Specific Examples Involving The Interpretation Of The Parthenon’s Frieze

3 Pages 836 Words

Specific Examples Involving the Interpretation of the Parthenon’s Frieze


Looking at the Parthenon’s frieze you see many different characters in what seems to be some kind of procession. This is all noticeable to the common viewer, but does it actually have any meaning. Many interpretations have given the beautiful frieze different yet similar meanings. To many it is thought to be a piece of music transposed in to a pictorial story. The frieze seems to have a distinctive rhythm where it feels as if the characters are dancing. It is commonly thought that the scenes in the frieze are a representation of the Panathenaic procession, but scholars are arguing many of the actions and underlying meanings.
Many of the actions that take place on the frieze may seem insignificant, but they actually take on a lot of meaning. The simple gesture of fiddling with a sandal marks the beginning of the festival of the Panathenaic procession. Since most scholars agree on this, their interpretations are set around the south-western corner of the frieze as being the beginning events of the procession. The characters in the frieze are all headed toward the eastern front. The Panathenaic procession was the beginning of the grand Panathenaic games. As depicted on the frieze, this ritual included the sacrifice of animals and also the offering of the Peplos to Athena. In one scene of the frieze, the priestess of Athena, the Archon Basilieus, and a young boy are folding a large piece of cloth. “Since the offering of the Peplos was the essential feature of the Panathenaic procession, and the Peplos, if not represented here, is not to be found anywhere else in the frieze, it is generally agreed that we must recognize it in the piece of drapery which the priest holds”(Gardner 89-91). It is thought that the folding of this cloth is a symbol of putting away the old Peplos to make offering of the new one.
Joan B. Connelly has interpreted th...