Page:A history of architecture on the comparative method for the student, craftsman, and amateur.djvu/155

 GREEK ARCHITECTURE. 97 Anthemion design, the lower portion having panels in bas-relief (Nos. 42 H, 43 F, and 44 e). Many of these can be seen in the British Museum. AGORA. The agora, or open meeting -places for the transaction of public business, were large open spaces surrounded by stoae or open colonnades, giving access to the public buildings, such, as temples, basilicas, stadion (racecourse), and the palaestrae or gymnasia. PUBLIC BUILDINGS. Stoae or Colonnades were formed for the protection of pilgrims to the various shrines, as connections between public monuments, or as shelters adjoining open spaces, and were an important class of structure. The most important of these were the Stoa Pacile, or Echo Colonnade, about 300 feet by 30 feet, at Olympia ; two at Epidauros — one two stories in height — acting as shelters for the patients who came to be healed at the shrine of vEsculapius ; three examples at Delphi ; and the remarkable example near the Propylaea at Delos, known as the "Sanctuary of the Bulls" (No, 42). The Stadion was the foot racecourse found in cities where games were celebrated, and it came eventually to be used for other athletic performances. It was usually straight at one end, the starting-place, and semicircular at the other, and was always 600 Greek feet in length, although the foot varied, and was some- times planned with the semicircular end on the side of a hill, so that the seats could be cut out of the sloping sides, as at Olympia, Thebes, and Epidauros, or else constructed on the flat, as at Delphi, Athens, and Ephesus. The Stadion at Athens, now completely restored, was commenced in b.c. 331, and finished by Herodes Atticus, and accommodates between 40,000 and 50,000 people. The Hippodrome was a similar type of building used for horse racing. The Palaestra or gymnasia, as at Olympia and Ephesus, were the prototypes of the Roman thermae, and comprised exercise courts, tanks for bathers, exedrae or recesses for lectures, with seats for spectators. 4. COMPARATIVE. A. Plans (Nos. 18, 20 e, and 27 c). — -These were simple, well judged, nicely balanced, and symmetrical, exceptions to the latter being the Erechtheion (No, 18 m), and the Propylaea (No. 18 n), at Athens, and probably the private houses. Plans involving F.A, H