Temple of Artemis

This is a model of the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, one of the most famous Greek temples to have ever been built, and one of the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World. It has 2,329 pieces, and includes the main temple to Artemis, two colonnades, the central altar to the goddess, and the statue of the goddess inside the temple. I was inspired to begin this project after realizing that the LEGO lamppost, with a double-wheeled rolling skate piece on top, looked a lot like a microscale Ionic column.

Even before classical times, Ionic columns and temples in the eastern Ionian city states were famous for being more beautifully slender and taller than mainland Greek Doric columns and temples (like the Parthenon). The Temple of Artemis was named as one of the seven wonders of the ancient world by several writers of antiquity, including Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus. A famous trait of eastern Ionic temples was having wider spacing between the center-few columns than between the rest of the columns. Another example of this was the Temple at Sardis.

Due to its Ionic architecture and lavish royal patronage, the Temple of Artemis was likely much larger than the most famous of all Greek temples, the Parthenon. This scale is reflected quite well in the size comparison between my model of the Temple of Artemis here, and my older model of the Parthenon. Like the Parthenon, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus would have housed a monumental statue to the enshrined goddess.

The statue of Artemis at Ephesus was quite different from the more naturalistic statues found in other parts of the Greek world. It was archaic in style, and shared esoteric features and symbols with native non-Greek goddesses in that ancient region of Turkey. Rather than the divine huntress from mainstream Greek myth, the Ephesian Artemis was a goddess associated with fertility, and being a protectress of the city of Ephesus. The statue may have worn a mural crown, which is a tall, round crown that looks like a city’s walls. It is a symbol of the goddess’s role as the protector of her city. I used a cupcake piece for that.

Some reconstructions and possible miniatures of the statue show the goddess with a large halo around her back, shoulders, and head. It was cool to use the Asian-style straw hat to represent that. For me, the most exciting piece to use was the LEGO mermaid’s tail to model the tapering lower body as interpreted among many depictions of the Ephesian Artemis.

The Ephesian Temple of Artemis was built in many stages from the Archaic to Hellenistic periods. The largest and most famous stage of the temple was, according to Plutarch, burned to the ground by Herostratus as an act to attain for his name eternal fame. That historical anecdote also explains how Alexander the Great was born the same night the temple was set ablaze. It was later rumored that the goddess Artemis was busy handling Alexander’s birth to save her own temple. Alexander later offered to fund the rebuilding of the temple, but was declined on the basis that “a god doesn’t patronize another god”.

The temple was likely rebuilt at some later point, but eventually fell into disrepair after the closing of pagan sanctuaries by Roman Emperor Theodosius in the 4th century AD. Columns and stones were dismantled and reused in other buildings, including churches. There is a noteworthy historical account that the silversmiths who received and worked metal tribute items for Artemis were very unhappy with the closing of the temple, and tried to advocate for continued worship of Artemis at Ephesus.

There is a rumor that the green columns in the Hagia Sophia were taken from the Temple of Artemis, but this seems to be a medieval legend. Instead, a single, ad-hoc white column is all that stands on the site now, alone reminding the world of the wonder that once stood there.