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70-570: The Ionic building, which housed the statue of Athena Polias, has in modern scholarship been called the Erechtheion (the sanctuary of Erechtheus or Poseidon ) in the belief that it encompassed two buildings mentioned by the Greek-Roman geographer Pausanias : the Temple of Athena Polias and the Erechtheion. However, whether the Erechtheion referred to by Pausanias and other sources is indeed

140-654: A Greek and Roman temple is typically topped with a pediment. The different variants of porticos are named by the number of columns they have. The "style" suffix comes from the Greek στῦλος , "column". In Greek and Roman architecture, the pronaos of a temple is typically topped with a pediment . The tetrastyle has four columns; it was commonly employed by the Greeks and the Etruscans for small structures such as public buildings and amphiprostyles . The Romans favoured

210-404: A Homeric, pan-Hellenic name has been superimposed on an autochthonous , non-Greek name." Swinburne 's classical tragedy Erechtheus was published in 1876. He uses the framework of the classical myth to express the republican and patriotic ideals that preoccupied him at this era. Hexastyle A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade , with

280-462: A major construction project and that there was a likely hiatus in building during the Sicilian disaster of 413. Alternatively, dates as early as the mid-430s and as late as 412 have been put forward. Work seems to have ended in 406–405, and the last accounts were from 405–404, though some mouldings were never finished and some of the bosses of some stone blocks were not chiselled off. The names of

350-805: A monument and archaeological site. For the Erechtheion this meant the remnants of the Frankish North Addition, the Venetian vault in the North Porch, the Ottoman masonry structure in the angle of the westward projection of the North Porch and the West Façade, and the Frankish and Ottoman alterations of the interior were removed. The first attempted reconstruction of the damaged building was Pittakis's in 1839–40. The second anastylosis

420-477: A repetition of a single person or deity but a group of individuals. Lesk argues that they may have been intended as a replacement for the (highly individuated) Acropolis korai that were destroyed by the Persians and in this capacity represent the servants of Athena who stood ready to make libation to the cult statue housed inside. Vickers suggests not only a later date for the construction of the Erechtheion but that

490-599: A roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cultures, including most Western cultures . Porticos are sometimes topped with pediments . Palladio was a pioneer of using temple-fronts for secular buildings. In the UK , the temple-front applied to The Vyne , Hampshire, was the first portico applied to an English country house . A pronaos ( UK : / p r oʊ ˈ n eɪ . ɒ s / or US : / p r oʊ ˈ n eɪ . ə s / )

560-402: Is attributed either to the irregularity of the site or to the evolving and complex nature of the cults which the building housed, or it is conjectured to be the incomplete part of a larger symmetrical building. Additionally, its post-classical history of change of use, damage, and spoliation has made it one of the more problematic sites in classical archaeology. The precise nature and location of

630-765: Is the best-preserved Roman hexastyle temple surviving from antiquity . Octastyle buildings had eight columns; they were considerably rarer than the hexastyle ones in the classical Greek architectural canon . The best-known octastyle buildings surviving from antiquity are the Parthenon in Athens , built during the Age of Pericles (450–430 BCE), and the Pantheon in Rome (125 CE). The destroyed Temple of Divus Augustus in Rome,

700-482: Is the condition of the site that prompted the first major anastylosis of the Erechtheion, by Kyriakos Pittakis between 1837 and 1840. Externally, the temple is an Ionic hexastyle , prostyle pronaos which faces east. The building is in Pentelic marble with a blue Eleusinian limestone frieze. The temple's walls were constructed in ashlar isodomic masonry. The east porch doesn't exhibit any entasis , but

770-448: Is the inner area of the portico of a Greek or Roman temple , situated between the portico's colonnade or walls and the entrance to the cella , or shrine. Roman temples commonly had an open pronaos, usually with only columns and no walls, and the pronaos could be as long as the cella . The word pronaos ( πρόναος ) is Greek for "before a temple". In Latin , a pronaos is also referred to as an anticum or prodomus . The pronaos of

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840-578: Is unclear. Julian the Apostate undertook the reconstruction of the Parthenon as a pagan temple in circa AD 361 and 363, at which point the Parthenon was the only attested site of the cult of Athena on the Acropolis, implying that the Erechtheion had been abandoned. In the post-classical period, the Erechtheion was subject to a number of structural changes that must be assumed to have been prompted by

