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MYTHOLOGY AND MONUMENTS

DIV. D

the old temple is recovered and shows the unique arrangement
of an actual right and left-hand chamber, the inference seems
irresistible.
The other piece of positive evidence from inscriptions must be
added. In the inventory of the old temple (αρχαίο? ναό?) a quantity
of objects are enumerated as to be found on the parastades, and
the left and right-hand parastas are distinguished ; the objects
were presumably suspended on nails driven into the jambs. It
is noticeable that the parastades only, not the walls, are used
for the purpose ; the reason is clearly that the walls were of stone,
the parastades of wood. All ancient Doric buildings had door-
jambs of wood, even as late as the Parthenon and Propylaea.
These door-jambs were called respectively the right and left
parastas. Now the east cella of the Erechtheion, if that be
supposed to be the “ancient temple,” being Ionic, had stone not
wooden jambs, so the parastades in question must belong to our
“ old Athene temple.”
It may seem to us a wasteful and needless arrangement, once
the Periclean temple completed, to keep on the older structure,
but such was the ordinary custom among the Greeks. The older
Heraion at Argos was kept up long after the new temple was
built. The reason in all such cases was no doubt twofold—(i)
piety prescribed the conservation of the old fabric, (2) convenience
utilised it as a storehouse for ever-increasing treasures.
By the building of the “ Parthenon ” the worship and honour
of Athene had been duly cared for, and it was now possible to do
something for Erechtheus. That the importance of his temple
was subordinate is, it seems to me, shown by the simple fact that
it had to wait its turn for restoration. Had the sanctity of this
temple been, as was always supposed, supreme, it would surely
have been attended to first.
It has been usual to regard the “ Parthenon,” as we have had
occasion to note, as a sort of annexe and museum to the Erech-
theion. Dr. Dorpfeld turns the tables completely. The “ Par-
thenon ” was thenceforward the supreme cultus temple, not of
Athene Parthenos, but of the old goddess Athene Polias ; the
attribute Parthenos was a mere extra title like Ergane, not a
cultus name. The new Erechtheion was, on the other hand,
actually a sort of museum, and its odd shape was due to the
desire to embrace several cults ; its precinct had to take in the
old Erechtheus shrine, old altars to the Butadae, the marks of the
trident of Poseidon, the salt well, the reputed grave of Cecrops, the