<P> In the sixth century BCE a cult of Athena Nike was established and a small temple was built using Mycenaean fortification and Cyclopean masonry . After the temple was demolished by the Persians in 480 BCE a new temple was built over the remains . The new temple construction was underway in 449 BCE and was finished around 420 BCE . </P> <P> The temple sat untouched until it was demolished in 1686 by the Turks who used the stones to build defences . In 1834 the temple was reconstructed after the independence of Greece . In 1998 the temple was dismantled so that the crumbling concrete floor could be replaced and its frieze was removed and placed in the new Acropolis Museum that opened in 2009 . The Temple of Athena Nike is often closed to visitors as work continues . The new museum exhibit consists of fragments of the site before the Persians were thought to have destroyed it in 480 BCE . Sculptures from the friezes have been salvaged such as: deeds of Hercules, statue of Moscophoros, a damaged sculpture of a goddess credited to Praxiteles and the Rampin horseman, as well as epigraphic dedications, decrees, and stelae . </P> <P> The Temple of Athena Nike was finished around 420 BC, during the Peace of Nicias . It is a tetrastyle (four column) Ionic structure with a colonnaded portico at both front and rear facades (amphiprostyle), designed by the architect Kallikrates . The columns along the east and west fronts were monolithic columns . The temple ran 8 metres (27 ft) long by 5.5 metres (18.5 ft) wide and 7 metres (23 ft) tall . The total height from the stylobate to the acme of the pediment while the temple remained intact was a modest 7 metres (23 ft). The ratio of height to diameter of the columns is 7: 1, the slender proportions creating an elegance and refinement not encountered in the normal 9: 1 or 10: 1 of Ionic buildings . Constructed from white Pentelic marble, it was built in stages as war - starved funding allowed . </P> <P> The famous frieze of Nike adjusting her sandal is an example of Wet drapery . Wet drapery involves showing the form of the body but also concealing the body with the drapery of the clothing . Some friezes are from the Persian and Peloponnesian wars . The friezes contained a cavalry scene from the battle of Marathon and a Greek victory over the Persians at the battle of Plataea . The battles represent Greek and Athenian dominance through military power and historical events . A statue of Nike stood in the cella, or otherwise referred to as a naos . Nike was originally the "winged victory" goddess (see the winged Nike of Samothrace). The Athena Nike statue's absence of wings led Athenians in later centuries to call it Apteros Nike or wingless victory, and the story arose that the statue was deprived of wings so that it could never leave the city . </P>

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