sacred precinct, the Altis, is one of the earliest Doric temples in Greece, and the oldest peripteral temple at that site, having a single row of columns on all sides. The location may have previously been the place of worship of an older cult.

The temple was erected in around 590 BC, most likely as a dedication by the Triphylian polis of Skillous. It is suggested that this dedication by a nearby city would originally have been in honour of the main patron deity at Olympia, Zeus, and rededicated to Hera, his wife and sister, at a later point—perhaps after 580 BC when control of Olympia had passed from Triphylia to Elis, or in the 5th century BC when the famous Temple of Zeus was built.

Description

Layout

The temple measures 50.01 by 18.76 m (164.1 by 61.5 ft) at the level of the temple platform, the stylobate. It was longer and narrower than the common architecture of the previous era, though the elongated proportions are a common feature of early Doric architecture. It has a peripteros — a colonnaded perimeter — of 6 by 16 columns which were originally wooden because those were the materials available at the time.

Columns

Doric capital at the Temple of Hera (east side, 4th column from south corner).

The columns were only gradually replaced with stone ones due to the wood rotting out, and other natural and man-made events.^[3] In the second century AD, one of the two columns in the opisthodomos was still oak.^[4] As the replacements took place at widely differing periods between the Archaic and Roman periods, and were carved under the influence of their respective contemporary styles, they differ considerably in proportions and detail. This becomes apparent in the columns' capitals, as each one is slightly different to the next. No remains of the entablature above the columns were found, but are believed to have been wooden.

Walls and roof

The walls had a bottom course of stone with a mudbrick superstructure, another feature typical of early Greek architecture. Other parts of the temple were made from limestone, unbaked bricks, and terracotta tiles. Holes in the protrusions at the ends of the walls—antae—indicate that a wooden cladding protected them from the elements. The temple had a Laconian-style roof; its pediments were decorated with disk acroteria of 2.5 m (8.2 ft) diameter, each made in one single piece (one is on display at the Archaeological Museum of Olympia).

Contents

The opisthodomos was also used to store numerous other objects, including many further statues of deities and votive offerings of Zeus and Hera.^[5] Among the few of these objects to survive was a statue of Hermes holding baby Dionysos, which is generally identified as the Hermes of Praxiteles, one of the most important preserved examples of Greek sculpture.

The travel writer Pausanias also witnessed a small ivory-clad couch (purportedly once belonging to Hippodameia), the bronze disc of Iphitus of Elis (commemorating the truce that according to legend founded the Olympic games), and the table on which the olive wreaths for the victors were displayed during the Olympic Games.

The table of Colotes

The table was made with ivory and gold, and was sculpted by Colotes. It displayed the figures of the Hera, Zeus, Rhea, Hermes, Apollo, and Artemis in front of the Games. On one side was Asclepius and his daughter Aceso, and Ares and the Olympian spirit of contest Agon. On the other were Pluto, Dionysos, Persephone and nymphs.^[4][6]

The statue Hermes and the Infant Dionysos

The Chest of Cypselus

The temple contained a cedarwood chest (Ancient Greek: κυψἐλη kypsele) in which Cypselus, the tyrant of Corinth was reportedly hidden by his mother. The chest was reportedly dedicated at Olympia in gratitude to the gods,^[4] and so, according to folktale, Cypselus gained his name.^[7] According to Dio Chrysostom in the 1st century AD, the chest was found in the opisthodomos.^[8] The chest had various mythological figures inscribed on it in ivory, gold, or in the wood of the chest itself. Accompanying many of the figures were inscriptions in Corinthian (Doric) indicating their identity, some of the text being written boustrophedon in alternating directions.^[4]

Legacy

Set apart from the temple at its eastern side is the Altar of Hera, where the Olympic flame has been lit since 1936 using a parabolic mirror to concentrate the rays of the sun.^[9]

The temple was depicted on the reverse of the Greek 1000 drachmae banknote of 1987–2001.^[10]

The Jasmine Hill Gardens at Wetumpka, Alabama (USA), contains a full-sized replica of the (ruined) Temple of Hera.^[11]

See also

• Architecture of Ancient Greece
• Greek temple
• List of Greco-Roman roofs

References

1. Darling, Janina K. (2004). Architecture of Greece. Greenwood Publishing Group. pp. 195–197. Retrieved 19 November 2015.
2. The Olympic Flame and the Torch Relay (PDF), p. 4, retrieved 19 November 2015
3. "No artifact found". www.perseus.tufts.edu. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
4. Pausanias, Pausanias vol 5 (Description of Greece), Translated by W. H. S. Jones, retrieved 20 November 2015
5. "Temple Architecture - Boundless Open Textbook". Boundless. Retrieved 2015-11-19.
6. Pollitt, J. J. (1990). The art of ancient Greece: sources and documents (New ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. p. 220. ISBN 0-521-25368-3. Retrieved 20 November 2015.
7. Fine, John Van Antwerp (1983). The Ancient Greeks: A Critical History. USA: Harvard University Press. p. 110. ISBN 0-674-03311-6. Retrieved 20 November 2015.
8. Snodgrass, A.M. Alocock, Susan E.; Cherry, John F.; Elsner, Jas, eds. Pausanias: Travel and Memory in Ancient Greece.
9. The Olympic Flame and the Torch Relay (PDF), p. 4, retrieved 19 November 2015
10. "Drachma". Retrieved 3 January 2016.
11. "Jasmine Hill on Alabama Garden Trail". Retrieved 3 January 2016.

• The Heraeum - The Temple of Hera at University of Richmond.

Coordinates: 37°38′20″N 21°37′47″E / 37.63889°N 21.62972°E