The Parthenon Enigma

by Joan Breton Connelly

  Ares, Aphrodite (or Eos?), Artemis, Apollo, and Zeus, east frieze, Siphnian Treasury, Delphi. (illustration credit ill.65)

  A council of the gods also appears on the east frieze of the temple called Theseion (and/or Hephaisteion) in the Athenian Agora. Construction of this temple was begun sometime between 460 and 449 B.C., though it was not finished or dedicated until much later, around 416.124 The sculptured friezes on its east and west porches were probably carved in the 430s or 420s, after the completion of the Parthenon. At the center of the east frieze, just above the porch, we see a battle that has been variously identified as Greeks versus Trojans, Theseus battling Pallas and his sons, and gods versus Giants.125 Judith Barringer has offered an attractive suggestion, identifying the scene as representing the war between early Athenians and the people of Atlantis, a clash from the antediluvian past, famously referenced in Plato’s Timaeus.126 Six divinities sit in attendance, three to either side of the central combat. The identities of those at right are uncertain: Poseidon or Hephaistos (?), Amphitrite (?), and one illegible figure. To the left we see Athena, Hera, and Zeus, seated on rocky outcrops.

  Barringer laments the fact that there are no iconographic parallels for an Atlantis-versus-Athens showdown, but this would seem perfectly in keeping with the site specificity of such a temple sculpture. The iconography of the Parthenon’s east frieze, like the east pediment of Zeus’s temple at Olympia, is also unexampled in contemporary sculpture or vase painting. And this is precisely what has led to the great enigma concerning its subject. Our best guide in such temple mysteries is the ultimately genealogical function of architectural sculpture; it demands the telling of local versions of myths, grounding the formula in specific landscapes, cult places, family lines, and divine patronage. And so iconography, far from hewing to a general repertoire throughout the Greek world, can be as maddeningly variable and contradictory as myth itself.

  A third frieze featuring an assembly of gods stands just meters away from the Parthenon. The little temple of Athena Nike was built at the very western edge of the Acropolis in the 420s B.C. and finished during the teens of the century (this page).127 Its east frieze shows a lineup of divinities whose identities are debated. Nonetheless, some of them have been named, from left to right: Peitho, Eros, Aphrodite, and, farther along, Leto, Apollo, Artemis, Dionysos, Amphitrite, and Poseidon, with a fully armed Athena, standing at the center of the composition. The god shown just to her right is probably Hephaistos. Next, we see Zeus, enthroned, and then Hera, Herakles, Hermes, Kore, Demeter, the Graces, and Hygieia.128

  The gods are gathered here to watch the battles that rage around the other three sides of the Nike temple. Greeks fighting Greeks appear on the north and west, and Greeks fighting horsemen in eastern costume are seen at the south. This south frieze has been the focus of particular debate concerning just who this eastern enemy might be. One understanding sees them as Trojans. Another, advanced by Chrysoula Kardara, holds that all three sides of the temple show Erechtheus’s war with Eumolpos, the soldiers in eastern costume being the Thracian mercenaries who fought on the side of Poseidon’s son.129 Still other scholars have argued that the frieze shows scenes from the Persian Wars, with Greeks fighting the troops of Darius at Marathon or the army of Xerxes at Plataia.130 This interpretation obviously suggests images of historical battles rather than mythological ones. If true, it would place the south frieze of the Nike temple well outside the conventions for Greek temple decoration with its traditionally mythological subject matter. Some would counter this objection, however, saying that by the end of the fifth century the Battle of Marathon had taken on mythical proportions of its own as a “modern legend” and was thus fair game for memorializing in architectural sculpture.

