Cyber Day IV!

Today we have yet another dreaded cyber day. As much as I hate cyber days, I love them because now they won't take from our spring break or have us stay in school until June 20th or something. Today's assignment Mr. Schick is having us research on three Ancient Greek buildings, write a short paragraph on it, and post pictures with it as well. I think this is an easy assignment, but I will put a lot of effort into it so I get the full 20 points for my grade.

                                     The Acropolis

                                       
The word Acropolis means "high city". An Acropolis is many temples built on a hill that watch over the city of Athens. Pericles ruled Athens from 461 BC- 429 BC when he died. Pericles was in charge of the building of the Acropolis. One temple is the Propylaea which is built in honor of Athena Nike. Athena was the goddess of victory. Her temple was used as Athens treasury, the people of Athens would store their money there. The next temple was the Erechtheum, this was not a common Greek temple because of its design. The Erechtheum is dedicated to Poseidon, the god of seas. His temple was built with two levels instead on one, they did this because the ground was not even. The Parthenon is the biggest temple on the Acropolis. The reason why this is the most important temple is because it is dedicated to Athena Parthenos, the patron goddess of the city. The temple was huge, there were 8 columns in the front and 17 columns on each side! The temple was also covered with beautiful sculptures, which are now at the British Museum. In the Parthenon there is a 12 meter high statue of the Athena Parthenos. Fun Fact, the statue had 1 ton of gold in it and it costed the same amount as the building!

                                      Olympia
                                   

This is one of the most important sanctuaries in Greece. When we hear the word Olympia, the first thing that comes to mind is the Olympic Games. The first games occurred in 776 B.C. In 471 B.C. the games were now a five day event. The games included boxing, pentathlon (long jumping, discus,  sprint, javelin, and wrestling), horse and chariot racing, and pancrateon ( free-style fighting), and track events. The main buildings include: the Temple of Zeus, Philippeion, and the stadium . With Zeus's temple we can really only see the south colonnade because an earthquake destroyed some of it. Olympia started to be built about 4,500 years ago and 3,000 years ago the sanctuary was built. In 476 B.C. after the Greeks defeated the Perusians, they decided to build a temple in dedication to Zeus. When the started to build this almighty temple, they decided that they wanted the temple to stand out from anything and everything. Fun fact, they say that the first Olympic Games took place in 776 B.C., but archaeological evidence says otherwise. The evidence states that it could not have happened until a little before 700 B.C. after the stadium and hippodrome was built.

                                   Greek Theatre
                                    
They would build theatres on the slope of a hill, so they could get great elevation in the last few rows of seats. The steps would get covered in marble. They divide the auditorium with broad concentric belts called diazomata. They used diazomatas as lobbies and they had eleven rows of seats separating them. Where you sat was arranged by your rank and other things. The rows closest to the orchestra were reserved for members of the council and the rest were for the public. Fun fact, greek theatre began with festivals honoring the gods and goddesses. With greek theatre the architecture of the theatre was the orchestra, the scene, and the main one which was the Koilon.

Just want to say, Mr. Schick, I loved this assignment. I really enjoyed learning about the different things the Greeks made and came up with!