Welcome to Architectural
History II
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
What is architecture?
Human necessity A space
Shelter…
Structural Functional component
Form
Shape Aesthetic component
Color
Style
It address Physical, Spiritual, Psychological and Emotional needs
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Fundamental Principles of Architecture
Vitruvian characteristics:
• Roman architect and engineer Vitruvius defined
• architecture’s characteristics to include:
1) Firmitas:structural integrity, firmness, well made
2) Utilitas: usefulness, functionality, commodity
3) Venustas: beauty, delight
Vitruvian
characteristics can
be found one way
or another in most
buildings and
constructions
from antiquity
through the
present.
Prehistoric Caves/ The Lascaux Caves, Dordogne Valley, Southern France Disney Concert Hall. Los Angeles CA
Architectural space is fist of all utilitarian. Architectural art begins physical and ends Psychological”
James O’Gorman
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
story
al
ental
Gathering societies Stonehenge Sumerians Egyptian Old Kingdom
Architecture in Prehistoric Times: Paleolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic periods, as well as portions of the
Bronze and Iron Ages
- humans constructed earthen mounds, stone circles, megaliths, and structures
- Monumental structures
- Thatch and mud structures.
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Timeline:
• Beginning of prehistory 3.3 Million Year ago-3,500 BCE
beginning of recorded history
• Sumerians develop a whiten language/systems 3500 BCE
• Construction of Stonehenge ca 2900-1400 BCE
Old Kingdom 2549-2134 BCE
• Egyptian Old Kingdom Middle Kingdom 2040-1640 BCE
New Kingdom 1550-1070 BCE
• The Greek World
• The Roman world
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
The beginnings of Architecture
Beginning of prehistory 3.3 Million Years ago
Paleolithic literary means “Old Stone”
ca.35,000 BCE 3500 BCE
Gathering societies
Cooperative hunting
primary means of obtaining food (traditions)
• Foraging
• Hunting
• fishing
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Gathering societies
Cooperative hunting
Migrant communities
Relocate close to
• Water
• Food
• And temporary shelter
tent-link structures made of wooden poles or animal bones,
covered with grass or animal skin and bones.
Prehistoric Settlements and Megalithic Construction
Small clan or Family level cooperative hunting
Protection and security
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Megalithic
Megalithic Construction:
Construction: Stonehenge
Stonehenge CA 2900-1400 BCE • A prehistoric
monument on
Salisbury, England
• Consists of an outer
ring of vertical sarsen
standing stones
• Each around 13 feet
high, seven feet wide,
and weighing around
25 tons
• Topped by connecting
horizontal lintel stones
The name means “hanging” or “suspended” stones
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Why Stonehenge is
important?
It is the most architecturally
sophisticated prehistoric
stone circle in the world.
Together with inter-related
monuments and their
associated landscapes, they
help us to understand
Neolithic and Bronze Age
ceremonial and mortuary
practices.
Megalithic Construction
Terms
Lintel
Mega=Large
lithos = Stone
other characteristic architecture of the Neolithic
Trilithon= “Three stones”
post It is a megalithic structure consisting of two large
post upright stones (post) supporting a third stone set
horizontally across the top (lintel = capstone). It is
commonly used in the context of megalithic
monuments
Stonehenge
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Megalithic Construction: Stonehenge CA 2900-1400 BCE
Megalithic
Mega=Large
lithos = Stone
Ability to
Organize materials
And labor for
Ceremonial purposes
• Spiritual need
The name means “hanging” or “suspended” stones
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Connections with ancient astronomy
• Organize materials
• Labor for
• Ceremonial purposes
• How they build it the
available technology in
ca 2900- 1400 BCE?
• Transportation of megastores
• Connections with ancient
astronomy
Transportation and building techniques
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Archeological evidences:
Could have been a burial ground at the beginnings (human bone 3000 BC)
Place with a religious, astronomical and pilgrimage significance
Neolithic people of Britain began to erect a monumental stone structure known as
“Stonehenge” on the Salisbury Plain (5000 years ago).
The Sumerians • Mathematics
• Astronomy
The Oldest Known Civilization • Sexagesimal system:
5000-3500 BCE
• calculation of time and
angles, the multiple
divisibility of the
number 60
• the Greek day of 12
“double-hours”
• The zodiac and its
signs.
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Megalithic Construction: Stonehenge
5,000 years ago
Southern Iraq
Other civilizations in the area:
•Sumerians, Babylonians,
Assyrians and Persians
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Discovering of
Supper food: Wheat
The people combined hunting and gathering with keeping
animals and growing cereals.
