The sculptures of the Parthenon are closely connected with the form and significance of the building. Their technical detail, like their genre and subject, indicates an ensemble integrated with the architectural product. The fate of the sculptures has been that of the temple itself, during its long and tumultuous history. The building has suffered burning, bombing, conversion, and looting. There was at least one fire in antiquity, probably in the days of the Antonines. When the Parthenon was converted to a Christian church, in the 6th or 7th century A.D., the sculptures of the east pediment were taken down to help build a sanctuary apse. Though much of the decorative sculpture was pulverized when Morosini shelled the site in 1687, enough survived for us to be able to reconstruct the two pediment compositions and determine in what order the scenes on the frieze came.
We should be grateful that we have the sketches made by Jacques Carrey shortly before the Venetian siege of 1674, for most of the sculptures were detached from the building by Lord Elgin between 1799 and 1812, to end up in the British Museum. A certain number are still on the Acropolis. A few found their way to the Louvre.

Pentelic marble was used both for the Parthenon's architectural members and for its sculptures. The pieces of marble intended for the sculptures were roughly worked before leaving the quarry. Then they were carted to the Acropolis, where the final hewing took place. Inscriptions recording the accounts for the work tell us that work on the columns was as yet not complete in 442/1 B.C.. This means that the metope-panels - though almost certainly executed earlier - were put in place after that date. The wide variation in quality of work and type of technique which we find in the various panels indicates that different craftsmen were employed on them.

Clearly the work on the metope-panels was a yardstick for choosing from among a host of craftsmen who had flocked to Athens from various parts of Hellas. The frieze was probably put in place in 438 B.C. The pediments must have been finished by 432 B.C., since that was the date the final payments were made.

Pericles appointed Phidias to supervise the work, as we know mainly from Plutarch. Phidias' name appears frequently in accounts of Classical art. But the fact is that we have no basic information about him - to what extent he was in tune with the ideas of Anaxagoras and Protagoras; how close his connection was with Pericles; and how far they worked together to design the programme for the Parthenon's decorative sculptures. We are not in a position to decide which of the surviving sculptures could be from the hand of Phidias. Yet his spirit and style can be seen in both the frieze and the pediment compositions. Two pupils of his are often mentioned as having worked alongside him on the supervision and the creation of the sculptural decorations: Alcamenes from Athens, and Agoracritus from Paros.

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