Copy of a Parthenon Marble

The fragment belongs to a draped figure on the east side of the Parthenon frieze, the magnificent temple built in 449 to 438 BC on the Acropolis of Athens and dedicated to Athena Parthenos (Virgin).The frieze decorated the outside of the cella for about 160 metres and depicted the participants in the Panathenaic procession, the most important religious festival in honour of the goddess. This began on the west side with a procession of knights, followed by the elderly, musicians and bearers of offerings (north and south friezes) that converge on the eastern side, where the offering of the peplos to Athena in the presence of an assembly of divinities is representedThe fragment of the foot exhibited here belongs to the latter scene: it corresponds to the right leg of Artemis, the virgin goddess protector of fertility, birth and youth, seated between her brother Apollo and the goddess of love Aphrodite, next to her son Eros.It is not known how Fagan came into possession of the artefact.This is the slab VI, known from drawings of the 17" century (Carrey 1674). Already incomplete in the plaster reproductions of Fauvel (1787), the representation has been largely destroyed, except for a fragment of the left portion, exhibited in the Acropolis Museum in Athens. Here the entire frieze was reconstructed by combining the original fragments remaining in situ with the casts of parts lost or held in other museums (especially the British Museum in London).