Apollo Hellenistic Temple

The Temple of Apollo is located in the southwest of Turkey. It remains the most grandiose example of religious architecture of this period during Ancient Ionia. It is unique for its oracle room, hidden behind a forest of columns at its eastern front. This large temple was dedicated to Apollo. Didyma means, “twin” and it was referred to Apollo and Artemis who were twins. Apollo’s temple was in Didyma while Artemis’ was in Miletus. Many believed that the temple had been there since the second millennium BC. Pausanias said the temple was constructed before Greek colonization. Darius I of Persia destroyed the temple in 494 and looted many of its statues. The temple regained its importance in 334 after Alexander the Great conquered Miletus in 334 BC, thus the Milesians began building a new Hellenistic temple on the site. It became the largest temple in the Greek world, which the visitors see today. …show more content…
It appeared to be a large conventional dipteral Ionic temple. The temple was known for its 122 columns during the Roman times but most of them are now in ruins. Only two still survive. The tall cella was surrounded by a double row of columns. The ten columns of the façade rose above seven steps. The columns were sixty feet high and they were spaced eighteen Ionian feet apart, which equals to seventeen feet and six inches. This façade gave access to a twelve-column vestibule. There was a huge opening in the center. No one could enter this door and that is how it got its name “sacred doorway”. There were still constructions during the Roman period. Experts believed that this temple would have been one of the seven wonders of the ancient world if it had been completed. Despite the incompletion, it is still impressive and it is the third largest in the ancient