Art Travel Vacation to Paestum, Italy

South of Naples the traveler finds the archaeological site of Paestum. Only twenty miles from the Amalfi Coast, this would make an ideal base for travel. Paestum is the Latin name for the ancient city of Poseidonia, which was established by Greek colonists in the seventh-century B.C. The Greeks, as Homer's Odyssey attests, were avid sea travelers, and during this ancient period much of southern Italy as well as Sicily was known as “Magna Graecia” -- that is, Great Greece . For this reason, Italy is unexpectedly rich in Greek temples, and the surviving complex at Paestum is one of the most impressive sites of all.

Three massive temples stand surrounded by mountains and sea: the oldest, the so-called Basilica (also known as the Temple of Hera I), was built in the sixth-century B.C. along with the Temple of Athena; while the more classically perfect Temple of Hera II was built about a century later. The temples were re-discovered only in the mid eighteenth- century, since nearby malarial swamps had long deterred visitors. Today the land has been drained, and archaeological excavations in the region continue to unearth architecture, tomb paintings, statuary, coins and other vestiges of ancient urban life in Italy.

Basilica

The Basilica stands in a sacred precinct south of the city. Looking at the temple, you may notice it generally resembles the famed Parthenon in Athens . Rows of fluted columns, nine along each of the shorter ends of the rectangular building and eighteen along each longer, uphold the heavy stones of the architrave. And yet, in contrast to the Parthenon or even the adjacent Temple of Hera II, the traveler may notice that the Basilica is more squat than graceful, more muscular than refined. This is because it is a temple of the so-called Archaic period, among the earliest structures built of stone in the Greek world. In earlier centuries the Greeks built their temples of wood, and it was only with the import of stone-working techniques from Egypt that a transition to more durable, monumental architecture was begun. At Paestum , local travertine was used, the stone stuccoed and painted to hide its pock marks and resemble fine Greek marble.

The Basilica is built in the Doric Order, each of the five orders being fixed systems of column and superstructure codified in classical architecture. But because it is so early a structure in the history of Greek building, its details were still being worked out. The columns taper quite drastically towards the top, so that their upper diameters are about half that of below. The capitals look as though squashed under the weight of the architrave. Finally, the architect was experimenting with an artistic trick known as entasis, so that the columns swell at their middles to counteract the illusion of their curving inwards as they rise. The archaic Basilica is a vigorous, full-blooded structure, whose experiments would culminate in the more refined Greek architecture of the following century.

To whom was the temple dedicated, and what was housed inside? Within the outermost perimeter of columns, the traveler will see another row of seven marching down the interior. These upheld the roof of the cella, a dark chamber that enclosed a cult statue. Archaeological finds at the site, such as a silver disk inscribed “I am sacred to Hera, strengthen our bows,” suggest the temple was dedicated to this goddess. As the cella was divided down its center by the row of columns, however, the temple may have borne a dual dedication to Hera's all-powerful husband, Zeus. The two cult statues, long since destroyed, would have shone mysteriously in this ancient, darkened sanctuary, enclosed against the heat of the southern Italian sun.