The Piraeus Athena is a bronze statue of the Greek goddess Athena, known for her wisdom, warfare, and protection of cities. She is shown wearing a Doric peplos, a simple but strong dress style common in ancient Greece. The dress has a large fold at the top that falls over her back, and across her chest is the aegis, a special cloth linked to Zeus and Athena, decorated with many tiny snakes to show its power. On her head sits a Corinthian helmet, detailed with two small owls—Athena’s sacred animal, symbolizing wisdom.
The statue once held a spear in one hand and a libation bowl in the other, used for pouring offerings to the gods. Even though these pieces are now missing, the rest of the statue still shows great skill in bronze work.
Scholars think it may have been made by the sculptor Kephisodotos or Euphranor, and it likely dates to the late 4th century BC. Some experts believe it could also be a later piece made in the Hellenistic period, designed to look like earlier classical art.
The statue was found in 1959 in Piraeus, the ancient harbor of Athens. It was discovered in a storeroom along with other bronze statues. These had been hidden there for protection during the Roman siege of Piraeus by Sulla in 86 BC. Thanks to this, the statue survived for centuries and gives us a rare and beautiful example of large-scale bronze sculpture from the ancient world.
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