7/6 Paestum

Originally settled by the Greeks and named Posedonia (in honor of Poseidon), Paestum showcased a wonderful opportunity to study early Doric Greek temples in their entirety. Before we could get to a true introduction to the city, however, a presentation was made on the Sea and Technology of Greece.

Due to its rough terrain, the Greeks were forced inevitably to become masters of sea travel. In addition, because the Greek mainland was not exactly ideal for growing crops, the Greeks had to find some way to bring in food from outside sources and produce goods and services at home with which to trade. Some obvious dangers of sea travel were pirates, storms, and sickness, but these dangers were inevitable sometimes and the benefits often outweighed the negatives. The Greeks could easily travel by sea, much faster than over land, could get to remote locations to set up colonies, and could trade much faster. The trireme, or main battleship, was the principal way in which the Greeks defended their empires. The front of the ship featured a ram which would be used to cripple other ships. This would produce combats at sea that were often very close together, and since they hadn’t been introduced to gunpowder yet, were able to fight at such a close range.

We found out the reason that Paestum developed was through a process called Apoecism – the splitting up of a population, as when it gets so large that colonies have to be founded elsewhere in order to maintain a stable population in the original city (metropolis, or “mother city”) and not use up all of its natural resources. Paestum was one such instance of a colony and was established in the 6^th century BCE. Oddly enough, the original city of Posedonia was set up much like a Roman colony: a strict outline of the city wall, or pomerium, was established and then divided up 3 ways into two housing blocks separated by a public area with temples and civic buildings. The city blocks in the residential area were of proportions 1x8 so as to use up maximum area for living. Unfortunately, much of the city is still yet to be excavated, and only the main public area is visible today.

Yet, what is excavated and standing today is one of the best remaining examples of an early Doric temple. One of the main reasons this area was untouched was that after the population had declined to a specific amount, a period of malaria-carrying mosquitos began to inhabit the area, rendering it virtually useless as a town. This, plus the fact that it was a low seismic zone contributed to the 3 temples being so well preserved. The northern sanctuary, or Temple of Athena as it’s referred to today, is a hexastyle Doric (exterior) and Ionic (interior) one which was built in 510 BCE. The Greeks’ architectural efforts at this temple represent a time when they were a bit more daring in their designs, incorporating elements that they would otherwise not have if they were back in the mainland of Greece such as not having a back entrance or room to the temple, and adding an extra layer of stones on its entablature to give it more height and prominence.

The Temple of Hera, as it is referred to today, is the south sanctuary and was constructed between 550-510BCE. No marble was used in this structure as it was built completely out of local stone. What gets me about this particular temple is the use and combination of entasis (exaggeration of a bulge in the middle of the column) and miosis (the reduction in diameter from the lower to upper drums). In later iterations of temples, the Greeks would become more daring in how far they were willing to span between columns. Here, however, they seemed to still be experimenting with these different elements of the temple, and therefore the columns are closer together than the Parthenon, and their entasis/miosis factors are a big embellished. It almost seems like an early form of parametric design: change one factor and the entire aesthetic of the structure changes. The Greeks, however, changed these factors ever so slightly in their temples over the years, and the look of them slowly evolved into the masterpiece at the Parthenon, which gets each of the factors just right (at least for some people). You can tell that this temple is archaic by simply noting that the miosis here is extreme and that the swelling at the capital embodies this same characteristic as well. The Greeks knew they wanted their temples to be in harmony with nature and therefore exemplify natural forces within their structures. Therefore, the capital looks like it was made out of some plastic material that, when the entablature was applied, sagged under the weight to receive the upper portion of the temple.

A series of discussions took place at these temples that simply asked: why was there a desire for columns to surround a temple in the first place? There are myriad of possible responses to this question, and a few of them included:

- Old accounts of animal or enemy sacrifices is represented in the repetition of the column

- They are anthropomorphized figures as a leg would hold up a body or a body itself holding a weight

- A temple is a work of thresholds, from outside to inside, and the transparency of the temple gives the common person somewhat of a relation to the house of the deity, but not a complete one as they were not allowed in the inner sanctuary

- A frozen procession that honors the god within, its people protecting and guarding the inner house

- To be a purely sculptural element, one that turns inert stone into something that embodies forces within to make it seem like it will burst under the weight of the entablature at any time

Any of these answers could be the right one. None of them could be the right one. We know that it probably has to do with the Greeks’ relationship with nature. We know that it probably has to do with the relationship of the human body to the temple to the deity, and its proportions that would be pleasing to the eye. I think that ambiguity is what makes architecture such a wonderful profession. It raises all kinds of societal questions and, while it doesn’t always give an answer to them, reaffirms the fact that we are a collection of people who have our own subjective experiences of the world. It’s that interstitial space left over between the creator and his creation that excites me. If the architects had written a manifesto after completing the temple saying “this is why we built this structure”, it would have taken some of the mystery out of life. I wouldn’t have liked that, we still need some in our world.

These questions and more could also be grouped under the heading “philosophy”, which is interesting because we had a presentation on that topic as well in front of these temples. A philosopher, or lover of wisdom, sought actual explanations as opposed to religious explanations for both the banal and the supernatural; explanations with a historical viewpoint based in reality, not based around Gods and myths. We were each paired off and tasked to debate a certain topic. Mine had to do with there being another planet somewhere in the solar system that balances out our planet and moves the number up to 10. I thought this was a reasonable hypothesis, as the Chinese liked to observe the yin and yang of the universe. As well, the universe does tend to balance itself out and favor equilibrium, so somewhere out there must be a planet where everything we do is of the exact opposite nature on that planet, like a bizzaro world. What a preposterous load of garbage you say? I say prove it! Just because we haven’t found it yet, does not mean it doesn’t exist. That’s at least what my line of reasoning was.