910-400: Is unknown; it has traditionally been thought to have been built from c.  421 –406 BC, but more recent scholarship favours a date in the 430s, when it could have been part of the programme of works instigated by Pericles . The Erechtheion is unique in the corpus of Greek temples in that its asymmetrical composition doesn't conform to the canon of Greek classical architecture . This

980-511: The Dörpfeld foundations . However, while there is no consensus among scholars on this issue, the building continues to be referred to as the Erechtheion by convention. In the official decrees the Ionic building is referred to as "... το͂ νεὸ το͂ ἐμ πόλει ἐν ο͂ι τὸ ἀρχαῖον ἄγαλμα" (the temple on the Acropolis within which is the ancient statue). In other instances it is referred to as the Temple of

1050-590: The White House is perhaps the most notable four-columned portico in the United States. Hexastyle buildings had six columns and were the standard façade in canonical Greek Doric architecture between the archaic period 600–550 BCE up to the Age of Pericles 450–430 BCE. Some well-known examples of classical Doric hexastyle Greek temples : Hexastyle was also applied to Ionic temples, such as

1120-415: The autochthonic nature of Athenian identity. J.H. Clements argues that the Erechtheion was built to house a diverse collection of religious objects, akin to a "'museum of curiosities' for the collections of religious objects", and that it is problematic to draw an overall theme for the religious purpose of the temple. The cults of the Erechtheion encompass the birth of Erichthonius from the soil of Attica;

1190-512: The sacred olive tree of Athena would have been. On the south wall of the western naos was an L-shaped staircase which leads to the higher Porch of the Maidens (or Caryatid Porch, or Korai Porch), a prostyle tetrastyle porch, or pteron , having six sculpted female figures as supports, all facing south and standing on a low wall. The only entrance to the Porch of the Maidens was the stairway from

1260-423: The stylobate is curved. The naos is apparently divided in two, with the floor of the western part of the building three meters lower than the eastern section but with identical ceiling height. The western end of the naos has three entrances. On the north of the western naos is a great door and step leading to the lower Ionic prostyle, dipteral tetrastyle porch of six columns, with a distinctive double anta at

1330-564: The "trident marks" in its pronaos. Others restore a number of temene adjacent to the Temple of Athena Polias or a tetrastyle naiskos . To the south of the Erechtheion site would have been the Dörpfeld Foundations Temple, now thought to be the archaic Temple of Athena Polias, the foundations of which are visible on the acropolis today. Examination of the remains of the north edge of this temple by Korres might suggest

1400-707: The 12th century, the basilica was renovated. The round apse was enlarged and was given straight sides on the exterior. The chancel screen was extended to the North and South Walls. During the Frankish occupation (1204–1458), the Erechteion was deconsecrated and changed to a Bishop's residence, probably for the Catholic bishops of Athens who held mass in the Latin Cathedral of Church of Our Lady of Athens . With

1470-418: The Erechtheion. In this same spirit came the work of Richard Pococke , who published the first reconstruction of the temple in 1745 and who was the first to conjecture the existence of a larger, symmetrical building. Later, Stuart and Revett published the first accurate measured drawings of the Erechtheion in the second volume of their Antiquities of Athens in 1787. This book, perhaps more than any other,

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1540-456: The Erechtheion; the frieze and the korai of the Maiden porch. The entablature of the naos and north porch has a frieze of blue Eleusinian limestone that was decorated with white Pentelic marble figures attached by means of iron dowels. This "cameo-like" effect of the contrasting stones was unique amongst Ionic temples and rare in any other applications. Of the sculpted elements, 112 fragments of

1610-524: The Ionic temple or an entirely different building has become a point of contention in recent decades, with various scholars ruling out that Athena and Erechtheus were worshipped in a single building. Alternative suggested locations of the true Erechtheion include the structures on the Acropolis conventionally identified as the Arrephorion , the Sanctuary of Zeus Polieus , the Sanctuary of Pandion , and

1680-466: The Maiden Porch was, at the time, more controversial than his removal of the Parthenon sculptures. In the post-revolutionary period, ambitious plans were drawn up to clear the Acropolis and build a royal palace for the newly installed Bavarian king. Although no such palace was built, the plateau was cleared of much of the post-classical accretions, which were thought to obscure the site, and left as

