Treasury of the Sicyonians (Olympia)

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The Sikyonian treasure house is the best preserved (or reconstructed) of the twelve treasure houses - according to the reconstruction by Wilhelm Dörpfeld - in Olympia . It has the shape of a Doric temple with the basic dimensions 6.73 × 11.85 m on a two-step base plate. A surrounding triglyph frieze , red and blue underlay of the frieze and palmette ante fixtures on the ridge and the eaves were probably the only decorations. The treasure house was built around 470 BC. Or a little later. According to Pausanias 6, 19, 1, however, it goes back to a foundation of the tyrant Myron from Sikyon . BC had won a chariot race, which is difficult to reconcile with the established time of the treasury.

Pausanias writes: “[…] Myron built this after he had won the 33rd Olympiad with the chariot, and he had two shrines made in the treasury, one from Doric, the other from Ionic work. I saw for myself that they are made of bronze […] In Olympia there are inscriptions on the smaller of the shrines, as to the weight of the bronze, that there are 500 talents, and as to the consecrators, that it is Myron and the Sicyonian people . “(Translation by Ernst Meyer ). Pausanias names other consecration offerings that were in the treasury at his time.

In the treasure house of Sikyon three diskoi were kept, which the pentathletes used to throw a discus .

literature

  • Wilhelm Dittenberger , Karl Purgold : The inscriptions of Olympia (= Olympia. The results of the excavation organized by the German Reich. Volume 5). Asher, Berlin 1896, Col. 663 f. No. 649 ( digitized version ).
  • Wilhelm Dörpfeld : About the treasure house of the Sikyonier in Olympia. In: Communications from the German Archaeological Institute, Athens Department. Volume 8, 1883, pp. 67-70 ( PDF ).
  • Audrey Griffin: Sicyon. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1982, pp. 101-106.
  • Klaus Herrmann : The treasure houses in Olympia. In: William DE Coulson , Helmut Kyrieleis (ed.): Proceedings of an International Symposium on the Olympic Games, September 5-9, 1988. Athens 1992, pp. 25-32, here p. 28.
  • Madeleine Mertens-Horn, Luisa Viola: Archaic clay roofs of western Greek typology in Delphi and Olympia. In: Hesperia . Volume 59, 1990, pp. 235-248, here p. 247 f.

Web links

Coordinates: 37 ° 38 ′ 20.3 "  N , 21 ° 37 ′ 49.4"  E