Temple of Apollo

“ The situation of the temple of Apollo at Thebes is a most convincing proof that his worship was totally distinct from any other. Those of the ancient national gods were built on the citadel of Cadmeia, whilst Apollo was not only not worshipped in the citadel, but even without the gates, in the temple of Ismene,1018 which, according to Pausanias, must have been situated opposite to the temple of Hercules and the house of Amphitryon. ”

“ Delos, would that thou wert minded to be the seat of my Son, Phœbus Apollo, and to let build him therein a rich temple! No other God will touch thee, nor none will honour thee, for methinks thou art not to be well seen in cattle or in sheep, in fruit or grain, nor wilt thou grow plants unnumbered. But wert thou to possess a temple of Apollo the Far-darter; then would all men bring thee hecatombs, gathering to thee, and ever wilt thou have savour of sacrifice . ”

“ The temple of Apollo forms the centre of the whole precinct, which it dominates by the height of its steps as well as of the terrace already mentioned; its position must have been more commanding in ancient times than it is now that heaps of earth and débris cover so much of the level. ”

“ On the Festival of Apollo the lads go to the river Sythas, and, after bringing Apollo and Artemis to the temple of Persuasion, take them back again to the temple of Apollo. And that temple is in the middle of the present market-place, and they say it was originally built by Prœtus, because his daughters got cured of madness here. ”

“ Then far-working Apollo answered then and said: ‘Strangers who once dwelt about wooded Cnossos but now shall return no more each to his loved city and fair house and dear wife; here shall you keep my rich temple that is honoured by many men. I am the son of Zeus; Apollo is my name: but you I brought here over the wide gulf of the sea, meaning you no hurt; nay, here you shall keep my rich temple that is greatly honoured among men, and you shall know the plans of the deathless gods, and by their will you shall be honoured continually for all time. ”

“ At that time, and always in Greece before it was converted to Christianity, there were temples of the gods in various places, at which it was supposed that men might receive answers to their questions. These [Pg 202] temples were called oracles, or places where oracles were given, and the most famous of them was the temple of Apollo at Pytho, or Delphi, far to the north-west of Athens. Here was a deep ravine of a steep mountain, where the god Apollo was said to have shot a monstrous dragon with his arrows. ”

“ There Apollo established his temple for the succour and enlightenment of mankind, while Trophonius and Agamedes, sons of Erginus, men dear to the immortal gods, built the approaches of stone.
Thus the divine origin of the temple is vindicated, the structure described, and the human architects honoured, whose descendants, very likely, were present to hear their ancestors' praise. But here a puzzling fact challenges the attention and stimulates the fancy of the poet: Apollo was a Dorian deity, yet his chief shrine was here upon Phocian ground. ”

“ Close to the foot of the steep cliff, and beneath the spot where Jupiter's eagles had fallen, he laid the foundations; and soon where had been the lair of the Python, the white walls of Apollo's temple arose among the rocks. Then the poor people of the land came and built their houses near by; and Apollo lived among them many years, and taught them to be gentle and wise, and showed them how to be happy. The mountain was no longer savage and wild, but was a place of music and song ”

“ As you go up the acropolis you come to the sanctuary of Hera of the Height (Akraia) , and also a temple of Apollo, which is said to have been first built by Pythaeus when he came from Delphi. The present image is a bronze standing figure called Apollo Deiradiotes, because this place, too, is called Deiras (Ridge) . Oracular responses are still given here, and the oracle acts in the following way. There is a woman who prophesies, being debarred from intercourse with a man. ”

“ You will pass a ruined temple of Apollo with standing columns and lonely altar and steps that lead to a room that is gone. A little farther on you will come out into a large open paved space. It is the forum. This used to be the busiest place in all Pompeii. At certain hours of the day it was filled with little tables and with merchants calling out and with gentlemen and slaves buying good’s. But now it is empty and very still. Around the sides a few beautiful columns are yet standing with carved marble at the top connecting them. But others lie broken, and most of them are gone entirely. ”

“ The most ancient temple of Apollo in Thrace was also founded by Cretans, as well as that at Ismarus or Maroneia;962 Maron its priest being, according to tradition, a Cretan adventurer.963 With this sanctuary was probably connected the ancient oracular temple of Apollo at Deræa near Abdera,964 alluded to in the device on the coins of Abdera ”

“ Alone he knelt down and prayed to Apollo, his god.
[Pg 8]
‘Hear me, god of the silver bow!’ he cried. ‘If I have built thee a temple that is fair in thine eyes, and have offered unto thee there the flesh of bulls and goats, hear me! Let the Greeks be paid by thine arrows for my tears!’
High up amongst the peaks of Olympus Apollo heard the prayer of his priest, and great anger filled his heart. ”

“ The colonnade and steps of the Temple to the right. A wall surrounds the court with a large grille at the extreme left. About midway in the wall a niche holds a statue of the Ephesian Artemis, before which are flowers and a burning taper. The shadow of the great image of the God Apollo is thrown across the stage from within the Temple and slowly lessens as the scene goes on.
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Libanius, Themistius, Damis, Lysis, and Opora are seated on the steps of the Temple.
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As the hymn ends Asclepiades passes slowly between the columns down the steps. ”

“ These Greeks brought with them their national worship; and of the temples mentioned by Herodotos, those of Apollo, Aphrodite, and Hera, have been found, and also one to the Dioskouroi, not recorded in history. The temple of the Milesian Apollo appears to have been the oldest: it stood in the centre of the town, outside of the fort, and was first built of mud-brick, plastered over, and later on—about the fifth century—of{40}
25. ”