1750-448: The Maiden Porch. Kontoleon has argued that it served as a monopteral heroön to the tomb of Kekrops. Scholl has argued that the korai are mourners for Kekrops because of the association of caryatids with tombs. Shear disputes this is a tomb since it does not follow the pattern of other religious tokens. For Shear the architectural supports are derived from the bases of the columns of the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus and are typical of

1820-520: The Polias. The joint cult of Athena and Poseidon-Erechtheus appears to have been established on the Acropolis at a very early period, and they were even worshipped in the same temple as may, according to the traditional view, be inferred from two passages in Homer and also from later Greek texts. The extant building is the successor of several temples and buildings on the site. Its precise date of construction

1890-516: The advent of Ottoman control and the adaptation of the Acropolis plateau to a garrison, the Erechtheion took on its final incarnation as the Dizdar 's harem. However, new research questions whether the building was actually in use as a harem, as this is not found in Turkish sources. This final period of the building's use also witnessed the beginning of traveller's accounts and architectural recording of

1960-416: The architect-overseers ( episkopos ), Philokles and Archilochos, have come down to us. They worked on the site after 409. But the identity of the architect ( architecton ) is unknown. Several candidates have been suggested; namely, Mnesikles , Kallikrates , and Iktinos . The subsequent history of the building has been one of damage, restoration and change of use, which complicates the task of reconstructing

2030-480: The boundaries of the pre-Ionic Erechtheion site and therefore determine the shape of the classical temenos . Korres argues that a columnar monument marking the kekropeion would have been approximately where the Porch of the Maidens is, and that there was a stoa for the Pandroseion adjacent. The building accounts for the classical Erechtheion from 409–404 BC have survived, allowing an unusually secure dating of

2100-462: The building's adaptation to Christian worship. The first was its conversion to a pillared hall with a groin vaulted roof at some point in the 4th century. In the late 6th or 7th century, the Erechtheion was converted into a three-aisled basilica church with the West Corridor serving as the narthex . The central portion of the east foundations was removed to make room for a curved apse . In

2170-573: The city". The Odyssey (VII.81) already records that Athena returned to Athens and "entered the strong-built house of Erechtheus". The archaic joint temple built upon the spot that was identified as the Kekropion , the hero-grave of the mythic founder-king Cecrops and the serpent that embodied his spirit was destroyed by the Persian forces in 480 BC, during the Greco-Persian wars , and

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2240-465: The city; he will be known for him who killed him, under the name of 'sacred Poseidon'; but among the citizens, when the sacrificial cattle are slaughtered, he shall also be called 'Erechtheus'. To you, however, since you have rebuilt the city's foundations, I grant the duty of bringing in the preliminary fire-sacrifices for the city, and to be called my priestess. In the Athenian king-list, Xuthus ,

2310-460: The construction of the temple. Nevertheless, the question remains of when the building project was inaugurated. There is no primary evidence for when construction began; it is conjectured to be either the 430s or in 421 during the Peace of Nikias . The latter is broadly the consensus view, the rationale being that this lull in the long Peloponnesian War would have been the most convenient time to begin

2380-409: The daughters of Kekrops opening the basket containing Erichthonios on the north and the birth of Ericthonios on the east. Other suggestions for aspects of the narrative of the frieze include the story of Ion , the sacrifice of Erectheus' daughters to save Athens and the departure of Erechtheus for the battle with Eumolpos . Peter Schultz's recent reinterpretation of the standing god and goddesses on

2450-418: The death of one of the three daughters of Erechtheus. Perhaps this means the three unmarried daughters. In one version it is Chthonia, the youngest, who is sacrificed. In another, it is both Protogeneia and Pandora, the two eldest, who offer themselves up. In any case the remaining sisters (excepting Orithyia who had been kidnapped by Boreas ), or at least some of them, are said to kill themselves. The story of

2520-462: The earth with blows of his trident, The ending lines of Euripides' tragedy were recovered in 1965 from a papyrus fragment. They demonstrate for Burkert that "the founding of the Erechtheum and the institution of the priestess of Athena coincide." Athena resolves the action by instructing Erichtheus' widow Praxithea: ...and for your husband I command a shrine to be constructed in the middle of

