Tuesday, August 26, 2014
Easy to Forget
Patrick Leigh Fermor (1915-2011), Mani: Travels in the Southern Peloponnese (London: John Murray, 1958; rpt. New York: New York Review Books, 2006), p. 271:
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It is easy to forget that the Parthenon and Delphi and Olympia were painted ox-blood and deep blue and ochre, and that the hosts of polychrome, black-eyed and staring statuary bristled with gold ornaments. The insides of the temples were obscure and mysterious and black smoke darkened the giant chryselephantine statues. They were curtained in purple and dripping with honey and wine and glistening with oil and blood, while the reek of carrion and burning meat filled the batlike gloom.