“ In the temple of Apollo at Bassae, though the main building was of limestone, the roof was covered with very beautiful tiles of Parian marble, which are specially mentioned by Pausanias as being one of the chief beauties of the temple. ”

“ The gift of prophecy Earth had at the first, and after her Themis; and after her Phœbe, who was of the race of the Titans, and Phœbe gave it to Apollo—who is also called Phœbus—at his birth. Now Apollo had a great temple and famous upon the hill of Delphi, to which men were wont to resort from all the earth, seeking counsel and knowledge of the things that should come to pass hereafter. And it came to pass on a day that the priestess—for the temple was served by a woman, whom men called Pythia—when she went into the shrine, after her custom, in the morning, saw therein a dreadful sight. ”

“ But now Apollo has set up his oracle at Delphi, Asclepius his temple of health at Pergamum, Bendis and Anubis and Artemis their shrines in Thrace, Egypt, Ephesus; and to these all run; theirs the festal gatherings and the hecatombs. As for me, I am superannuated; they think themselves very generous if they offer me a victim at Olympia at four-year intervals. My altars are cold as Plato's Laws or Chrysippus's Syllogisms.'
So talking, we reached the spot where he was to sit and listen to the prayers. There was a row of openings with lids like well- covers, and a chair of gold by each. ”

“ Considering all these facts, we cannot, I think, resist the conclusion that, as early at least as 475 B.C., and almost certainly at a much earlier date, Apollo already possessed a temple in Delos distinct from the grotto. Now we know that the most ancient altars in Delos (the κεράτινος and that of Apollo Genitor) stood near the oval basin. And, as early at least as the Odyssey, the palm which saw Latona's pangs was shown near an altar. The site of Apollo's temple can scarcely be sought, then, elsewhere than on the spot where remains now exist. ”

“ Long time Apollo sought a place where he might build a temple to which men might come to learn of him and to seek his help in time of need. At length he came to a broad plain, by the shore of a beautiful lake; and there he began to build a house, for the land was a pleasant one, well-watered, and rich in grain and fruit. But the nymph that lived in the lake liked not to have Apollo so near her, lest men seeing and loving him should forget to honor her ”

“ The worship of Apollo never occupied the all-important position in Rome which it held in Greece, nor was it introduced till a comparatively late period. There was no sanctuary erected to this divinity until B.C. 430, when the Romans, in order to avert a plague, built a temple in his honour ”

“ Besides the Delphian temple, Apollo had numerous temples throughout Greece, and oracles at Abæ in Phôkis, on the Mount Ptôon, and at Tegyra in Bœotia, where he was said to have been born, [110] at Branchidæ near Milêtus, at Klarus in Asia Minor, and at Patara in Lykia. He was not the only oracular god: Zeus at Dodona and at Olympia gave responses also: the gods or heroes Trophônius, Amphiaraus, Amphilochus, Mopsus, etc., each at his own [p. 51] sanctuary and in his own prescribed manner, rendered the same service. ”

“ The complete plan of the sacred precinct of Apollo has been recovered, as well as those of a considerable portion of the commercial quarter of Hellenistic and Roman times, of the theatre, of the temples of the foreign gods, of the temples on the top of Mount Cynthus, and of several very interesting private houses. Numerous works of sculpture of all periods have been found, and also a very extensive series of inscriptions, some of them throwing much light upon the subject of temple administration in Greece.
The most convenient place for landing is protected by an ancient mole ”

“ Lest what has been said should suggest that the sculptors of the Olympia pediment-figures were indifferent to beauty, attention may be drawn again to the superb head of the Lapith bride. Apollo, too (Fig. 110) , though not that radiant god whom a later age conceived and bodied forth, has an austere beauty which only a dull eye can fail to appreciate.
The twelve sculptured metopes of the temple do not belong to the exterior frieze, whose metopes were plain, but to a second frieze, placed above the columns and antae of pronaos and opisthodomos. ”

“ But if you have the temple of far-shooting Apollo, all men will bring you hecatombs and gather here, and incessant savour of rich sacrifice will always arise, and you will feed those who dwell in you from the hand of strangers; for truly your own soil is not rich. ”

“ After enumerating others also of the Hyperboreans, at the end of the hymn she names Olen: “And Olen, who became the first prophet of Phoebus, And first fashioned a song of ancient verses.” Tradition, however, reports no other man as prophet, but makes mention of prophetesses only.
10.5.9 They say that the most ancient temple of Apollo was made of laurel, the branches of which were brought from the laurel in Tempe. This temple must have had the form of a hut. The Delphians say that the second temple was made by bees from beeswax and feathers, and that it was sent to the Hyperboreans by Apollo. ”

“ Aristotle indeed speaks of the paternal Apollo (Ἀπόλλων πατρῷος) as being a son of Athene and Hephæstus;1024 but this is nothing more than an endeavour to create a family connexion between the principal gods of the same town: for where do we ever find a temple dedicated conjointly to Athene and Apollo? what ceremonies and sacrifices were offered to them in common? and in what legends are they found connected? Till such an union of the two deities is discovered, we must consider Athene as an ancient and native deity, Apollo as one of much later introduction. ”

“ Apollo is in ancient traditions represented as himself protecting his own temple.913 The Phlegyans to the east, and the Ætolians to the west, appear to have been particularly adverse to the worship of the Delphian Apollo. That there was a national opposition caused by the Phlegyans possessing the stronghold of Panopeus in the mountain-passes towards Bœotia, is shown by the legends, that Phorbas their leader wrestled there with Apollo ”