  East frieze, Parthenon, showing groups of maidens, men, gods, and the family of Erechtheus. (illustration credit ill.66)

  These patterns give one good reason to conclude that the gods on the east frieze of the Parthenon have gathered to watch a mythical battle, that of Erechtheus and Eumolpos, which has finished. They now sit as a group ready to receive the thanksgiving sacrifice through which tensions will be ritually resolved (previous page and front of book). The gods have properly turned their backs on the scene of preparation for the virgin’s death (the sphagion, or preliminary sacrifice), looking out toward the procession that approaches from the other three sides of the temple. This procession brings animal offerings for the post-battle, thanksgiving sacrifice that follows the Athenian victory. The Parthenon frieze can thus be understood to show not just some historical Panathenaia but the very first Panathenaia, the foundational sacrifice upon which Acropolis ritual was based ever after. The offerings of cattle and sheep, of honey and water, as shown on the north and south friezes, are all made in honor of the king and his daughters as described in Euripides’s Erechtheus.131 The cavalcade of horsemen is the king’s returning army, back from the war just in time to join the procession celebrating their victory.132

  The mythical human sacrifice offered before battle is, thus, separated by the divine assembly from the thanksgiving sacrifice offered after the battle, the immortals filling the interval between that which is just before and that which is just after. The plenitude of early Athenian society is represented by the groups of elders, maidens, horsemen, and youths marching east toward the central spectacle. On account of its selflessness, the royal family is shown deified, taking their rightful places at center among the gods. Indeed Cicero tells us that Erechtheus and his daughters were worshipped as divinities at Athens.133 The placing of the royal family within the midst of the Olympian gods is wholly in keeping with the temporal conceit of the frieze, which “reconciles” the time just before and just after the battle.

  To either side of the divine company, we find two groups of cloaked men: six at the south and four at the north (previous page and facing page). Some are bearded, some clean shaven, several are shown leaning upon sticks. Like much else, the identity of these men is debated, along with their numbers and what their numbers signify.134 Four additional men can be seen at the north, and one man at the very south corner of the east frieze.135 These are traditionally identified as parade marshals, those charged with keeping order in the procession. Two of these “marshals” have been further classified as teletarches, that is, officials in charge of the ceremony.136

  Group of men, east frieze, Parthenon. (illustration credit ill.67)

  Group of maidens, east frieze, Parthenon. (illustration credit ill.68)

  When these cloaked men to either side of the gods are counted as ten, they are identified as the Eponymous Heroes, brave individuals from the mythical past whose names were assigned to the ten tribes of Athens when the Kleisthenic democracy reorganized them in 508 B.C.137 When counted as nine, they are seen as the archons of Athens, the tenth conscripted to the center of the “peplos scene.”138 For this to work, one of the men on the east frieze must be subtracted and identified as a parade marshal. One scholar who counts the men as nine sees them, instead, as the athlothetai, a group of officials who administered religious and athletic matters for the Panathenaia. This reading gives nine athlothetai standing to either side of the gods with a tenth official seen in the mature male figure at the center of the east frieze.139 The men have also been identified as lesser Athenian deities and, more simply, as generic citizens.140 The counting and naming of the men on the east frieze is a dizzying and highly subjective enterprise. From the so-called marshals, heads can be added or subtracted to achieve a particularly significant number of heroes or officials.

  But whoever these men are, they are clearly related to the groups of maidens marching just beside them. Whether mythical kings, heroes, or generic Athenians from the legendary past, these men are likely to represent the fathers, uncles, brothers, or other male kin of the young women shown next to them at the far ends of the frieze (this page, previous page, and front of book). Juxtaposition of fathers and daughters would echo the special relationship of Erechtheus and his da
ughters featured in the central panel. It would also be a profound statement of the necessity for participation by citizens of all stations, both male and female, in securing the common good, the ultimate democratic virtue being to give oneself for the sake of the polis.

  As we have seen in chapter 3, in 451/450 B.C. Perikles introduced radical new legislation by which Athenian citizenship would pass only to those with both a mother and a father from citizen families. Previously, the honor passed through the father’s line alone. Men had been free to marry foreigners or non-Athenian Greeks and still have children who were citizens. But the Periklean citizenship law, by limiting the pool of marriageable prospects, gave a powerful new status to Athenian women, now much sought after as brides.141 The grouping of men and maidens on the east frieze of the Parthenon may express the newly mandated purity in the Athenian bloodline. By assuring that all citizens had two inherited ties to the land, being descended on both sides from the legendary ancestors, the new regime for legitimate marriage reinforced group solidarity and civic identity as never before.

