The column bases of about 460 Greek monuments from (proto)geometric to late Hellenistic times in the Greek home territory and on the Peloponnese, the Greek islands and in Asia minor, as well as examples from Greek colonies of the Magna Graecia and others, are covered. Twelve different types of Greek column, some variants and modifications and a few special forms can be distinguished. The different types were studied for their distribution, choice of materials, combination with forms of columns and building styles, form, fluting or decoration, proprotions, dating, origin, derivation, stone carving and technique; the results are summarised in a synopsis spanning all the different forms. The “foot” of the Ionian or Corinthian column, in contrast to the shaft and the capital, provided room for creative design; the individually formed types of column bases with a particular area of distribution were used as a characteristic form of expression for local architectural traditions.
The subject of the present study is the Greek column base – the “foot” of the Ionian column, whose architectural shape evolved from the early first millenium B.C. up to the late Hellenistic era.
The column bases of about 460 different Greek monuments from (proto)geometric to late Hellenistic times – spanning a period of more than 900 years – in the Greek home territory and on the Peloponnese, the Greek islands and in Asia minor, as well as examples from Greek colonies in southern Italy and Sicily, the Black Sea region and the Nile Delta, are covered. Landmarks of Hellenistic cantral and southern Italian, Ptolemaic and Punic architecture with Greek column bases were also included in the study, as well as some isolated remnants of the Hellenistic world’s Eastern periphery.
Twelve different types of Greek column bases, some variants and modifications and a few special forms can be distinguished and, in part, classified in a new way. The different forms were studied for their distribution, choice of materials, combination with forms of columns and building styles, forms, fluting or decoration, proprotions, dating, origin, derivation, stone carving and technique; the results are summarised in a synopsis spanning all the different forms.
The analysis of the column bases shows, among other things, that the “foot” of the Ionian or Corinthian column , in contrast to the shaft and the capital, provided room for creative design, and the various individually formed types of column base with a particular area of distribution were apparently used as a characteristic form of expression for local architectural traditions. This is shown, for example, in the use of “exotic” Asia Minor column bases on monuments in temples with more than regional importance, such as the treasure houses of Clazonenae and Massalia, the Athenians’ Hall in Delphi or the Ptolemies’ votive offering in Olypmpia, which point to the origin of the founders, a place of military conflict or the home of the recipient. The conscious readoption of the Ionian-Carian tradition of the archaic Ephesian column bases in late classical buildings of the Carian Hecatomnidean dynasty in Labraunda and Halicarnassus after an interruption of roughly a century during the co-called Ionian remaissance also illustrates this.
The new designs of column bases at the temple of Nike on the Athenian Acropolis and the temple of Apollo in Bassai-Phigalia in the second half of the 5th century, which are influenced by the Ionian column bases, being independent “Attic” or “Peloponnesian” types of bases, are also motivated by the need to assimilate the Ionian column as received in Attica and on the Peloponnese using individual local base types.
„Zusammengefasst ist die Arbeit von Uta Dirschedl eine sehr umfangreiche und mit immensem Fleiß aus profunder Literaturkenntnis zusammengetragene Materialsammlung, die sehr gut recherchiert und systematisch erschlossen ist.“
Von Christof Hendrich
In: Bonner Jahrbücher Bd. 214 (2014), S. 333-334.
Dr Uta Dirschedl (*1968)
Studied classical archaelogy, art history and ancient history at the University of Regensburg (and Würzburg)
2003 Ph.D., supervised by Prof. Burkhardt Wesenberg at the Chair for Classical Archaeology at the University of Regensburg, with her dissertation “Typology of Greek Column Bases”
2003/2004 Wülfing travel grant of the German Archaeological Institute (DAI)
2004/2005 Advanced training grant of the DAI
2005-2013 Academic consultant/head of the schloars‘ archive at the DAI’s main office in Berlin
Research projects:
2003-2013 “The archaic temple of Apollo (temple II) in Didyma”
since 2011 with Dr Andreas Oettel “The city walls of Lissus/Lezha in Albania”
In the series of “Archäologische Forschungen” (Archaeological Studies), monographs on the various areas of research in Classical Archaeology are published, mainly concentrating on studies concerning architecture, urban research, topography and everyday culture of Greece, Asia Minor, and the periphery of the Greek world. The chronological scope ranges from the beginning of periodized history to late antiquity. The following volumes, partly to be published in sub-series, will present the findings of research and excavations in the Hellenistic and Roman towns of Priene, Aizanoi and Pompeii. “Archäologische Forschungen” are edited by the Head Office of the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut (German Archaeological Institute) in Berlin.
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