Pictures photos & images of Paestum Ancient Greek Archaeological site, Italy. Paestum lies on the southern Italian coast 85 km south of Naples. Photos by photographer Paul E Williams. Founded around the end of the 7th century BC by colonists from the Greek city of Sybaris, and originally known as Poseidonia. Archaeological evidence has indicated that the two cultures, Greek and Oscan, were able to thrive alongside one another. Later it became the Roman city of Paestum in 273 BC after the Graeco-Italian Poseidonians sided with the loser, Pyrrhus, in war against Rome during the first quarter of the third century BC. During the invasion of Italy by Hannibal the city remained faithful to Rome and afterwards was granted special favours such as the minting of its coinage. The city continued to prosper during the Roman imperial period, but started to go into decline between the 4th and 7th centuries. It was abandoned during the Middle Ages and its ruins only came to notice again in the 18th century, following the rediscovery of the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. The main features of Paestum today are the standing remains of three major temples which were built in the Doric style in the first half of the 6th century BC. The city of Paestum covers an area of approximately 120 hectares of which only the 25 hectares that contain the three main temples that have been excavated so far. The temple of Hera was built around 550 BC by the Greek colonists and is the oldest surviving temple in Paestum. The temple next to the Temple of Hera was built in about 460–450 BC and it was originally thought to have been dedicated to Poseidon-Neptune but recent studies have now attributed it to Apollo in his capacity as doctor. It stands on a 3 step base with a doric colonnade of 6x14 columns. There are 3 rooms of which the central one, hall n.2, is where the cult statue would have stood and which. It has a central isle and 2 naives divided from each other by 2 rows of columns. The original sacrificial altar was at the East end of the building but a newer altar closer to the eastern frontage from the first century BC. shows that the cult was still very much alive in Roman Paestum. The architect of the Temple of Poseidon was clearly inspired by the Parthenon in Athens. The third Greek Doric temple at the Paestum archaeological site at a higher level is the the Temple of Ceres (probably dedicated to Athena) is dated to around 500 BC.

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Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paestum
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