Thermal Infrared Investigation of Hephaestus Temple in Ancient Agora of Athens

Infrared Thermography and evaluation (IRT) is a non-destructive testing technique, with a wide range of applications in the field of cultural heritage protection. In this study, IRT was used for the investigation of the temple of Hephaestus, one of the most well preserved ancient Greek temples and a great example of Architecture of Classical Times. There was an attempt to apply this IRT technique in a systematic way, in order to evaluate the most important factors affecting its performance. The examined factors examined fall into three categories: the first ones are climatic conditions (air temperature, relative humidity, solar radiation, wind speed); the second ones are factors related to the building itself (materials, geometry, microclimate) and thirdly factors associated with the capturing of the thermal image (shooting time, angle, distance). For those reasons, thermographic inspection of the monument was conducted in all four seasons of the year at different distances and different times throughout the day. IRT with the aid of suitable software has proven to be a valuable method for monitoring temperature changes of marble through time.