3. Temple of Hephaestus

The Doric temple is among the best-preserved Greek temples of classical Athens. It was dedicated to Hephaestus, the patron god of metal workers and potters, and Athena Ergane, the patron goddess of craftsmen and artists. The depiction of the labours of Theseus on the frieze resulted in the erroneous identification of the temple as the Theseion. In antiquity, though, the building housed bronze statues of Hephaestus and Athena; therefore, it is almost certainly the Hephaisteion. The frieze of the opisthodomos shows the battle of Centaurs and Lapiths. The west pediment shows the Return of Hephaestus to Olympus, while the east pediment is decorated with the Birth of Athena. The temple is built of Pentelic marble and was elaborately painted as was common in ancient Greece. In the 5th or the 7th century, the temple became a Christian church dedicated to Saint George. In 1204 the Franks used the church as the katholikon of a monastery. The Athenians derisively characterised Saint George as “Akamates” (Sluggard) during the Ottoman period because the church was used only on the saint’s feast day. In 1834, the building became an archaeological museum and a storage facility for Athenian antiquities.

The selection of a capital for the newly established Greek state was a matter of grave concern for the Bavarian prince Otto, who had been selected as the first king of Greece. After a lengthy consultation process, he selected Athens in 1834. The king had received a thoroughly neoclassical education on the insistence of his father, King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who was an ardent Philhellene. Athens was the ideal choice for the construction of Greece’s national identity. The triumphal celebration for the arrival of Otto in Athens in 1834 made a great impression and confirmed the rebirth of the ancient Greek ideal that was so dear to the new king.

The brothers Konstantinos and Aristotelis Romaidis made a name for themselves as photographers in Bucharest. In 1876, they settled in Athens and opened their photo studio. They used calotype, a photographic process introduced in the middle of the 19th century to photograph monuments. They collaborated with many archaeological schools and produced memorable photographs of ancient Olympia for the German Archaeological Institute at Athens. These were published in a series of volumes under the title “Die Ausgrabungen zu Olympia”. In 1878, they published a photo album with photographs of Heinrich Schliemann’s excavation in Mycenae. In 1896, the Romaides brothers photographed the first international Olympic Games held in modern history in Athens.