Which war is depicted on the north metopes of the Parthenon?
Answer
Trojan War
Answer
Trojan War
Which war is depicted on the north metopes of the Parthenon? The north metopes depict the Trojan War, especially episodes connected with the fall and sack of Troy. The damaged reliefs formed one of four mythological battle themes distributed around the temple.
The Parthenon had 92 metopes in total. The east side represented the Gigantomachy, the struggle between the Olympian gods and the Giants; the west showed the Amazonomachy; and the south focused mainly on the Centauromachy, the battle between Lapiths and Centaurs. The north therefore presented the Trojan cycle, in which Greek forces attacked Troy after Paris took Helen to the city.
The exact identification of many northern figures remains difficult because the reliefs were damaged by Christian iconoclasm and by the 1687 explosion. Scholars debate individual scenes and their sequence, but the broad subject is conventionally identified as the Trojan War or the fall of Troy, also called the Ilioupersis. That uncertainty explains why some references say “fall of Troy” rather than naming the wider war.
Source: Wikipedia · fact-checked Sept. 2026