How it really looked like ancient Greek statues and temples?

The ancient Greeks were not big fans of white marble, we think. They painted their statues, reliefs and temples and covered them with patterns, drawn to people, to gods and heroes eyes. How it really looked ancient Greece, can now be seen only in the ultraviolet.

We are used to seeing Greek statues white, painted only in shades of marble. The same stand, in our imagination, the Greek temples with columns. However, many remember that in fact the Greeks were not big fans of monochrome nor to sculpture, nor architecture. They painted their statues in bright colors, painted patterns on the clothes, stressed paint facial features.

The building was also decorated: with colorful patterns, geometric and floral. It turns out that these patterns still can be seen and even to reconstruct.

German archaeologist Vinzenz Brinkmann is aiming at ancient statues and fragments of architectural decorations light the UV lamps and it become visible outlines of the patterns that once covered sculpture and temples. He then recreates the designs and drawings: we can see statues like this, as they saw the Greeks.

Of course, Brinkmann cannot be sure of how to arrange colors is preserved only the outlines of figures, with no indication of what the paint used by the artist. However, the archaeologist tries to use only those dyes that were available in Greece. A green obtained from crushed malachite, blue from azurite mineral, yellow from natural compounds of arsenic, red cinnabar, black from burnt bones and wine.

Unfortunately, those who tried to imitate antiquity in the Renaissance and later, there was no technology that would allow you to see the patterns on them. Therefore, the architecture of classicism, it is believed to be the successor of antiquity, was deprived of the fun of designs and drawings, maintaining pure “antique” white.

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