Dyer, Thomas Henry: Ancient Athens: Its history, topography, and remains (London, 1873)

RESTORATION OF THE ERECHTHEIUM.

13!)

time,1 when it is quite impossible, from his age, that he can have meant
the temple rebuilt in the archonship of Callias, b.c. 406. Miiller, who
places the visit of Herodotus to Athens about the third year of the
Peloponnesian war, thinks that the temple was in a serviceable state,
in which we agree with him; but for his opinion that it had been
rebuilt of wood, or with a wooden roof, he produces no authority, and
it is therefore a mere conjecture. He is, too, evidently in error about
the date of Herodotus' visit, which must have been much earlier, since,
as we have seen (supra, p. 132), he beheld the old Propylasa in their
burnt state, whereas in the third year of the Peloponnesian war, he
would have found those of Pericles just newly erected.2 We have
already ventured an opinion (supra, p. 126) that it had been partially
restored by Themistocles, for it is contrary to all probability, as well as
to the testimony of Herodotus just quoted, that it should have been
suffered to lie in a useless state. Both these considerations, as well as
the small size of the temple in comparison with most of the works of
Pericles, yet at the same time its exceeding sanctity and venerableness,
militate, we think, against Leake's conclusion, taken apparently from
Stuart, that " Upon the whole it appears that tbis building, although
designed by Pheidias and his colleagues, was not terminated until
towards the end of the Peloponnesian war, or even after its conclusion,
perhaps about the year B.C. 393." 3 The building then finished was, it
appears to us much more likely, a wholly or nearly wholly new one,
undertaken in the archonship of Diodes, B.C. 409, or a little before,
because the ancient one, badly restored, had fallen into a state of
complete decay. Nothing, we should imagine, but a case of the last
necessity could have induced the Athenians to apply their funds to such
a purpose in the very thick of the Peloponnesian war.

1 (<m iv rrj aKpcmoKi TavTg 'Epf^^e'cs
tov yTjyeveos Xeyojuerou aval vrjos, ei> Tto
eKaiTj re Km Sakao-o-a evi.—viii. 55.

2 " Tamen sanctuarium totius civilatis
inter Thesei, Parthenonis, Propylaeorumque
struendorum contentionem neglectum est
atquc florcnte reipublicaa statu sacra au-
gnstissima huud dubie in tedicuta lignea

vel ligno tecta fieri permissum." Then in
a note, after quoting the above passage from
Herodotus, he says of it: " Qua? scripta
puto sub tertium fere annum belli Pelopon-
nesiaci."—De Minerva; Poliadis templo,
apud Kose, Inscr. Gr. p. 149.
3 vol. i. p. 577.