LATE CLASSICAL PERIOD

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Athenian history

• The Peloponnesian War starts up in earnest again; lasts from 431-421, and again 416-404 B.C.
  • most Greeks were pro-Sparta, saw Athenian power as threat
  • The Athenians lose to the Spartans; never regain their cultural supremacy

Late 5th century (430-400)

• The Athenian Acropolis
  • Propylaia (entrance building), 437-432
    • begun c. 437, when Parthenon building finished (though not the pediment sculptures) but never finished--you can see lifting bosses, other signs of this
      
  • Temple to Nike (Victory), 427-424
    • Ionic order: a rectangular room with four Ionic columns outside across the front and back, and an Ionic frieze; stands on on its own bastion or parapet
    • parapet also has a frieze
      • female figures with wild drapery
      • similar exaggerated style in vase painting at the same time--Meidias Painter
        
  • Erechtheum, 421-405
    • very elaborate building (Ionic order) housing several different shrines
    • south porch has female statues ("caryatids") instead of columns
      • more graceful than those on the 6th cy. Siphnian treasury at Delphi
    • we have building accounts, showing how many worked on each part, how much they were paid, how much marble they used, etc.

Fourth century (400-332)

officially ends with the death of Alexander the Great in 332 B.C.

• Freestanding sculpture
  • Leochares
    • Apollo Belvedere, c. 330; preserved in Roman copy
      • In late 19th century, hailed as THE finest Greek statue
        
  • Lysippos
    • statue of man scraping oil off himself (Apoxyomenos), c. 330
      • reaches out into third dimension for first time; no one 'right' vantage point
      • new canon of proportions--body 9 times the length of the head
    • Farnese Herakles, c. 320; preserved in Roman copy
      
  • Praxiteles
    • statue of Hermes with baby Dionysos, ? c. 340 B.C.
      • softer, curvier style than Lysippos
    • statue of Aphrodite getting ready for a bath--Aphrodite of Cnidos, 350-340
      • this was the first female nude in Greece
      • many Hellenistic copies, like the Aphrodite of Cyrene, c. 100 B.C.
        
• Theater at Epidauros, c. 350
  • seating capacity of 14,000; perfect acoustics
  • diameter 387 feet