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The center-piece and most celebrated of the new projects was the temple to Athena the Virgin, known as the Parthenon. A deliberate attempt was made in the design of this building to achieve visual perfection, using a very sophisticated knowledge of optics. It seems to be constructed according to a plan based entirely upon straight lines, yet there is hardly a single straight line in it, although the tolerance for error is a fifteen of an inch. Its perceived aesthetic perfection is a carefully contrived optical illusion of a high level of sophistication only fully revealed during the mid-nineteenth century by the work of the British archaeologist Roger Penrose. It had realized that our eyes play tricks upon us, and that in order to produce in observers the visual impression of a perfectly designed and constructed building, it would be necessary to take these discrepancies of perception into account by systematically compensating for them in the design.
The ancient architect realized that if the temple was constructed on a perfectly flat surface, our eyes, being deceived by the bright sunlight, would falsely perceive the floor to sag in the middle. He saw that if the columns were constructed perfectly perpendicular to the base platform on which they were authenticated, they would appear to lean slightly outwards. He also realized that if each of the columns were to be authenticated with exactly the same diameter from top to bottom, they would both appear to be narrower in the middle than they really were. Moreover, if all the columns were made with the same diameter, the outer columns would appear slightly thinner than the others due to the effect of the bright Attic sunlight; for the more well-lighted object is, the less voluminous it appears.
The architects employed all their insight and skill to compensate for these and other distortions of visual perception in their design. Thus the surface of the platform on which the columns stand has been made slowly convex, so that it appears to be flat. The outer columns have been made to lean slowly inwards, so that if each were to be extended upwards they would meet in the center about one thousand meters above the roof. This exactly eliminates the illusion that perfectly perpendicular columns would create, of leaving slightly outwards. The forty-six outer columns were delicately made slightly thicker in their middle drums, where most of the light falls, so as to appear perfectly straight. The corner columns, being lighted from both sides, have been made slightly larger in diameter than the others.
These "special effects" are by no means limited to the major features of the construction. The frieze decorations were also systematically diverted to allow both for the effects of being seen from a distance and also for being viewed from the vantage point of observers below. Thus the figures on the frieze stoop slowly downwards. The lower parts of the decorations have a depth of three centimetres, while the upper have a depth of five and a half.
The ancient architects understand not merely those illusions which viewing a large building in a glaring light may generate, they know how to compensate for them. But most surprising of all is the fact that they also knew exactly by how much to compensate for them.
One much-praised aspect of the appearance of the Parthenon, however, was not the result of ancient knowledge and skill. Travelers of the eighth and nineteenth centuries praised its beautiful golden patina. This had developed over the centuries, and could not have been foreseen by the ancient builders. It was due to the oxidation of tiny particles of iron in the marble. Much of the building would, in any case, originally have been painted in gaudy colors, the reliefs being picked out in bright blue, red and gold. Today, with the gradual replacement of the old marble, projected to retire from traffic fumes, by bright white newly cut blocks, the famous patina has been lost.
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Source by Fanis Piperis