2590-537: The east porch of the Nike Athena temple as the birth of Athena invites comparison with the birth scene on the Parthenon pediment and has prompted the question of whether there is a tradition of birth scenes in Attic sculpture that was continued on the Erechtheion frieze. As is typical of the Ionic style, there is no pediment sculpture on the Erechtheion. There are several theories about the function and significance of

2660-399: The entablature, door and window frames, and the coffering of the ceilings. The capitals were gilded and the braidings at the column bases were studded with coloured glass. The Erechtheion potentially served as a reliquary for an assortment of religious items rather than being dedicated to a single deity, as was usually the case. Ludwig Pallat posits that the Erechtheion is the expression of

2730-533: The form of terracing, children's graves, and a limestone column base. Hurwitt, arguing by analogy with population centres elsewhere from the period, maintains that there may have been a cult centre on the acropolis to the armed goddess a-ta-na-po-ti-ni-ja , which could represent the primitive origins of the Athenian cult. Additionally, the Mycenaean well and Cyclopean walls , which appear to have been in use between LH IIIB and LH IIIC, attests to attempts to fortify

2800-596: The four columned portico for their pseudoperipteral temples like the Temple of Portunus , and for amphiprostyle temples such as the Temple of Venus and Roma , and for the prostyle entrance porticos of large public buildings like the Basilica of Maxentius and Constantine . Roman provincial capitals also manifested tetrastyle construction, such as the Capitoline Temple in Volubilis . The North Portico of

2870-416: The frieze have survived, perhaps 80% of the figures. Attempts to match dowel hole to figure have not been successful, and therefore the order of the figures and overall theme of frieze remains unclear. However, several attempts to identify individual scenes within the sequence of figures have been made. According to Pallat, the north porch had a chariot race with a quadriga on the west face and Athena catching

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2940-640: The hill-top as the "strong-built house of Erechtheus" recorded in the Homeric tradition. The well may be an indication of the location of the cult of Erechtheus. The archaeology under the Erechtheion is also poorly evidenced for the archaic and early classical periods. Despite this a number of proposals have been made for a structure on the site immediately before the Achaemenid destruction of Athens in 480 BC. Orlandos reconstructs an obliquely orientated hexastyle amphiprostyle temple, which would have contained

3010-418: The interior of the naos. The western end is a double-height space, and at the second-storey level, the outside west facing wall has an engaged base moulding with four engaged columns topped by Ionic capitals. The spaces between these columns were of open grillwork. From the outside, the western facade would have had the appearance of having a floor at the same level as the eastern naos. The coffered ceiling of

3080-508: The korai are actually Vitruvian caryatids and represent a memorial to Athens's humiliation in the Peloponnesian War . The Erechtheion is a "remarkably luxurious" building in the detailing of its mouldings. Lotus- palmette chains (anthemion) decorate the column capitals and epicranitis of the temple. Additionally, egg-and-dart , egg and leaf, bead and reel , lesbian cyma , guilloches , and rosettes are liberally placed around

3150-419: The korai. In the building accounts they are referred to as korai or maidens. The lower arms of all the caryatids have been lost. In 1952 the discovery of copies from Tivoli revealed that the korai carried phiale , suggesting that they might be either the arrephoroi (as "bearers of unmentionable things") or kanephoroi . The six korai of the porch all exhibit subtle variations, implying that they do not represent

3220-430: The late Bronze Age Mycenaean period . L.B. Holland conjectured that the remains under the Erechtheion was the forecourt of a palace complex similar to that of Mycenae. The scant evidence of the period LHI includes potsherds and scraps of a wall under the foundations of the Ionic temple. From the remainder of the shaft-grave period, there is nothing from LHII-LH IIIA, only from LH IIIB is there evidence of habitation in

3290-526: The miniaturization of elements of the Ionic style when it was imported from Asia Minor to the Greek mainland. Nor was the use of korai as an architectural support element a novelty, as they were used before in the Siphnian Treasury at Delphi and perhaps the Kore of Lyons and therefore represent the classical expression of an established archaic tradition. Then there is the problem of the identity of

3360-418: The north porch is continued at the Porch of the Maidens. There is no wholly satisfactory account of the interior layout of the Erechtheion in antiquity since it has over time been entirely erased. The points of contention are whether and where there was an internal dividing wall, and whether the building had two storeys as suggested by Pausanias' description of it as a διπλοῦν... οἴκημα. The conventional view of

