DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.800#0264
PROPYLJEUM OF ATHENA ARCHEGETIS.
245
same reason the arches of the aqueduct which supplied the water-clock
at the Tower of the Winds might be regarded as part of a temple dedi-
cated to Athena Archegetis, for they have a similar inscription.1 To
dedicate a forum or market to some deity was a Eoman custom; and
thus the Forum Julium at Rome was consecrated to Venus Genetrix,
that of Augustus to Mars Ultor, and that of Nerva, like this at Athens,
to Minerva.
Meursius seems to have been the first2 who, from the passage in
Strabo before cited, inferred the existence of a new agora. But among
more modern topographers, the honour belongs to Stuart of having
held this colonnade to have formed the entrance to it; an opinion
founded on its style of architecture and the inscriptions on and near it.
The architectural objections to its being a temple are stated by Stuart
as follows: " The wall in which the door is placed extended on each
side beyond the lateral walls of the portico; whereas, the usual plan of
temples is a rectangular parallelogram, and their lateral walls are
continued without interruption from the ante of the portico to the
posticus or back front. Besides this, the diameters of these columns
are in a smaller proportion to their height than the diameters of any
that are found in the ancient temples of this order; which circum-
stance, considering the distinction which Vitruvius has made between
the proportion of those columns which are employed in temples and of
those which are placed in buildings of inferior dignity (lib. v. c. 9),
adds a considerable weight to this opinion."3 Botticher has adduced
another objection: that the crepidoma of this structure consists only
of a single step,4 an anomaly not hitherto found in any temple. And
he further points out that the width of the intercolumniations, the
middle one being two and a half times as wide as each of the side
ones, shows that the former was intended for carriages and the latter
for foot-passengers, and consequently that the whole must have formed
1 Curtius, Erlauternder Text to his s Ant. of Athens, vol. i. p. 2. Sec also
maps, p. 44. Leake, vol. i. p. 211 sqq. who adopts
2 Ceramicus Gemiims, c. 16 ; and Atben. Stuart's view, and adds some particulars.
Att. i. C. * Bericht, p. 225.
245
same reason the arches of the aqueduct which supplied the water-clock
at the Tower of the Winds might be regarded as part of a temple dedi-
cated to Athena Archegetis, for they have a similar inscription.1 To
dedicate a forum or market to some deity was a Eoman custom; and
thus the Forum Julium at Rome was consecrated to Venus Genetrix,
that of Augustus to Mars Ultor, and that of Nerva, like this at Athens,
to Minerva.
Meursius seems to have been the first2 who, from the passage in
Strabo before cited, inferred the existence of a new agora. But among
more modern topographers, the honour belongs to Stuart of having
held this colonnade to have formed the entrance to it; an opinion
founded on its style of architecture and the inscriptions on and near it.
The architectural objections to its being a temple are stated by Stuart
as follows: " The wall in which the door is placed extended on each
side beyond the lateral walls of the portico; whereas, the usual plan of
temples is a rectangular parallelogram, and their lateral walls are
continued without interruption from the ante of the portico to the
posticus or back front. Besides this, the diameters of these columns
are in a smaller proportion to their height than the diameters of any
that are found in the ancient temples of this order; which circum-
stance, considering the distinction which Vitruvius has made between
the proportion of those columns which are employed in temples and of
those which are placed in buildings of inferior dignity (lib. v. c. 9),
adds a considerable weight to this opinion."3 Botticher has adduced
another objection: that the crepidoma of this structure consists only
of a single step,4 an anomaly not hitherto found in any temple. And
he further points out that the width of the intercolumniations, the
middle one being two and a half times as wide as each of the side
ones, shows that the former was intended for carriages and the latter
for foot-passengers, and consequently that the whole must have formed
1 Curtius, Erlauternder Text to his s Ant. of Athens, vol. i. p. 2. Sec also
maps, p. 44. Leake, vol. i. p. 211 sqq. who adopts
2 Ceramicus Gemiims, c. 16 ; and Atben. Stuart's view, and adds some particulars.
Att. i. C. * Bericht, p. 225.