The architecture of the Near East, especially that of the western Semites, presented a united front which imposed standards of architecture and divine iconography on the Aegean. Even back in the 13th to 12th centuries these architectural styles were adopted by the Mycenaeans. Western Semitic dominance can be seen from the sites of Zinjirli, Tell Halaf and Karatepe, where archaeological finds show that through the 8th and 9th centuries much of northern Syria and southern Anatolia underwent strong Semitic influences. The centre of this was the Phoenician lands and from here new motifs were spread, though with such continuity that the art of the first millennium owed much to the second.

The later style of early Phoenician and Phoenician-influenced temples can be seen from the 14th, 13th and 10th centuries. The 13th century temple at Alalakh had one antechamber and a cella, whereas both the 14th century temple of Hazor and the 10th century temple of Solomon had two antechambers before you reached the room at the rear. The temple of Solomon was long, with a courtyard situated in front containing a font or bowl of lustral water and an altar for sacrifice. The temple door was flanked by two named bronze columns. The temple was in three parts and a priest would pass further back into the temple until reaching the Most Holy area at the back - a dark, square room reached by a door covered by a curtain. The central room was rectangular and held a golden altar and cedar table. Before the Greeks anthropomorphised their gods, the Greek world knew no temples such as these, although they were common in the Near East. Thus the Greek temple as the home of the god that held the cult image in the naos was a creation of the 8th century.

Architecture and temple building was an area where Phoenician influences could certainly be felt and "The Greeks themselves traced much of their originals to Eastern origins, to Egypt and Phoenician communities of the Levant." The temples of the Near East were great stone and brick affairs with the lower courses generally being of stone elaborated with orthostats and friezes. It was on the Greek Islands that some of the first temples were seen, either built by Phoenicians or by those who met or lived with these traders; on Cyprus, Greeks, Phoenicians and others lived side by side. The early architecture of the settlers in Cyprus was a form of monumental architecture as can be seen by their temple complexes at Palaipaphos, Kition and Enkomi. The Mycenaeans’ use of Canaanite forms of temple building was reinforced by later Phoenician settlers and from the late Cypriot II and III periods, Kition reflects these earlier influences. Kition was a well-established Phoenician settlement by the 9th century, with a temple to a fertility goddess whom the Phoenicians identified with their goddess Astarte. Another Cyprian temple, that of Aphrodite in Paphos, was established by Phoenicians from Askalon. The Phoenician presence arrived here at the beginning of the first millennium, but the temple site was first established at the end of the Mycenaean period. When the Phoenicians arrived on Cyprus, Cypriot traditions were submerged beneath those of the Orient, and sunk still further into oblivion with the arrival of western Greeks, as Cyprus became an intermediary place between East and West.

Pillars: The Mycenaeans had not needed temples; their places of worship were either natural sites or rooms within houses. Their gods were represented by natural items such as trees and pillars; this feature paralleled contemporary Phoenician cult practices in which sacred stones played a large part. In Phoenician architecture, the column fulfilled a ritual rather than purely structural function, with pillars possibly representing gods. Records show that the son of Abibal erected a gold column in the temple of Baal Shamen (Greek Zeus Olympus). At Kition there were two free-standing pillars either side of the central opening as well as 28 forming the support for a pair of porticoes. Baetylic shapes of the god are present on Crete, and Cyrenaica has a small Baetylic altar. Mycenaean connections can be seen from Crete where there is a stalactite in the cave to the goddess Eileithya at Amnisus. Three pillars at the Kommos shrine may have represented a triad of deities, one of them possibly Artemis. Further proof of the sacredness of pillars comes from pillar depictions on rings. Pillar worship and pillar shrines were particularly common in the Syro-Palestine area in the second millennium and they are mentioned in the Hebrew scripture as free standing masseba or baetyls. These showed some similarities with the obelisks of Egypt. There is also an Egyptianising style that dates to the 7th century.

Pillar Shrines: Temple B at Kommos is one of our best examples of a pillar shrine. It would appear to be inspired by Phoenician models and stands out on Crete, because unlike in Cyprus, there are no indigenous Cretan pillar shrines. It was first used c800-760 BC, a period when the Phoenicians would appear to have been expanding westwards. Compared to other known Eastern pillars, those of this tripillar shrine are relatively small. There are similarities with the pillar from Kition and a single pillar found at a 7th century Greek temple at Sukas. There does not seem to have been the wholesale adoption of pillar worship by the later Greeks that can be seen from Minoan tripartite shrines. Another shrine, at Byblos, was a major centre of pillar worship, and pillar worship is still traceable at Sarepta from an 8th century shrine of Tanit-Ashtart. There were between one and three columns at Bit Hilani and Tyre had two columns of gold and emerald flanking the front of a god's tomb.

