Erechtheion: The Sacred Temple of the Caryatids

The Story of the Erechtheion

Long before the Parthenon rose beside it, the northern edge of the Acropolis was the most sacred ground in Athens. According to myth, this is where Athena and Poseidon competed to become patron of the city. Poseidon struck the rock with his trident and a spring of salt water gushed out. Athena planted an olive tree. The judges chose the olive, and the city took the goddess's name. The Athenians believed the marks of the trident and the sacred olive were still there, and the temple that came to be called the Erechtheion was built to embrace them both.

The building takes its name from Erechtheus, a legendary king of Athens who was worshipped here alongside Poseidon. Another early king, Cecrops, said to be half man and half serpent, was believed to be buried beneath its southwest corner. Most important of all, the temple housed the ancient olive wood statue of Athena Polias, protector of the city. It was the holiest image in Athens, far older than the gold and ivory statue in the Parthenon, and every four years at the Great Panathenaia it was dressed in a new woven robe called the peplos.

Construction began around 421 BC, during a pause in the long Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta, and it was completed around 406 BC. Building on such holy and uneven ground forced the architects to be inventive. Instead of the usual rectangle, the Erechtheion is split across two levels, with different porches on three sides and several separate rooms for different cults. Its slender Ionic columns and finely carved decoration make it one of the most refined buildings of classical Athens.

The south porch is the one everyone comes to see. Instead of columns, six young women carved in marble hold up the roof on their heads, standing calmly as if in a procession. They are known as the Caryatids, a name later linked to the women of Karyai in Laconia. Each figure is slightly different in hair and dress, and the weight of the roof seems to rest lightly on them. In the north porch, a gap was deliberately left in the roof and floor above marks in the rock, believed to be the strike of Poseidon's trident.

Like the Parthenon, the Erechtheion lived many lives after the ancient gods were forgotten. It was turned into a Christian church, and later, under Ottoman rule, it is said to have housed the family of the Turkish commander of the Acropolis. During the Greek War of Independence in the 1820s it suffered heavy damage, and part of the roof collapsed.

In the early 19th century, agents of Lord Elgin removed one of the Caryatids, along with a column from the north porch, and shipped them to Britain, where they are still in the British Museum. The other five maidens remained in Athens. Air pollution was slowly eating away their marble faces, so in 1979 they were taken down and replaced with exact copies. Today the five originals stand together in the Acropolis Museum, where you can walk all the way around them and see the delicate braids of their hair up close.

Visitors to the Acropolis reach the Erechtheion just north of the Parthenon. You cannot go inside, but you can walk around it and admire its porches, so different from the massive Doric temple next door. Look for the olive tree growing beside the west wall, planted in modern times to recall Athena's gift to the city. Then stand at the Caryatid porch and imagine the procession of the Panathenaia arriving with a new robe for the goddess, at the most sacred spot in ancient Athens.