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It was built on the Acropolis-a rocky citadel at the heart of the city.
建于雅典市中心的石头城堡—卫城之上，
Its central hall housed a colossal statue of the goddess herself, made of gold and ivory.
中央大厅有雅典娜的巨大雕像，用象牙与黄金制成。
And everywhere there was sculpture.
石雕则无处不在。
Around all four sides of the building, above the columns and easily seen by everybody approaching, was a series of 92 square relief carvings, known as metopes.
在建筑物四面柱子的顶端，环绕着九十二幅系列方形石雕，被称为排档间饰，只要靠近神庙便清晰可见。
Like all the other sculpture in the building, these would have originally been brightly coloured in red and blue and gold, and it's one of these metopes, now without its colour, that I want to take as our object to think about Athens around 440 BC.
如建筑物中的其他雕像一样，它们也曾被饰以艳丽的红、蓝、金色，而如今，颜色都已褪去。我挑选的雕像便是其中之一，我想通过它来讲述公元前440年的雅典。
The metopes are all about battles-battles between the Olympian gods and the Giants, between Athenians and Amazons and, in the ones I want to focus on, between Lapiths and Centaurs.
这些排档间饰都与战争有关—奥林匹亚众神与巨人的战争，雅典人与亚马孙女战士的战争，以及本文将要讲述的半人马与拉庇泰人的战争。
The figures are almost free-standing, and the human ones are about four feet tall.
雕像中的形象几乎都彼此独立，人像高达一米。
Centaurs-half horse, half human-are attacking the Lapiths, who are a legendary Greek people.
半人马正在攻击传说中的希腊民族拉庇泰人。
According to the story, the Lapiths made the mistake of giving the Centaurs wine at the marriage feast of their king.
故事里说，在拉庇泰国王的婚宴上，人们犯了个错误，
The Centaurs got horribly drunk and attempted to rape the women, while their leader tried to carry off the bride.
让半人马喝醉了酒。烂醉的半人马企图强奸妇女，他们的首领则想掠走新娘。
A general bitter battle ensued, and the Lapiths-the Greeks-were ultimately victorious over their half-animal Centaur enemies.
一场恶战由此展开，拉庇泰人，也就是希腊人，赢得了最终胜利，战胜了半人马。
The one I'm looking at now is particularly moving; there are only two figures-a Centaur rearing triumphantly over a fallen Lapith, who lies dying on the ground.
本节中的这幅雕像尤为动人：只有两个角色，其中，半人马摆出胜利者的姿态，正要踏向倒地挣扎的拉庇泰人。
As with so many of the Parthenon sculptures, this one is damaged, and we can no longer see the expression in the dying Lapith's face, or the aggression in the eyes of the Centaur.
如众多的帕台农浮雕一样， 这幅浮雕也已毁损，如今，我们无法看清垂死的拉庇泰人脸上的表情，也看不清半人马凶狠的眼神。
