The Rise and Fall of Empire

This is an argumentative document about the rise and fall of classical Greek empire. The document expounds more on the classical Greek Temples namely the temple of Athena Nike, the Parathenon and the Apollo (Rhode).

Temple of Athena Nike, which is also widely known as Wingless Victory, came into being around 427BC (Jerome). Though small, it size was remunerated for its location, as it was found to be a little temple supported by a platform located on the south-west side of the Athens Acropoli. People from Athens could worship this temple because most of its architectural ornaments is said to represent the battles fields, mythological scenes and goddess of victory. Its existence gave Athenian people hope of prosperity in war's endeavors. With its completion, the Athenians added a protective wall to express their determination and hope for final victory in the war (Jerome).

This temple, Athena Nike, stood unperturbed until its demolition in 1968 by the invaders from Turkey. These stones were later used to build defenses against the Venetians, but with time, the Temple of Athena Nike was completely reassembled.

The Temple of Parathenons was built in 447 B.C., and, unlike the Temple of Athena; it was constructed as a main politicized issue not necessarily for Athens but for the Greece as a whole (Lisa). Among other reasons, Thucydides deals widely in explaining the causes of Peloponnesian War, the calamity that led to Greek classical civilization to a tragic end. Its construction is related to a decisive turning point, in the political situation, in Greece (Lisa). There occurred the death of a leader of oligarchic party in Athens called Cimon. The Oligarchic Party stood for sacred unions of all the Greeks in the National war against Persia as well as an understanding with Sparta. The death of Cimon gave Pericles, the leader of the Democratic Party, a chance to proceed to a total reversal of Athenian Policy (Lisa). It is said that Pericles' key aim was to transform the Delian league, whose purpose was to oppose Persian Research shows that the key point of imperialistic policy was driving the Greek cities into paying tribute to Athens. Huge amounts of cash are mentioned to have been collected in the name of providing means of transports to Athens, who, on the other side, defended all the Greeks from Persia. Nevertheless, by developing the Athens, Cimon policy was to build powerful Democratic Party (Rhode). In this case, Greek political conception and practices are seen to serve their country military as it had the rights to be involved in political decisions.
However, the most unfortunate thing that led to the fall of Temple of Parathenons transpired around 5th Century (Lisa). Around this time, a Roman Emperor raided the Parthenon and the statue of the cult image of Athena was stolen and taken to Constantinople. This statue was later destroyed during the crusades. It said that, with the passage of time, it was then converted into a Christian church dedicated to thootokos meaning Mary the Virgin (Rhode).

The conversion to a church from a temple involved doing away with some of the walls and the internal columns of the cella, the creation of the apse to the eastern terminal (Rhode). This inevitably led to the dispersal and removal of quite a number of the sculptures. Those that displayed pagan oriented gods, were probably eliminated intentionally, and may be eventually destroyed.

The Temple of Apollo was founded in mid 5th century B.C (Fredrek). It was famous for its godly healing and the sun. It is situated in most lonely heights of the Arcadian mountains. This temple is known to have the oldest Corinthian capital that is yet to be found, and combines the style of Archaic and the serenity with same audacious, architectural features (Coulton). The temple is unusual in its hypothetical look and the absence of the roof.

It was surrounded on all four sides by double rows and columns, 21 along the sides and 10 across the rear and front facades, the interior cella was exposed to the open sky above, providing a large open-ended sanctuary within the forest of strong columns and raised on a stepped podium.

Behind the arrays of 12 columns in this temple's deep porch, there was a huge doorway of such a high threshold that it did not even serve as a key entrance but as a stage or an antechamber (Fredrek). On both sides were two vaulted doorways/passages that descended into the dark, not to the common, traditional cella, but rather out into the sun-lit interior court of the sanctuary. At the far end, there was a minute tetra-style temple, which housed a cult statue of a spring and Apollo. Turning around, one first saw a large flight of stairs heading to the entrances on the adjacent side of the antechamber.

However, with the rise of tyranny other the island, the temple never got finished, History shows that the temple was replaced to all an open sanctuary of Geometric times that was said to a simple open air shrine (Coulton). Today, what are left of this grandiose temple are the foundations, its shrine base and the gigantic gate also known as “Portara” by the residents because of its size. This gate is said to have been built of huge pieces of local marbles each carries ginormous weight. Its survival to-date is owed to the size and the weight of the materials used.

Greek orders

Doric order.

Ionic orderThe above structure is amongst the simplest order of the Greek order distinguished by its heavy, short, faceted columns with plain, round capitals and baseless. Its height measures 8 times its diameter. This form, Doric order, has no individual base. However, the orders are placed on stylobate directly. Improved version of the same consisted of the torus and plinth.

Corinthian orderThe Ionic order originated from Eastern Greek. It was inter-twined with the little but similar known Aeolic order. Fluted and slender pillars holding large bases characterize it, and two opposed scrolls/volutes.

Its is considered as the most ornate amongst the Greek orders. Fluted and slender columns with ornate capitals decorated using a double row of leaves from Acanthus, and four scrolls. It is the most elegant and classy of the three orders. Its shaft has twenty-four flutes and mostly 10 diameters high.

In conclusion, the significant Temples, the Temple of Nike Athena, Parthenon, and Temple of Apollo made a great impact to the lives of the people involved. However, they did not last long because sequences of events led to their tragic end. In this document, we find that these temples were constructed with major reasons, but in the end, they were found not to deliver the purpose to which they were built for. From the above analysis, it is depicted that, for an empire to survive, it takes more than just finance and proper management.