Temples, Theatres, and the Sacred City

Burnt animal bone lies among the accumulated remains of fires on Mount Lykaion in Arcadia. Infrared analysis identifies bone altered sufficiently by heat to be suitable for radiocarbon dating, and selected samples place sacrificial activity here in the Late Bronze Age. Thin sections of the deposits, examined under a microscope, reveal repeated burning and the accumulation of ash. People returned to this summit with animals and fuel centuries before the construction of the great stone temples. Their sacrifices added material to the ground on which later worshippers stood.

At Olympia, Pausanias describes an altar maintained with ash from sacrifice and water from the Alpheios. Animals, vessels and fuel had to be gathered, with portions assigned to burning and human consumption. The temple belonged within this larger working sanctuary. At Amarynthos on Euboea, a late eighth-century BC building, thirty-two metres long and eight wide, contained three rooms with hearths or altars. Vessels and offerings give its interior a history of people tending fires, drinking and leaving gifts with Artemis.

Visitors to Delphi climbed past treasuries, statues and captured weapons to consult Apollo through the Pythia. The Serpent Column carried the names of communities associated with victory over Persia; other dedications commemorated victories over fellow Greeks. Journeys brought these communities onto ground managed by particular authorities, including the Amphictyony at Delphi and Elis at Olympia. At Dodona, small lead tablets preserve enquiries about marriage, illness and livelihoods. One writer asks about combining travel and trade with the practice of a craft.

The procession to Eleusis brought initiates to the sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone. Women and enslaved people could participate alongside free men, following purification, fasting and the drinking of kykeon before admission to the Telesterion. The hymn to Demeter links initiation with expectations after death. Experimental treatment of ergot has demonstrated chemical conversions relevant to a proposed psychoactive drink, although no analysed drink from Eleusis establishes its consumption there. The journey, crowded hall, darkness and torchlight already gave the rites a substantial sensory setting.

At Olympia, athletes ran, wrestled, boxed and entered equestrian contests within Zeus’s festival. Olympia and Delphi held their principal games every four years, Nemea and Isthmia every two, providing repeated opportunities to compete. The Olympic truce protected the festival and connected journeys while warfare continued elsewhere. Training and travel required resources; victory could bring honours, public meals and commissions for statues or poetry. The names of competitors and their communities remained on dedications after the gathering dispersed.

Pindar’s first Olympian ode celebrates Hieron of Syracuse, whose horse Pherenikos won in 476 BC. Ownership attached the victory to Hieron, while others trained and rode the animal. Kyniska, a Spartan king’s daughter, likewise won chariot victories as the owner of a team. Land, horses and attendants supported her achievement, commemorated in a monument at Olympia. A woman could receive this particular distinction within a festival whose events and religious offices distributed participation differently.

On the Athenian Acropolis, burnt column drums incorporated into the northern wall preserved material from the Persian destruction of 480 BC. Later building brought marble from Pentelikon to a summit entered through the Propylaia, with Athena Nike’s temple on its bastion. The Parthenon, begun in 447, combined a Doric exterior with an Ionic frieze. Athens concentrated resources from its territory and empire on the sanctuary, employing workers who cut individual stones to fit the building’s curves and inclinations.

Egyptian blue emits infrared light under suitable illumination, allowing imaging to locate pigment particles scarcely visible to the eye. Examination of Parthenon sculpture found it on eleven pedimental figures and one frieze figure, recovering painted garment patterns extending beyond the carving. Architectural surfaces also preserve the pigment. At the nearby Erechtheion, whose different levels accommodated an uneven site and several established cult places, accounts record eighteen drachmae for column fluting by Ameiniades and eighteen for work by Somenes, his slave. The entries attach equal amounts to a task performed under different legal conditions.

Below the Acropolis, performances in Dionysus’s sanctuary required choruses, rehearsals, masks and costumes. A wealthy sponsor supported a chorus through his obligation as choregos, while civic officials organised the festival and competition. Actors took several parts, and music and movement accompanied the words that survive. Much of the visible stone theatre belongs to fourth-century and later work; the Acropolis rose behind the seated audience, with the performance area lower down the slope.

In Euripides’ Trojan Women, performed in 415 BC, Hecuba awaits the assignment of an owner and Andromache is taken away from her destroyed household. Astyanax’s body returns in Hector’s shield, leaving his grandmother to prepare the burial. The play follows captivity through the separation of a family. Months earlier, Athens had killed the adult men of Melos and enslaved its women and children. The chronology gives the performance a contemporary setting for comparison, while its Trojan story brings particular losses before the festival audience.

At Epidauros, the lower auditorium dates to the fourth century BC and the upper extension to the second. Sound measurements and models distinguish direct sound, reflections and diffraction around seat edges. Sound travelling upwards through the rows helped speech reach distant listeners. An audience, the stage building and a performer’s position changed those conditions. The theatre’s surviving surfaces and the models together help reconstruct a space occupied by people listening to speech and music.

The Panathenaic route crossed the Athenian Agora before climbing to Athena’s sanctuary. A priestess served Athena Polias, while women prepared the robe and undertook ceremonial roles. At Corinth, dining rooms in Demeter and Kore’s sanctuary contain vessels, ash and animal bones, preserving the preparation and sharing of meals. At Amyklai, south of Sparta, Apollo and Hyakinthos received worship within one complex; survey and excavation extend its history into the surrounding slopes. Recurring festivals required food, clothing and labour. At Olympia, Philip II’s family images joined earlier dedications in the Philippeion after his victory at Chaironeia in 338 BC.

Lecture summary: 983 words