Athenian Agora - The Hephaistion - Theseion

The Hephaisteion, the temple of Hephaistos and his half-sister Athena, is one of the few buildings in the Agora that has always been visible. The temple is frequently depicted on paintings and drawings of artists who visited Greece in the 17th and following centuries. With a large part of its marble ceiling still intact, the Hephaisteion is the best preserved temple in Greece and a prime example of Classical architecture.

From its elevated position on the 'Kolonos Agoraios' hill it provides a scenic view of the rest of the Agora. The construction of the Hephaisteion began in 460-450 BC, i.e. before the Parthenon, as part of a more extensive building program under the famous statesman Perikles.

Athens in this period was at the absolute height of her power and money from her allies was flowing in. Work on the Hephaisteion may have been interrupted when construction of the Parthenon began in 447 BC. An inscription records that the bronze cult statues of Hephaistos and Athena were not put up until 421-415 BC, suggesting that the temple was completed only shortly before that date.

The name of the architect of the Hephaisteion is unknown, but he was probably responsible for the construction of three other, very similar temples in Attica: the temple of Nemesis at Rhamnous, the temple of Poseidon at Sounion and the temple of Ares at Pallene (which was transferred to the Agora by the Romans in the late 1st century BC).

The Hephaisteion is a typical example of a Classical 'hexastyle' temple, with six Doric columns on the short sides and thirteen on the long sides. The inner part (not accessible) has the usual tripartite arrangement of pronaos (front porch), cella or naos (main room) and opisthodomos (back room).

The overall dimensions of the temple are 13.7 x 31.8 m. It must have been a costly building, as it was largely made of marble and abundantly decorated with sculpture. Pentelic marble was used for the walls and columns and island marble for part of the ceiling and for the sculpture.

The metopes on the front (east side) of the temple depict nine of the Twelve Labors of Herakles. The easternmost four metopes on each of the long sides represent the exploits of Theseus, the legendary early king of Athens.

The frieze around the pronaos has scenes of Centaurs fighting Lapiths. (The centaurs, half horse half man, had been invited to the wedding of the daughter of the Lapith King, but got drunk and misbehaved terribly, trying to take off with the women. A fight ensued.)

The pedimental sculpture has unfortunately not been preserved. Because eight of the metopes depict the exploits of Theseus, the temple was initially identified as the Theseion (the name is preserved in that of the modern neighborhood and metro station).

Ancient literary sources state that a 'theseion' was built to house the bones of Theseus, which had been brought back to Athens from the island of Skiros by Kimon in the 470s. However, the 2nd-century AD traveler Pausanias clearly says that the temple of Hephaistos was above the Agora and the Royal Stoa.

Hephaistos was the god of the forge. As the debris of iron and bronze working has been found on the slopes around the temple, it seems that it was set up appropriately in the neighborhood of the smiths. Excavation in the area immediately around the Hephaisteion showed that the temple was surrounded by a pleasant garden. Two rows of planting pits were found, with large terracotta pots that date to the 3rd century BC. The pits have now been replanted with pomegranate and myrtle, shrubs that were probably common in antiquity as well.

In the 7th century AD the Hephaisteion was converted into a Christian church for Ayios Yioryos (Saint George), which explains why it was not pillaged for building materials. This is not to say the temple was not damaged. The orientation of the building had to be changed, from the east, where the apse had to be, to the west. The temple was also provided with a vaulted concrete roof and part of the sculpture was defaced. The church was used as a Protestant burial place from the 17th century AD. When Fauvel, the late 18th century French consul, decided to dig in the temple to try and find the bones of the legendary Theseus he found instead those of the British traveler John Tweddell.

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