  Maidens dominate the east frieze, thirteen at the north and sixteen at the south.142 They march in pairs and carry libation bowls, jugs, and what may be incense burners. I maintain that they represent the sacred maiden choruses that Athena instructs Praxithea to establish in memory of her deceased daughters. In the Erechtheus, Athena proclaims, “To my fellow citizens I say not to forget them over time but to honor them with annual sacrifices and bull-slaying slaughters, celebrating them with holy maiden dancing choruses.”143 What we see are the mythical predecessors of the girls who would keep the all-night vigil for the Panathenaia, the pannychis, during historical times.144 The fact that there are so many female figures, thirty-three in all, on the most important side of the temple speaks to the extraordinary significance of women in the foundational myth of Athenian identity.

  LEAVING THE EAST FAÇADE and turning the corners to the north and south sides of the Parthenon, we find animals being led to sacrifice. On the south frieze there are ten cows and on the north frieze four cows and four rams (this page, this page, this page, and this page). Already in the Iliad bulls and rams are specified as offerings made to Erechtheus: “To him Athenian youth make sacrificial offerings, with bulls and rams as each year comes around.”145 We will remember that at the end of the Erechtheus, Athena instructs that the deceased king be honored: “On account of his killer, he will be called, eponymously, Holy Poseidon-Erechtheus, by the citizens worshipping in cattle sacrifices.”146 Two inscriptions found in Athens further attest to sacrifices made to Erechtheus. One mentions “a ram for Erechtheus,” and another, very fragmentary text mentions a “bull,” and just possibly, an “ox” or bull, and “a ram.”147

  Behind the animal offerings, on the north frieze, march three male offering bearers with trays (skaphai) and four youths carrying water jars (hydriai)148 for the sacrifice (this page, this page, top, this page, and front of book). The south frieze (this page–this page), which has suffered so much damage, preserves just a fragment of one male tray bearer. This is enough, however, to suggest that there was a second group carrying trays here as well. The ninth-century lexicographer Photios tells us that the tray bearers were foreigners, resident aliens (metoikoi) at Athens, and that they wore purple chitons in the procession. Importantly, he tells us that the bronze and silver skaphai they carried were filled with honeycombs and cakes.149 And indeed, in the tray of one skaphephoros from the north frieze we can make out textured cross-hatching very much like that of a honeycomb, best viewed in a plaster cast of the sculpture in Basel (this page, bottom, and this page, far left).150

  Youths leading cattle to sacrifice, north frieze, Parthenon. (illustration credit ill.69)

  Honey is an offering associated with underground, chthonic deities, not Olympians like Athena.151 But in the Erechtheus, Athena unambiguously instructs that libations for the dead princesses should include only honey and water and not wine. The goddess ordains that prior to all battles the daughters of Erechtheus be propitiated: “Make to these, first, a preliminary sacrifice before taking up the spear of war, not touching the wine-making grape nor pouring on the pyre anything other than the fruit of the hardworking bee [honey] together with river water.”152 The explicit combination of these two offerings carried by men bearing trays and men carrying heavy bronze water jugs on the Parthenon frieze surely refers to this special libation ordained by Athena for the daughters of Erechtheus.

  Youths leading ewes to sacrifice, north frieze, Parthenon. (illustration credit ill.70)

  The goddess goes on to give instructions for the building of a shrine for the dead princesses, one with forbidden access: “It is necessary that these daughters have a precinct that must not be entered [abaton], and no one of the enemies should be allowed to make secret sacrifice there.”153 We can now understand just why the chthonic gift of honeycomb is so appropriate for the daughters of Erechtheus, buried as they are together in their common “earth-tomb.” The sisters have returned to Gaia (Ge), from which their own father was born and to which he will unexpectedly return when swallowed by a chasm created by Poseidon. Thus, Erechtheus leaves this world as he came into it, directly through Mother Earth.

