During the fifth century BC, building activity in the Agora, the city center, alternated with efforts on the Acropolis. From 479 BC to mid-century, a period when the Acropolis lay fallow because of the Oath of Plataea, construction was lively in the Agora. The Persians had destroyed the Agora as well as the Acropolis, but because most of its buildings served secular purposes, they could be rebuilt without violating the Oath. After a slowdown during the Periklean period, when resources were directed toward rebuilding the shrines of the city on the Acropolis and elsewhere, several new buildings were erected during the Peloponnesian War. By the end of the fifth century BC, the existing buildings sufficed for the main civic activities; little was added in the following century, the Late Classical period (Figure 16.13).
Figure 16.13 Plan, Agora, Athens, ca. 400
BC
Early Classical buildings included the Painted Stoa, or Stoa Poikile, discovered in 1981 on the north end of the Agora. This building contained famous paintings on large wooden panels, highly praised by ancient authors; the best - known scene depicted the Athenian victory at Marathon. None have survived. The Tholos, a round structure also Early Classical in date, served as the headquarters, dining hall, and dormitory of the Prytany, the fifty men from the larger Boule, or Council of 500, that handled the daily business of the city for a period of thirty-five to thirty-six days. At this time, too, Kimon dedicated three large herms to mark his victory over the Persians at Eion in 476 BC. A herm was a plain rectangular shaft with a portrait head of the bearded god Hermes on top and male genitalia halfway down. The prestige conferred by Kimon’s dedication assured the popularity of the herm, and from then on they were commonly set up at entrances of houses and shrines and at public crossroads to bring good luck, success, and protection. So many stood near the north-west entrance to the Agora that they gave their name to the neighborhood: “The Herms.”
Figure 16.14 Hephaisteion, Athens. View from the south-west
During the early Periklean period, work began on an impressive temple dedicated to Hep-haistos, god of the forge, and to Athena, here goddess of arts and crafts, patrons for the many craftsmen who worked in the vicinity. Excellently preserved, thanks in large part to its reuse as a Christian church, the Hephaisteion still dominates the area from its commanding location on the western hill, the Kolonos Agoraios (Figure 16.14). Indeed, this temple was situated in order to be seen from the front, from the Agora; a focus on the front view was unusual for Greek temples, but would become a hallmark of Roman temples.
Begun ca. 450 BC but not completed until ca. 420 BC, the Hephaisteion did not replace an earlier shrine, but was a new conception. This temple is traditionally Doric in plan and elevation. As was true for its contemporary, the Parthenon, its sculptural decoration was abundant and costly. With some emphasis on the short east side facing the Agora, the sculpture consisted of the east and west pediments, poorly preserved; eighteen metopes depicting deeds of Herakles and of the great Athenian hero, Theseus, placed on the east side and in the four spaces immediately adjacent on the north and south; and friezes of battle scenes, one placed above the east pronaos and extending north and south across the space covered by the colonnade to the very edges of the temple, the second, showing Lapiths vs. centaurs, above the west opisthodomos only, not the adjoining colonnade. The bronze cult statue of the two gods, made by Alkamenes, has not survived.
Excavations have revealed that the Hephaisteion was surrounded by formal plantings. Discoveries of planting pits with large terracotta flowerpots indicate that two rows of bushes lined the temple on the long north and south sides, three rows on the west. This find emphasizes an overlooked aspect of ancient topography, the importance of setting. Texts make clear that trees, plants, and water were important components of sanctuaries; archaeological excavations, by stripping away vegetation, give a false picture of the landscape.
Other mid-fifth century BC buildings in the Agora include the state prison, a curious structure situated beyond the south-west corner of the Agora. Its unusual plan features a central corridor flanked by small rooms, leading to a courtyard at the rear. In this prison the philosopher Socrates met his end in 399 BC, forced to kill himself with a drink of poisonous hemlock.
In the later fifth century, several new civic buildings were added to the Agora. On the west side, a New Bouleuterion rose adjacent to the still existing Old, also to serve the 500 member Council. Military activities were centered in the Strategeion, a meeting hall for generals (strat-egoi) tentatively identified with a poorly preserved structure just south of the Tholos. New stoas included the Stoa of Zeus in the north-west: a Doric building with two projecting wings, serving the cult of Zeus Eleutherios (Freedom), but also, like all stoas, offering shelter for anyone who wished.
On the south side of the Agora the South Stoa I contained administrative offices and rooms where officials could dine, reclining on couches as was the Greek custom. The many coins discovered in this building indicate its role in the commercial life of the city. Nearby lay a good source of the bronze coins, the Mint. Bronze coins, popular from the fourth century BC on, form the great majority of coins found during the Agora excavations. They served for ordinary purchases, in contrast with the valuable silver and gold coins.
“Agora” in a larger sense denotes the central market area of a city. Outside the formally marked sacred political and religious precinct, Athenians found all the services they might wish. Evidence for them comes from literature as well as from excavations. Such businesses included: shoemakers, barbers, metalworkers, sellers of wine, perfume, fish, vegetables, nuts, horses, clothes, and even stolen goods. “Everything will be for sale together in the same place at Athens, figs, policemen, grapes, turnips, pears, apples, witnesses, roses, medlars, haggis, honeycombs, chickpeas, lawsuits, puddings, beesting cures, myrtle berries, allotment machines, irises, lambs, water clocks, laws, indictments.” So quotes Athenaios, an Alexandrian writing ca. AD 200, from a much earlier Athenian comedy, “Olbia,” by the fourth century BC playwright Euboulos (Wycherley 1978: 91). The comic juxtaposition of food and legal matters, all available in the agora, makes clear the happy chaos that must have reigned in the Athenian Agora.
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