INVESTITURE,
LEAVING THE MOSQUE]

You are met toward the top of the ascent by the Propylaea that
"brilliant jewel set on the rocky coronet of the Acropolis" as a kind
of introductory vestibule to further greatness. It is the most
important secular work in Athens, consisting of a central gateway and
two wings. It was begun in 439 B.C. It contains a wealth of Doric
marble columns, beautiful, carved friezes and metopes, with five
gateways spanned by great marble beams twenty feet long. All these
wonders compel the stranger to stand spellbound at the magnificence of
their combined effect.

Near by stands the Temple of Athena Nike, and close at hand is the site
of Phidias' colossal statue of Athena Promachos, the "fighter of the
van," made of the spoils taken from the Persians at the battle of
Marathon; sixty-six feet high, in full armor, her poised lance was
always a landmark for those approaching Athens.

We now reach the temple, attached to which is the Portico of the
Maidens, the Caryatides, and containing the shrine of Athena Polias.

Next comes the great Parthenon, "the most impressive monument of
ancient art," built by Pericles in 438 B.C. It was adorned by statues
and monuments by Praxiteles, Phidias and Myron. It had fifty statues,
one hundred Doric columns, ninety-two metopes, and five hundred and
twenty-four feet of bas-relief frieze, thus realizing the highest dream
of plastic art and the immortality of constructive genius. Within the
inner sanctuary Phidias placed his chryselephantine figure of Athena
Parthenos, the virgin, thirty-nine feet high, the flesh parts being in
ivory and the garments of fine gold. It is estimated that this gold
was worth almost 200,000 pounds. For more than six centuries the
virgin goddess received here the worship of her devoted votaries. In
the fifth century the Parthenon became a Christian church; when the
Turks came they made it a mosque. The edifice remained in good
preservation till the seventeenth century. In 1687 the Venetian,
Morosini, besieged Athens and a shell from one of his guns ignited the
powder which the Turks had stored in the Parthenon. A destructive
explosion followed and thus the most magnificent structure of the ages,
which twenty-one centuries had spared, was reduced to ruins. What
remains of it is still most majestic and when seen by moonlight
inspires the greatest reverence. There is no speculative guess-work in
these statements, for in 167