  A neat parallel for honey offerings in metal hydriai has been discovered at an underground sanctuary at Poseidonia (Paestum) in southern Italy: nine bronze water jugs filled with a molasses-like substance that appears to be honey, apparently deposited in the late sixth century B.C. The shrine was dedicated to a chthonic deity, most likely Persephone—or, possibly, a group of nymphs, to judge by a vase found nearby with the inscription “I am sacred to the nymphs.”154 We should not forget that the daughters of Erechtheus are also children of the naiad nymph Praxithea, and thereby granddaughters of the river Kephisos. Libations of river water entirely befit their genealogy. Furthermore, the daughters of Erechtheus might have had their own special connection with Persephone. Like the Erechtheids, Persephone was just a maiden (Kore) when she was snatched into the underworld by Hades. According to Demaratus, it was Persephone who received the sacrifice of Erechtheus’s daughter. And at the very end of the Erechtheus, one line starts with the name “Demeter,” Persephone’s mother.155

  North frieze, Parthenon, surviving slabs and lost figures known from the Nointel Artist, showing tray and water jug bearers, pipe and lyre players, by George Marshall Peters. (illustration credit ill.71)

  Returning to the frieze, we see musicians marching (above and this page) just behind the offering bearers. On the north side, these include four playing the aulos (a double reed, similar to the oboe) and four the kithara (a seven-stringed lyre). This stretch of the frieze was largely destroyed by the Venetian cannon fire of 1687, but it can be reconstructed, thanks to drawings the Nointel Artist made thirteen years earlier. And a few fragments of one kithara player survive in Athens to give us a sense of what the figures looked like. The comparable stretch on the south frieze is entirely missing. Some of this, too, was lost to the Venetian explosion and some of it deliberately cut out to make windows when the Parthenon became a cathedral in the thirteenth century. The drawings of the Nointel Artist are, once again, invaluable; they confirm a matching group of musicians here on the south side (this page, second row from bottom). Now Euripides explicitly refers to the aulos and kithara in a choral song from his Erechtheus, perhaps inspired by the musicians shown on the Parthenon frieze. The old men of the chorus ask, “Shall I ever shout through the city the glorious victory song, crying ‘Ie paian’ [an exclamation of triumph], taking up the task of my aged hand, the Libyan pipe sounding to the kithara’s cries?”156

  Plaster cast of tray bearer carrying honeycombs, figure N15, north frieze, Parthenon. (illustration credit ill.72)

  Tray bearer (N15) and men carrying water jugs, north frieze, Parthenon. (illustration credit ill.73)

  Behind the musicians march groups of older men, sixteen on the north frieze and seventeen or eighteen on the south (this page–this page, following page, and
196–97). The positions of some of their hands, held up with fingers pressed together, have led some scholars to imagine olive branches, once painted here against the background of the frieze. This would link them to the thallophoroi, the elders of the city who carried branches in the Panathenaic procession.157 Xenophon tells us that “they choose the beautiful old men as thallophoroi for Athens.”158 On the north frieze, one of the men is seen to stop and turns to face the viewer straight on (above). In an arresting gesture he raises both arms to adjust the wreath upon his head. Drill holes preserved in the marble show where a metal crown had been attached.159 These groups of men represent the most senior marchers on the frieze, epitomizing the finest and most handsome of the Athenian elders.

  Group of elders, with one crowning himself, north frieze, Parthenon. (illustration credit ill.74)

  Finally, we come to the parade of chariots and horsemen that takes up roughly half of the north and south friezes and most of the west frieze (this page, this page–this page, and this page–this page). Here we must ask: If this represents the fifth-century Athenian army, why are there chariots, which had not been used in Greek warfare since the end of the Bronze Age, some seven hundred years earlier? And where are the hoplites? We know from Thucydides that hoplites did participate in the historical Panathenaic procession, at least by 514/513 B.C. He tells us that when the tyrant Hipparchos was assassinated while serving as procession marshal that year, his brother, Hippias, rushed to the hoplites who were marching and confiscated their weapons.160 The complete absence of the hoplite foot soldiers makes it most unlikely that we are looking at a fifth-century army. These problems go away if we understand the soldiers and chariots to represent the forces of Erechtheus during the early days of Athens.