Construction of Athena Parthenos Advances under Pheidias

The shell demanded a soul. Under Pheidias’ direction, workshops turned to the Athena Parthenos—a colossal statue of ivory and gold meant to command the cella’s center. Pausanias would later confirm the materials and details: the goddess made of ivory and gold, a small Nike perched in her hand, a serpent coiled nearby [5]. Pliny records the height—26 cubits, a measure that makes the naos’ volume intelligible [7].

The work was exacting. Ivory plates had to be prepared and joined over a wooden core; gold sheets hammered and fitted to shimmer under lamplight. The smell of oil and glue mingled with stone dust; the sound of fine tools—scrapers, burnishers—joined the worksite’s lower thrum. Pheidias balanced the aesthetic—dignity over spectacle—with the technical: differential expansion of materials, structural stability, and maintenance access [5].

Thucydides offers the political punchline: Pericles said the statue’s gold amounted to about forty talents and was detachable—removable in crisis, restorable in calmer times [9]. In one object, the city fused devotion and liquidity. The ivory skin would remain; the gold could become pay for sailors at the Piraeus or silver to calm a panic in the Agora. Faith became finance.

The figure’s iconography mattered, too. Athena Parthenos had a presence that resonated with the city’s self-image—armed yet composed, a protectress whose poise echoed the exterior’s Doric calm and the interior frieze’s civic procession [11]. Pheidias’ hands and those of his assistants translated that ideal into curves of a cheek, the fall of a peplos, the exact tilt of the Nike.

In practical terms, Pheidias had to coordinate with architects to ensure clearances and sightlines. Light sources were checked in all seasons; the statue’s reflective gold needed to catch but not blind. The azure wedge of daylight at the doors would strike high planes at noon; lamplight would gild edges at evening festival. Scarlet-dyed ropes kept curious workers at a respectful distance.

By the end of this phase, reports would have reached the Assembly: the goddess advances. The accounts did not list every stroke, but the city sensed the statue’s approach in new orders for metals, in the hush inside the cella, and in the way Pheidias’ workshop took on a new intensity. The building was about to become a house in fact, not just in name.