Storage
Domesticated animals
Agricultural farming
Growing cereals: discovering of supper food: Wheat
The beginnings of writing
Cuneiform characters
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Adobe
A building material made from earth and
Lintel organic materials, common in ancient
cultures specially in arid lands. Adobe is
Spanish work for mudbrick or sun dried
brick
Adobe was one of the first materials
ancient humans used to create buildings,
post dating as far back as the 8th century B.C.
post The word "adobe" is Spanish,
but etymologists trace its origins to an old
Arabic word, al-tob or al-tub, meaning
"brick."
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
Megalithic Construction: Stonehenge
Cultural level of sophistication: • 5,000 years ago, Cities gradually emerged
• 3000 BCE : Western Europe remain in the stone in Mesopotamian region: Ur, Uruk, Lagash,
age/Some Sumerian city had population of 34,000 Nippur, Kish Umma etc.
ARCH 1302 Architectural History II Week 1 General Introduction
The great engineers
Ancient Egypt
3,050 BC to 900 BC
Powerful rulers constructed
monumental pyramids, temples,
and shrines.
Enormous structures such as the
Pyramids of Giza were feats of
engineering capable of reaching
great heights.
Ancient Egypt Architecture characteristics
• Post and lintel
construction
• Massive walls
covered with
hieroglyphic
and pictorial
carving
• Flat roofs
• Most buildings
were built of
locally mud or
baked bricks
and limestone
• Workers were
slaves
Chapter two
The Greek World
The Greek World
Ancient Greece Peninsula Ancient Aegean
2800-1100 BCE
Architecture and art includes
How do you think three different cultures:
Greeks traveled?
Aegean Sea • Cycladic
• Minoan
• Mycenaean
Ionian Sea Mycenaean
Greece
Cycladic • Southeastern Europe
• On the southern end of the
Balkan Peninsula
extending into the
Minoan Mediterranean Sea
Mediterranean sea • East: the Aegean Sea
• West: the Ionian Sea
Aegean Architectural Features
• Columns (Structural)
Decoration:
Displays Wealth and family affluence
• Friezes
• Moldings
• Murals
• Fresco-paintings
• Colored reliefs
• Mosaic inlay
• Roof tiles (occasionally employed)
Themes
• Human figure
• Scenes: everyday life
• Related to nature
• Rite of passage
The ladies in blue fresco from
Neopalatial Knossos Period
- Young man’s ability to catch fish
- Shaved head communicates youth
- Shows importance of the sea to people The Fisherman Fresco
for food and commerce The Bronze age Frescoes from Akrotiri on
the Aegean Island of Thera (Santorini)
Lintel
On top the lintel sits a triangular block of stone some 27.5
post post inches thick which has been carved in relief, on the
outward-facing surface, two rampant lions (lionesses) with
their forepaws standing on an altar upon which is mounted
a tapering Minoan-style column. The lionesses may
originally have had bronze heads (now missing)
The corbelled arch system is based on the cantilever principle
that relies on an offset horizontal stone projecting beyond the
one underneath. Simultaneously, the horizontal stone layers
create an inverted "V" shape over a linear axis (depicted as
stepping stone stairs in cross-section). Unlike the semicircular
Roman arch, corbelled arch’s construction was less complex
because it only worked under gravity loads or by axial forces;
therefore, it was also known as a false arch
There are nine tholoi at Mycenae. The best preserved, mistakenly named
Corbelled The "Treasury of Atreus", is a huge circular chamber built of finely cut
Vault rectangular stones. The tholos is approached along a dromos or pathway
Stone about 20 feet wide and 118 feet long. The side walls are cut out of the rock
and lined with ashlar.
From abstraction To expressive naturalism
Greek Civilization:
• Ideologies: Freedom and individual
independence
• Human being: the center of culture,
everything is done at man’s measure
• Rich methodology and religion: gods
were use to express beauty ideal
• Reason, observation, and experience:
the basis for reality- philosophy and
sciences
Architectural ideas:
• Importance of the urbanism:
Hippodamus of Miletus (V century
BC.) created the orthogonal planning
• Sculptural values – building conceived
as an sculpture equilibrated and
proportional works
• Temple, a essential building, residence
of the gods no a place for people
• Other buildings: Theaters, sanctuaries,
gymnasiums
Architecture to be seen
Central axis
Building Systems:
• Dominant lines:
-Horizontal and vertical
• The columns is the essential element
Verticality
• Attention to detail
• Symmetry
• Harmony and balance
• Equilibrium and proportion
Horizontality
