<P> Around 500 BC the Hekatompedon was dismantled to make place for a new grander building, the "Older Parthenon" (often referred to as the Pre-Parthenon, "early Parthenon"). For this reason, Athenians decided to stop the construction of the Olympieion temple which was connoted with the tyrant Peisistratos and his sons and, instead, used the Piraeus limestone destined for the Olympieion to build the Older Parthenon . In order to accommodate the new temple, the south part of the summit was cleared, made level by adding some 8,000 two - ton blocks of limestone, a foundation 11 m (36 ft) deep at some points, and the rest was filled with soil kept in place by the retaining wall . However, after the victorious Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, the plan was revised and marble was used instead . The limestone phase of the building is referred to as Pre-Parthenon I and the marble phase as Pre-Parthenon II . In 485 BC, construction stalled to save resources as Xerxes became king of Persia and war seemed imminent . The Older Parthenon was still under construction when the Persians indeed invaded and sacked the city in 480 BC . The building was burned and looted, along with the Ancient Temple and practically everything else on the rock . After the Persian crisis had subsided, the Athenians incorporated many architectural parts of the unfinished temple (unfluted column drums, triglyphs, metopes, etc .) into the newly built northern curtain wall of the Acropolis, where they served as a prominent "war memorial" and can still be seen today . The devastated site was cleared of debris . Statuary, cult objects, religious offerings and unsalvageable architectural members were buried ceremoniously in several deeply dug pits on the hill, serving conveniently as a fill for the artificial plateau created around the classic Parthenon . This "Persian debris" is the richest archaeological deposit excavated on the Acropolis . </P> <P> After winning at Eurymedon during 468 BC, Cimon and Themistocles ordered the reconstruction of the southern and northern walls of the Acropolis . Most of the major temples, including the Parthenon, were rebuilt by order of Pericles during the so - called Golden Age of Athens (460--430 BC). Phidias, an Athenian sculptor, and Ictinus and Callicrates, two famous architects, were responsible for the reconstruction . </P> <P> During 437 BC, Mnesicles started building the Propylaea, a monumental gate at the western end of the Acropolis with Doric columns of Pentelic marble, built partly upon the old propylaea of Peisistratos . These colonnades were almost finished during 432 BC and had two wings, the northern one decorated with paintings by Polygnotus . About the same time, south of the Propylaea, building started on the small Ionic Temple of Athena Nike in Pentelic marble with tetrastyle porches, preserving the essentials of Greek temple design . After an interruption caused by the Peloponnesian War, the temple was finished during the time of Nicias' peace, between 421 BC and 409 BC . </P> <P> Construction of the elegant temple of Erechtheion in Pentelic marble (421--406 BC) was in accordance with a complex plan which took account of the extremely uneven ground and the need to circumvent several shrines in the area . The entrance, facing east, is lined with six Ionic columns . Unusually, the temple has two porches, one on the northwest corner borne by Ionic columns, the other, to the southwest, supported by huge female figures or Caryatids . The eastern part of the temple was dedicated to Athena Polias, while the western part, serving the cult of the archaic king Poseidon - Erechtheus, housed the altars of Hephaestus and Voutos, brother of Erechtheus . Little is known about the original plan of the interior which was destroyed by fire during the first century BC and has been rebuilt several times . </P>

Why were temples and public buildings located within the acropolis