An Ancient Wonder of Gold and Ivory - Part 1
The ivory and gold carving of Zeus and the temple in which it resided, was one of the greatest achievements of the classical age of Greece. The architect of the temple was a man named Libon from a nearby city. He created a temple much like the Parthenon in Athens.
The sculpture of Zeus' massive representation was rendered by Pheidias, son of Charmides, a citizen of Athens. Even if he hadn't sculpted the statue, he would have been remembered for his statues of the goddess Athena in the Acropolis and his statue of Athena in the Parthenon. It was said that the statue of Athena in the Acropolis which stood 32.8 feet high and had a helmet made of gold, could be seen by sailors far out to sea.
Pheidias had an interesting life. He was a friend of the noted statesman, Perikles, who influenced the rebuilding of Athens after it was destroyed by the Persians in 480 BC. Perikles was discredited by his enemies, thus making his friends vulnerable to attack as well. Pheidias, Perikles' friend, was accused of embezzling gold while he built the Athena in the Parthenon. Rather than face public humiliation, he chose voluntary exile. It is a matter of faith that the council at Olympia believed these charges to be trumped up as they commissioned him to sculpt Zeus. It is thought that Pheidias (along with a team of sculptors) took five years to sculpt the statue. By this time, Pheidias was in his fifties and when he returned to Athens, he was murdered by political opponents.
Pheidias developed a new technique in sculpting ivory and gold into immense statues and used it to sculpt the statue of Zeus. First, he erected a wooden framework where the statue would stand. Next, he used thin plates of ivory to fit the areas where the flesh of the statue would be before he used sheets of precious metals to mould the drapery and other details. Then, he built up the armature with the outer covering.. Each piece matched its neighbor perfectly and when the statue was completed, the seams were invisible. This careful work gave the statue the look of being a solid figure. We know that Pheidias did much of the sculpting in a nearby workshop because excavations have uncovered a workshop as well as a blackware cup with the words "I belong to Pheidias" etched into it.
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