Athena Parthenos

Athena Parthenos (Greek: Ἀθηνᾶ Παρθένος; literally, "Athena the Virgin") was the title of a massive chryselephantine sculpture of the Greek goddess Athena by Phidias. It was named after an epithet for the goddess herself, and was housed in the Parthenon in Athens. A number of replicas and works inspired by it, both ancient and modern, have been made.

It was the most renowned cult image of Athens, considered one of the greatest achievements of the most acclaimed sculptor of ancient Greece. Phidias began his work around 447 BCE, Lachares removed the gold sheets in 296 BCE to pay his troops, and the bronze was probably gilded thereafter; it was damaged by a fire about 165 BCE but repaired. It continued to stand in the Parthenon in the fifth century CE, when it may have been lost in another fire. An account mentions it in Constantinople in the tenth century, however.