The church of Hagios Georgios at Nemea (photo: courtesy of M. Chrysafi-Zografou).
The church of Hagios Georgios lies at the west end of the town of Nemea, beside a small pine tree grove. According to old oral testimonies the church had been a dependency (a metochion) of the monastery of Ha¬gios Georgios of Pheneos. Actually the same testimo¬nies talk about the existence of monks’ cells, a dining room (trapeza), stores and stables at the area of the adjacent small wood that served the monks, who culti¬vated the monastery’s fields in the area.
The church is a single nave, long vaulted basilica, 5.50 m wide and 10.60 m long without the apse, with an abbreviated dome at the center. In its interior five blind arches line each long side and over them there is a barrel vault. The longitudinal vault is interrupted in the center by two transversal higher barrel vaults with a dome in the middle.
This building type is quite common in the Peloponnese, as well as in the area of Corinthia. Morphological features of the church, such as the plain octagonal drum of the dome with four slender windows, the arched doorways on the west and south facades, the characteristic form of the tiny, flamboyant arches on the apse windows and those at the central part of the north and south sides, are traced in many other religious structures of the region.
This roofing typology is encountered in other churches of Corinthia, such as the ones of Agios Georgios (1700) in Sofiko, Agios Antonios and Hypapante at the same village, and also at the today demolished church of Agios Demetrios at Stefani.
In the interior the walls are lime-washed now, but there are two wall-painted blind arches by the built templon. The lower zone at its west side is also wall-painted, while its higher zone is decorated with wood-carvings.
The entrance to the church(photo: courtesy of M. Chrysafi-Zografou). The church is built with rubble masonry that form roughly horizontal courses with horizontal broken tiles in between the stones. At the building corners and the door shafts big perpendicular cut stones are used, together with architectural members in second use from ancient buildings (spolia).
Having in mind the date of the construction of the katholikon at the monastery of Hagios Georgios of Phe¬neos in 1693 and the close similarities in masonry and other morphological features between the two church¬es (Pheneou and Nemea), a date can be proposed at the first half of the 18th century and most possibly just after 1700 for the construction of Hagios Georgios at Nemea.
SOURCES
Theocharidou Kalliopi – Ζografou-Chrysafi Metaxoula, «Ο ναός του Αγιώργη Νεμέας» (The Church of Hagios Georgios at Nemea)», Εκκλησίες στην Ελλάδα μετά την Άλωση τ. 7, εκδ. Μυδρονία, Thessaloniki, 2013, 51-56.
Eleni I. Kanetaki
The groundfloor plan of the church (Theocharidou Kalliopi – Ζografou-Chrysafi Metaxoula, «Ο ναός του Αγιώργη Νεμέας» (The Church of Hagios Georgios at Nemea)»,Εκκλησίες στην Ελλάδα μετά την Άλωση τ. 7, εκδ. Μυδρονία, Thessaloniki, 2013, 51-56.)
Longitudinal section of the church (Theocharidou Kalliopi – Ζografou-Chrysafi Metaxoula, «Ο ναός του Αγιώργη Νεμέας» (The Church of Hagios Georgios at Nemea)»,Εκκλησίες στην Ελλάδα μετά την Άλωση τ. 7, εκδ. Μυδρονία, Thessaloniki, 2013, 51-56.)
Northern facade of the church (Theocharidou Kalliopi – Ζografou-Chrysafi Metaxoula, «Ο ναός του Αγιώργη Νεμέας» (The Church of Hagios Georgios at Nemea)»,Εκκλησίες στην Ελλάδα μετά την Άλωση τ. 7, εκδ. Μυδρονία, Thessaloniki, 2013, 51-56.)
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