3430-493: The north-west corner. Next to this porch is an outside terrace and steps leading to the east porch. East of the north doorway is an underground opening that leads to a crypt under the north porch with a pit for snakes. On the west end of the north elevation of the western naos, a further door and step lead to a walled temenos , the Sanctuary of Pandrosos , where the Pandroseion , tomb of Kekrops , altar of Zeus Herkeios and

3500-415: The original structure. The first recorded fire that the classical building suffered was perhaps 377–376, a second more severe fire took hold sometime in 1st century BC or earlier followed by a campaign of repair. The Erechtheion along with the Parthenon suffered a further major destruction at some point in the 3rd or 4th century AD; whether this was due to Herulian or Visigoth attack or a natural disaster

3570-554: The physical rule but Butes taking the priesthood of Athena and Poseidon, this right being passed on to his descendants. This late origin myth or aition justified and validated the descent of the hereditary priesthood of the Boutidai family. His reign was marked by the war between Athens and Eleusis , when the Eleusinians were commanded by Eumolpus , coming from Thrace . An oracle declared that Athens' survival depended on

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3640-404: The product of an attempted syncretism or merely a bricolage of relics accrued over time. On the east porch, immediately before the temple door, was an altar to Zeus Hypatos. Continuing inside in the eastern chamber of the naos would have been the altars to Poseidon and Erechtheus, Hephaistos and Boutes, and thrones of the temple priests. It is here that Athena's peplos might have been displayed. In

3710-638: The prostyle porch of the sanctuary of Athena on the Erechtheum , at the Acropolis of Athens . With the colonization by the Greeks of Southern Italy , hexastyle was adopted by the Etruscans and subsequently acquired by the ancient Romans . Roman taste favoured narrow pseudoperipteral and amphiprostyle buildings with tall columns, raised on podiums for the added pomp and grandeur conferred by considerable height. The Maison Carrée at Nîmes , France ,

3780-486: The reconstruction of the interior of the Erechtheion naos is that it was divided in two in imitation of the opisthodomos of the archaic temple of Athena Polias and that the altar of Athena was in the west half of the chamber and the altars of Erechtheus, Poseidon and Boutes in the other. Alternatively, that the Erechtheion was a replacement for the east cella of the archaic Temple of Athena and would have had an east cross wall. There are two figural sculptural programmes on

3850-588: The resulting trident marks. The altar of Thyechoos stood over the trident marks. Continuing outside was the sanctuary precinct, which may have contained the sacred olive tree, the snake pit, the Tomb of Kekrops and the Pandrosieon. Travellers' accounts of the Erechtheion are relatively scarce before the 18th century, when relations between the Ottoman Empire and Europe began to improve and access to Greece

3920-413: The son of "grain-giving Earth", reared by Athena . The earth-born son was sired by Hephaestus , whose semen Athena wiped from her thigh with a fillet of wool cast to earth, by which Gaia was made pregnant. In the contest for patronage of Athens between Poseidon and Athena, the salt spring on the Acropolis where Poseidon's trident struck was known as the sea of Erechtheus . The second Erechtheus

3990-449: The son-in-law of Erechtheus, was asked to choose his successor from among his many sons and chose Cecrops II, named for the mythic founder-king Cecrops . Thus Erechtheus is succeeded by Cecrops II, his brother, according to a fragment from the poet Casto. But according to pseudo-Apollodorus he was succeeded by his son. The central gods of the Acropolis of Athens were Poseidon Erechtheus and Athena Polias , "Athena patron-guardian of

4060-483: The structure along with its despoliation by antique collectors, including Elgin. This is how one of the caryatids was separated from the rest of the building and ended up in the British Museum. At one moment, Perhaps the greatest damage to the edifice came with the siege of 1826–1827 , when the Maiden Porch and west facade were felled by cannon fire and the masonry joints were scavenged for lead. This ruined state

4130-554: The tomb of Kekrops, mythical king and cult hero to the Athenians; and their relationship to the tutelary deities of the city. For many years, the accepted scholarly opinion has been that the Erechtheion fulfilled a triplicate purpose in its interior design: to "replace the Old Temple [of Athena], to house the old image, and to unite in an organized building several shrines and places of religious significance." The following may be

