Agrigento

Architecture Around the World ............... Sicily

Valley of the Temples
Agrigento, Sicily
UNESCO World Heritage Site
TEXT Beneath Illustrations

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Temple of Hera	Temple of Hera	Temple of Hera	Temple of Hera

Tourists stand on the sacrificial altar where animal sacrifices were offered to the god(dess)	Note 3 levels of steps Doric order	Doric order	Note chiseled U shape where rope used repeatedly on crane to lift blocks

05hera	Note how columns were placed on a slab. Since Doric columns have no base (unlike Greek Ionic and Corinthian columns), there were filler stones placed in between.
Temple of Concordia	Temple of Concordia	.	.

One of only 3 temples in the Western world with extant original inner walls Hexastyle (six columns along the narrow end) style temple	Entablature: Architrave with worn mutules underneath Frieze: alternating metopes and triglyphs, with guttae underneath		Note column section at left. The hole in the center is for a wood or metal rod that stabilized the column sections.

Miscellaneous facts:

Agrigento (Greek name: Akragas) founded in 581 BC by Rhodian and Cretan descendants from the nearby city of Gala; one hundred years later, there was a population of 200,000.
Romans renamed the city Agrigentum
Originally 21 temples in the valley
Temples were monumental homes for the gods, not meeting places for worshippers
After quarried and rough hewn, rocks (limestone, not marble) had to be transported from the quarry to the building site. This was done on carts with solid wheels, after placing the blocks onto the carts using levers and lifting beams. The carts were drawn by pack animals and slaves.
Small stones were transported on stretchers carried by four or eight men
Laying the blocks: Ropes and lifting devices (cranes and winches and derricks) were used to lift the large blocks. Once in place, the rocks were finished (fluted, for example).
Decoration: Plaster on the entablature (including friezes and metopes), statues, acroterions, color
3 rooms: antechamber / cella with statue of god(dess) / rear storage room
Temple of Hera:
- Doric order
- Constructed 5th c. BC
- Arbitrary name, although we are sure there was a temple devoted to her
Temple of Concordia:
- Doric order
- Built 5th century BC
- Concordia was the Roman name
- One of only 3 temples in the Western world with extant original inner wall
- 34 columns: 6 +6 +13+13
- One of the best preserved Doric temples in the world, because in 4th century AD the temple turned into a Christian basilica. Restored to its original classical form in 1748. Changes: archways on sides of inner wall

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