Der Kroisos-Tempel

In 1965 the excavations of the ÖAI (Austrian Archaeological Institute) in the Artemision of Ephesos were resumed. In the course of these works the altar of the sanctuary was found, and areas of the monumental temple unknown until now were uncovered. Beyond that numerous fragments of architectural members of the two succeeding temples with double rows of columns were saved. The remains especially of the older Dipteros, the so-called Kroisos temple, named after the king of the Lydians who donated columns for this monument were carefully documented and interpreted. The result is a new - graphic - reconstruction of the archaic temple (ground-plan and elevation) which diverges in some details from the former ones; for example there existed only two rows of columns in front of the western antae. Moreover the documentation of all scratching lines and other edges of architectural members and of the axes of the monument that were exactly measured resulted in an analysis of the planning process, the sequence of erection, possible alternations and small errors. It is still not possible to ascertain the exact height of the columns - and thus of the whole building because the architectural members are too fragmentary. But the arrangement of the corner capitals of the exterior column ring - with rosettes at the inner sides - was clarifiied as well as the appearance of the eaves at the exterior and the interior of the temple; the Sekos certainly was not covered by a roof. Hypotheses for the construction of the entablature including the orientation of the beams and the existence of capitals with a ring of leaves ("Blattkranzkapitelle") above the inner column ring were created. Finally considerations such as for the building technique, for the partly unfinished surfaces, the original colouring and for the metrology complete the new researches.