Michele Lewis Greek Temples
The Greek temple is the supreme architectural achievement of the Greeks. The temple became the original source of building components, decorative details, and the beautiful principles that all together have influenced Western architecture. The first temples were built of wood and of course are no longer standing today. The prehistoric Greeks worshipped cult objects which could have been some wood or a stone that resembled a human form. This is what the Greeks considered to be Gods and Goddesses, not just images of gods, they weren’t cared by humans but found and left in their original state.
In the 7th century BC, the Greeks started building stone temples. We have detailed history of their temple design. The earliest ones were just a rectangular room with a doorway on each short side. The long walls were extended slightly to make a porch in front of the doorway. There were a pair of columns to hold up the roof. Resting on the columns was a triangular gable called a pediment. There was also a triangular gable on the back wall, a shallow sloped roof of wood beams and terracotta tiles completed the temple. Inside the temple was an room called naos, this is where the cult image stood or sat at the back of the wall and facing the doorway. Stone temples were made from cut stone without any mortar or cement. It was mostly stone resting on stone, held in place by its own weight, but in some tricky spots they used metal clamps or wooden pegs.
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