07_09_09_The Pantheon

The Pantheon_01

The structure we now know as the Roman Pantheon has gone through many phases of reconstruction, alteration and function. This temple to all gods was originally built by Marcus Grippa, adviser to Emperor Augustus, in 25 BC, and thus the inscription in the temple’s original façade reads "'Marcus Agrippa, son of Lucius, Consul for the third time, built this." Sadly, the structure that Grippa built does not longer exist, for it was severely damaged by a fire in 80 AD, and what we actually admire nowadays is the Pantheon that Emperor Hadrian designed and built in the early second century AD. The entrance to the Pantheon, also known as the portico, consists of sixteen majestic Corinthian columns which support an equally massive triangular roof. The walls of this structure are twenty feet thick, and the bronze door that salutes all visitors is about twenty four feet high. And although, the entrance and circular building are quite unique and luxurious, nothing can nearly compare to the beauty and harmony of the Pantheon’s dome. A perfect hemisphere with a 142 foot long diameter crowns the gigantic rotonda and provides it with the only source of natural light through a circular opening at the very top. The Pantheon was consecrated as a church in 609 AD, and later dedicated to Santa Maria and Martyrs by Pope Boniface IV. The building owes its survival to the limited maintenance it received during the middle ages due to its close links to the Christian church. Unfortunately, this transition into Christianity also meant that all pagan idolatry and art was eradicated from the structure. Today the building, that once used to host massive statues of Olympian greatness, contains the tombs of Raphael and past chiefs of the Italian State.
Erick Oran, Survey of Art and Architecture in Italy, University of Florida

The Pantheon_02

From the outside at Piazza Rotunda, the Pantheon does not look like a temple or church of any kind, or even anything so important. Walking in however, we discovered how beautiful it was and learned more about what was inside.
Pantheon means “all the gods” and the building has this name because it was first built as a pagan temple. All of the statues inside were of different gods. However, in order to preserve this great building, they changed it into a church so it would not get destroyed in 609 AD.
The architect is unknown but archaeologists can tell from stamped bricks that it was built in less then a decade in the 120s. Emperor Hadrian was the ruler who executed the construction of the Pantheon and did not care how much it would cost. The outside was covered in bronze until the Emperor Constans II took it away in 663 AD and replaced it with led. Each column outside weighs forty-eight tons and four people can hug one column. The Pantheon is made almost entirely of concrete and it has a thirty foot wide hole or oculus in the top of the building which is one hundred fifty feet high. The floor is all marble and everything inside is symmetrical. Drains, almost unnoticeable, appear on the floor so nothing floods or gets ruined in the rain.
Many tombs lay inside the Pantheon, which does not really seem like a church at all when inside. The Romans used wooden frame work from another building to pour the concrete in to construct this amazing building!
Nicole Dagostino, Survey of Art and Architecture in Italy, St. John’s University