Practice question · Match the pairs
Match each Parthenon refinement to the illusion it corrects.
- Entasis (columns swell at mid-height)
- Upward-curving stylobate
- Thicker corner columns
- Columns leaning slightly inward
- A level platform looks like it sags
- Against bright sky they would look thin
- Vertical columns look like they splay outward
- Straight shafts look pinched in the middle
Hints
- Each refinement corrects an optical illusion.
- Straight lines would appear to sag or splay.
Show the answer
- Entasis (columns swell at mid-height) → Straight shafts look pinched in the middle
- Upward-curving stylobate → A level platform looks like it sags
- Thicker corner columns → Against bright sky they would look thin
- Columns leaning slightly inward → Vertical columns look like they splay outward
Why
Four corrections, one philosophy: the building is bent everywhere so that it will be perceived as perfectly straight. Hardly a true line exists in the most "rational" building ever made.
Practise Classical Greek Art
The app has 5 more questions on this lesson, and keeps your place in the course. History I is free to start.
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