4200-443: The unfortunate daughters of Erechtheus is comparable to those of the daughters of Hyacinthus of Lacedaemon , and of the daughters of Leos . In the following battle between the forces of Athens and Eleusis, Erechtheus won the battle and slew Eumolpus, but then himself fell, struck down by Poseidon's trident. According to fragments of Euripides ' tragedy Erechtheus , Poseidon avenged his son Eumolpus' death by driving Erechtheus into

4270-434: The various religious and architectural elements within the building remain the subject of debate. The temple was nonetheless a seminal example of the classical Ionic style and was highly influential on later Hellenistic , Roman , and Greek Revival architecture. The classical Erechtheion is the last in a series of buildings approximately on the mid-north site of the Acropolis of Athens , the earliest of which dates back to

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4340-573: The western section, there may have been the tomb of Erechtheus, the xoanon of Athena Polias and perhaps immediately before that a table. Additionally, this room housed the Lamp of Kallimachos , a Hermes, the saltwater well and a collection of spoils from the Persian War. To the north of this chamber was the north porch whose coffered ceiling was pierced supposedly as the entry point of one of Poseidon's thunderbolts; indentations below were thought to be

4410-586: Was Nikolaos Balanos 's in 1902–1909. Dissatisfaction with Balanos's haphazard placement of the ashlar blocks and his use of steel joints that caused additional damage led to the creation of the interdisciplinary Acropolis Restoration Service in 1975, whose conservation work is ongoing. 37°58′20″N 23°43′35″E  /  37.9721°N 23.7265°E  / 37.9721; 23.7265 Erechtheus Erechtheus ( / ɪ ˈ r ɛ k θj uː s , - θ i ə s / ; Ancient Greek : Ἐρεχθεύς ) in Greek mythology

4480-407: Was Protogeneia , Pandora , Procris , Creusa , Oreithyia and Chthonia . Sometimes, his other mentioned children were Orneus , Thespius , Eupalamus , Sicyon and Merope . According to Pseudo-Apollodorus , Erechtheus II had a twin brother named Butes who married Erechtheus' daughter Chthonia, the "earth-born". The brothers divided the royal power possessed by Pandion, Erechtheus taking

4550-399: Was a king of Athens , the founder of the polis and, in his role as god, attached to Poseidon , as "Poseidon Erechtheus". The name Erichthonius is carried by a son of Erechtheus, but Plutarch conflated the two names in the myth of the begetting of Erechtheus. Athenians thought of themselves as Erechtheidai , the "sons of Erechtheus". In Homer 's Iliad (2. 547–48) Erechtheus is

4620-402: Was given a historicizing genealogy as son and heir to King Pandion I of Athens by Zeuxippe , this Pandion being son of Erichthonius. This later king Erechtheus may be distinguished as Erechtheus II. His siblings were Philomela , Procne , Butes and possibly Teuthras . Erechtheus was father, by his wife Praxithea , of sons: Cecrops , Pandorus , Metion and of six daughters, the eldest

4690-474: Was influential in disseminating the Ionic style and the form of the Erechtheion amongst architects and an appreciative public in the 18th and 19th centuries. For a record of the temple's condition prior to its destruction during the Greek War of Independence , there are the detailed drawings of William Gell . Gell's period of study in 1800–1801 coincided with the activity of Lord Elgin , whose despoliation of

4760-426: Was opened. Moreover, the building north of the Parthenon was not identified with Pausanias' description of the Temple of Athena Polias until Spon and Wheler 's account of the topography of the acropolis published in 1682. Their use of ancient sources in the identification of ancient buildings rather than local folklore, as had been the case before, was innovative and presaged the beginning of scholarship with regard to

4830-580: Was replaced between 421 and 407 BC by the present Erechtheum . Continuity of the site made sacred by the presence of Cecrops is inherent in the reference in Nonnus ' Dionysiaca to the Erechtheion lamp as "the lamp of Cecrops". Priests of the Erechtheum and the priestess of Athena jointly took part in the procession to Skiron that inaugurated the Skira festival near the end of the Athenian year . Their object

4900-492: Was the temenos at Skiron of the hero-seer Skiros, who had aided Eumolpus in the war between Athens and Eleusis in which Erechtheus II, the hero-king, was both triumphant and died. That Poseidon and Erechtheus were two names at Athens for the same figure (see below) was demonstrated in the cult at the Erechtheum, where there was a single altar, a single priest and sacrifices were dedicated to Poseidon Erechtheus , Walter Burkert observed, adding "An historian would say that

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