Athena Promachos

Idealised view of the Acropolis with the bronze Athena Promachos carrying a great spear in her right hand (rather than with an owl as indicated from copies and coins), by the painter Leo von Klenze in 1846, who portrayed the great statue of Athena Promachos as visible from far away, as reported in ancient texts.

The Athena Promachos (Ἀθηνᾶ Πρόμαχος, "Athena who fights in the front line") was a colossal bronze statue of Athena sculpted by Pheidias, which stood between the Propylaea[1] and the Parthenon on the Acropolis of Athens. Athena was the tutelary deity of Athens and the goddess of wisdom and warriors. Pheidias also sculpted two other figures of Athena on the Acropolis, the huge gold and ivory ("chryselephantine") cult image of Athena Parthenos in the Parthenon and the Lemnian Athena.

The designation Athena Promachos is not attested before a dedicatory inscription of the early fourth century CE;[2] Pausanias (1.28.2) referred to it as "the great bronze Athena" on the Acropolis.

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Gaifman was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Birte Lundgreen, "A Methodological Enquiry: The Great Bronze Athena by Pheidias" The Journal of Hellenic Studies 117 (1997, pp. 190-197) p 198. Lundgreen usefully assembles the literature.