The
Heraion of Argos was the temple in the main sanctuary in the
Argolid dedicated to
Hera, whose epithet "Argive Hera" (
Here Argeie) is familiar to readers of
Homer: Hera herself claims to be the protector of Argos (
Iliad IV, 50–52), where the memory was preserved of an archaic, aniconic pillar representation of the Great Goddess (Burkert, III.2.2, note 3) The site, which might mark the introduction of the
cult of Hera in Mainland Greece, lies between
Argos and
Mycenae[1], two important
Mycenaean cities. The traveller
Pausanias, visiting the site in the second century CE referred to the area as
Prosymna.
The
temenos occupies three artificially terraced levels on a site above the plain with a commanding view. The Old Temple, destroyed by fire in 423 BCE, and an open-air altar stood on the uppermost terrace. The famous ivory and gold-plated bronze sculpture of Hera by
Polykleitos stood in the New Temple on the middle terrace, built by Eupolemos of Argos following the fire. There were other structures, one of which was the earliest example of a building with an open
peristyle court, surrounded by columned
stoas. The lowest level supports the remains of a stoa. Ancient retaining walls support the flat terraces.
Close to the Heraion a Mycenaean cemetery apparently a site of an ancestor cult in the Geometric period was excavated by
Carl Blegen. In Roman times a baths and a
palaestra were added near the site.
At the Heraion,
Agamemnon was chosen to lead the Argives against
Troy, according to a legend recorded by
Dictys of Crete. Walls and earliest finds at the site date to the
Geometric period, during which the
Iliad was composed. A
Helladic settlement preceded the sanctuary's development.
The British officer
Thomas Gordon was the first to identify the site (1831), and he conducted some desultory excavations (1836).
Heinrich Schliemann briefly investigated the site (1874) before modern archaeology at the Heraion began, under the auspices of the
Archaeological Institute of America, which chose the Argive Heraion in its first campaign of excavation in Greece, under the direction of
Charles Waldstein, who discovered a bundle of iron roasting spits (
oboloi) in a bundle of 180, together with a solid bar of iron weighing the same as the bundle and having the same length (about 120 centimeters), votive objects that served as standards of weight and measure, introduced by Pheidon of Argos which were still to be seen in Classical times. "The obols of the Heraion are mentioned by the philosopher
Heracleides of Pontus in his work on Etymologies in order to explain the origin of the name of the monetary unit
obol, which is 1/6 of
drachma" (Stecchini).
Notes
1.
^ It is closer to Mycenae, 10 km from Argos.
References
Argolis (Greek, Modern: Αργολίδα Argolida, Ancient/Katharevousa: Ἀργολίς—still the official, formal name) is one of the fifty-one prefectures of Greece.
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In the Olympian pantheon of classical Greek Mythology, Hera, (Greek Ήρα, IPA pronunciation [ˈhiːrə]; or Here (
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Homer is the name given to the purported author of the early Greek poems the Iliad and the Odyssey. It is now generally believed that they were composed by illiterate aoidoi (rhapsodes) in an oral tradition in the 8th or 7th century BC.
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cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings ("scriptures"), its theology or myths, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety.
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State Party Greece
Type Cultural
Criteria i, ii, iii, iv, vi
Reference 941
Region Europe and North America
Inscription History
Inscription 1999 (23rd Session)
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Mycenaean Greece, the last phase of the Bronze Age in ancient Greece, is the historical setting of the epics of Homer and much other Ancient Greek literature and myth.
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Pausanias (Greek: Παυσανίας) was a Greek traveller and geographer of the 2nd century A.D., who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius.
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Temenos (τέμενος [1] , from the Greek verb τέμνω
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Polykleit (or Polyklitos, Polycleitus, Polyclitus; Greek Πολύκλειτος'); called the Elder[1] was a Greek sculptor in bronze of the fifth and the early fourth century BC.
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peristyle is a columned porch or open colonnade in a building that surrounds a court that may contain an internal garden. "Tetrastoon" (Greek: "four arcades") is another name for this feature.
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Stoa (plural, stoae or stoæ) in Ancient Greek architecture; covered walkways or porticos, commonly for public usage. Early stoae were open at the entrance with columns lining the side of the building, creating an enveloping, protective atmosphere and were usually
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Carl William Blegen (January 27, 1887, Minneapolis, Minnesota – August 24, 1971 Athens, Greece) was an archaeologist famous for his work on the site of Pylos in modern day Greece and Troy in modern day Turkey.
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For the sports arena in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, see .
The
palaestra was the ancient Greek wrestling school. The events that did not require a lot of space, such as boxing and wrestling, were practiced there.
..... Click the link for more information. Agamemnon (Greek: Ἀγαμέμνων "very resolute") is one of the most distinguished of the Greek heroes. He is the son of King Atreus of Mycenae and Queen Aerope, and brother of Menelaus.
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State Party Turkey
Type Cultural
Criteria ii, iii, vi
Reference 849
Region Europe and North America
Inscription History
Inscription 1998 (22nd Session)
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Dictys Cretensis, (Dictys of Crete), alleged to have been of Knossus in Crete, was the legendary companion of Idomeneus during the Trojan War, and the purported author of a diary of its events, that deployed some of the same materials worked up by Homer for the Iliad
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Geometric Art is a phase of Greek art, characterised largely by geometric motives in vase painting, that flourished towards the end of the Greek Dark Ages, circa 900 BCE to 800 BCE. Its centre was in Athens, and it was diffused amongst the trading cities of the Aegean.
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iLiad is an electronic handheld device, or e-book device, which can be used for document reading and editing. Like the Sony Reader, the iLiad makes use of an electronic paper display.
Description
Main specifications:
..... Click the link for more information. Helladic is a modern term of archaeological origin to identify a sequence of periods characterizing the culture of mainland ancient Greece during the Bronze Age. The term is commonly used in archaeology and art history.
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Major-General Thomas Gordon, (1788 –20 April, 1841), was a British army officer and historian. He is remembered for his role in the Greek War of Independence in the 1820s and 1830s and his History of the war published in 1833.
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Heinrich Schliemann [ˈʃliːman] (Neubukow (Germany), January 6, 1822 - Naples (Italy), December 26, 1890) was a German-Russian treasure hunter, an advocate of the historical reality of places mentioned in the
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The Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) is a North American nonprofit organization devoted to the promotion of public interest in archaeology, and the preservation of archaeological sites. It is based at Boston University.
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Charles Waldstein, later Sir Charles Walston KBE , was an Anglo-American archaeologist. He was born into a Jewish family in New York City on March 30, 1856. Waldstein was educated at Columbia University (A.M., 1873), and studied also at Heidelberg (Ph.D.
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Heraclides Ponticus (Greek: Ἡρακλείδης ὁ Ποντικός) (387 BC-312 BC), also known as Herakleides
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The obolus (or obol) is a Greek silver coin worth a sixth of a drachma. In Classical Athens it was subdivided into eight chalkoi ("copper pieces").
According to Plutarch, the Spartans had an iron obolus of four chalkoi.
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Greek drachma
ελληνική δραχμή (Greek)
100 drachma coin.
ISO 4217 Code GRD
User(s) Greece
Inflation 3.
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Pausanias (Greek: Παυσανίας) was a Greek traveller and geographer of the 2nd century A.D., who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius.
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