The short timeline
- 490-480 BCE: an earlier temple, the pre-Parthenon, is under construction on the site.
- 480 BCE: the Persians take Athens and burn the Acropolis, unfinished temple included.
- 454/453 BCE: the treasury of the Delian League is moved from Delos to the Acropolis.
- 447 BCE: work on the Parthenon begins.
- 445-440 BCE: the metopes are carved.
- 443-438 BCE: the frieze is carved.
- 438 BCE: the building is complete.
- 432 BCE: the pediment sculptures are finished.
- 1205 CE: the temple is in use as a church of the Holy Mother of Athens.
- Ottoman period: it becomes a mosque, with a minaret.
- 1687: gunpowder stored inside explodes during a Venetian siege.
- Early 19th century: Lord Elgin’s agents remove sculpture to Britain.
- 1896-1902 and 1923-1933: restorations by Nikolaos Balanos.
Before 447: a temple that never stood
The Parthenon was the second attempt. From 490 BCE an earlier temple was rising on the same site; archaeologists call it the pre-Parthenon. It was still unfinished in 480, when the Persians took Athens and burned the sanctuary. The Athenians buried the broken statues and offerings in pits, and more than thirty years passed before work on a new temple began.
The money for a new start came from the alliance Athens led against Persia. In 454/453 BCE the treasury of the Delian League, made of the contributions of its member cities, was moved from the island of Delos to the Acropolis. Plutarch reports that critics in the assembly complained that Athens was gilding and adorning itself with money forced from the rest of Greece.
447 to 438: nine years of building
Work began in 447 BCE, under Perikles, the leading politician of Athens. Pheidias oversaw the whole programme, and its two architects were Iktinos and Kallikrates. The pace was fast for a Doric temple of Pentelic marble with 8 columns on the fronts and 17 on the sides. By 438 BCE the building was complete. Inside stood Pheidias’ gold and ivory statue of Athena Parthenos.
The carving ran alongside the construction. The ninety-two metopes, the square panels above the outer columns, were carved between 445 and 440 BCE and were the first sculptures to be installed on the building. The frieze, 160 metres of relief with the procession of Athena’s festival, followed in 443-438 BCE.
438 to 432: finishing the pediments
The last pieces to go up were the statues of the two pediments, the triangular gables at each end: fifty statues in all, set high above the entrances. They were finished in 432 BCE, so if you count from the first stone to the last statue, the Parthenon took fifteen years. A year later, in 431, the Peloponnesian War began. For the story the sculptures tell together, metopes, frieze and pediments have to be read as one programme.
After antiquity: church, mosque, ruin
Over the centuries the temple changed its god. In 1205 it was in use as a church dedicated to the Holy Mother of Athens. After the Ottoman conquest of Athens it became a mosque, and a minaret was built. The decisive date is 1687: during a siege by the Venetians, gunpowder stored inside by the Ottoman garrison exploded and turned the monument into a ruin.
Its sculpture was scattered next. In the early nineteenth century Lord Elgin’s agents removed eighteen pedimental statues, fifteen metopes and fifty-six blocks of the frieze, which are now in the British Museum. After Greek independence the restorations began; those of Nikolaos Balanos, in 1896-1902 and 1923-1933, gave the building much of its present look, and work on the monument continues today. For how the temple fits among the rest of the rock, the Acropolis has its own longer history.
Where to see it
The Parthenon stands on the Acropolis of Athens, inside the archaeological site. Most of its surviving sculpture is divided between the Acropolis Museum, at the foot of the hill, and the British Museum in London. Opening hours change with the season, so check the official sites before you go.
Sources
- Acropolis Restoration Service (YSMA), “Parthenon”.
- Acropolis Museum, Athens: “The metopes”; “The frieze”; “The pediments”.
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History: “Classical Art”.
- Plutarch, Life of Pericles 12-13, trans. B. Perrin (LacusCurtius, University of Chicago).