Decoration and styles: New features appeared in the art and architecture of this period: the lotus, guilloche, palmette, spiral and rosette. These Eastern styles were commonly seen on early temples and on shrine representations such as that found at Idalion which displayed two lotus-capped columns. Cyprus also produced proto-Aeolic capitals bearing the Phoenician palmette. The prototypes for capitals were essentially Eastern as were most architectural forms, though not all Eastern types were copied. New Greek art styles using Eastern prototypes appeared after 750 BC when Assyria was on the rise. The spread from Egypt of the proto-Ionic capital in the form of a lotus blossom occurred in the 10th century when it entered Phoenicia and from here it came to Cyprus and Ionia. Phoenician ivories show this palmette, as do pilasters from Cyprus and a stone capital found at Arkades on Crete.

Orthostats and pediment relief: Near Eastern temples used orthostats, such as those found at Tell Halaf dating from the 9th century. Palaces, temples and other public buildings of the neo-Hittites in northern Syria were typically ornamented with many reliefs carved on orthostats set along the lower walls. From the second half of the 8th century, further connections can be seen between decorative motifs on seals, reliefs seen at Karatepe and tombs at Pithekoussai. Furthermore, figures on Syrian stele show similarities to the relief found at Kommos B. A Near Eastern connection can also be made between one of the Tell Halaf orthostats and the limestone pediment of the 7th century Temple A at Prinias. The orthostat depicts the slaying of Humbaba by two heroes and the styles of the slayings are similar. Temple A also has a horse frieze, a minor relief frieze of the Eastern type, and it is likely that it was at ground level rather than around the top as the horses have abnormally long legs.

Image: The cult image is common in the religion of the western Semites, Egyptians and Mesopotamians, and from the late stages of Minoan-Mycenaean civilisation statuettes of goddesses appear. From the Greek Dark Ages there are no images of the gods until the 8th century, when statuettes of bronze and clay began to be made. These early images tended to be basic, such as the Apollo from Amyklai which is pillar shaped, or otherwise in the warrior style with shield, spear or lance.

Life-size Human statuary: With the setting down of the Greek pantheon in the works of Homer and Hesiod came the desire to depict those gods as life-size statues displaying traits that would make it easy to identify which god was which. There are Syro-Hittite bronze statues of the warrior god brandishing his weapon in his right hand. In much the same manner, early depictions of Zeus and Poseidon have both carrying a weapon; a thunderbolt and trident respectively. The first statues were probably carved from wood, later being produced in limestone, a medium almost as easy to carve as wood. This early statuary often copied the forms set out in votive offerings. Eastern influences were strong and Egypt is sometimes named as the origin of statuary, as Egyptian gods were predominantly depicted in stone. Kourai were often used to mark out graves or to represent worshippers in permanent attendance upon their gods. One of the earliest found pieces, the Auxerre goddess, falls into an area somewhere between votive offering and cult image. She is a limestone statue several feet tall and may well have fulfilled a function similar to modern day Catholic Madonnas. Her style is typical of Daedalic workmanship as it begins to move away from a direct copy of a Syrian original. Her depiction still remains typical of an Astarte fertility pose; pronounced breasts with one arm raised and drawn across the body. Her nose is set high, she has a triangular face and her wig-like hair shows more of a Syrian than Egyptian influence. The statue also shows traces of paint, and polychromy would appear to have been the rule on free standing and architectural sculpture. Greek full-size sculpture only began c660 BC and appears to follow Egyptian fashions in the stance of the male figure.

Temple Guardians: With reference to the Greeks, temple guardians comprise two major types: lintel goddesses and guardian felines. The Greek lintel goddess was generally on a similar scale to the Auxerre goddess, and similar to those found in the Near East; a seated goddess found at Catul Hüyük has distinct similarities to the Hera at Tiryns. At the Gortyn temple of Athena there was an unusual example; a life-size stone figure of a seated goddess. This temple was a rectangular building dating from 800 BC, and was built in a north Syrian tradition. Near Eastern influences can also be seen in the seated limestone goddess from Prinias of 650-625 BC. Typically in the Near East, stone lions were used to guard gates to temples and palaces. In the Greek world, too, guardian lions performed the same functions at Prinias and near the tomb of Menecrartes in Corcyra, where a limestone lion was discovered. This latter piece is of early workmanship and has a formalised treatment of the head suggesting it was probably made from a description of the beast, as the artist was not likely to have seen a lion. The Greek adoption of animal sculpture was well developed by the end of the 7th century.

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