KHANDELWAL COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN

HISTORY PRESENTATION
ON
GREEK ARCHITECTURE

UNDER GUIDANCE: PRESENTED BY:

AR. MOHD. FAISAL HONEY SINGH
SANJANA GUPTA
B.ARCH. – IIIRD Yr.
 HISTORICAL
BACKGROUND
 INTROCDUTION
 The Aegean culture was started on “crete “ an
island in the Mediterranean sea in about 3000
B.C.by the migration of the people from asia minor.
 Most of the Greek mainland was rocky and barren
and therefore bad for agriculture.
 Most Greeks therefore lived along the coastline or
on islands where the soil was good for farming.
 The Aegean and Mediterranean Seas provided a
means of communication and trade with other
places.
 Greek had moderate climate, this favoured the
Greeks an outdoor life.
 Greek civilization is the first major civilization in
Europe.
 RELIGIOUS BELIEFS
 The ancient Greeks were polytheistic.
 The God were regarded as all powerful but
similar to human beings in their passions, desires
and appetite.
 All aspect of life was under the protection of the
gods, and they controlled everything, from the
waves in the ocean to the winner of a race.
 All the gods and goddesses had specific roles,
controlling one or two major aspects of life.
 Temples were usually built in the cities of the
Gods called Acropolis.
 They usually consist of a large open hall called
sanctuary where the statue of the god to whom it
is dedicated is kept.
The Greek deities (the twelve Olympians) are as follows:
 Zeus: The Sky God (Supreme God)
 Hera: (His Consort) Goddess of Marriage
 Apollo: God of Law, Reason, Art, Music and
Poetry
 Athena: Goddess of Wisdom
 Ares: God of War
 Artemis: Goddess of Chase
 Aphrodite: Goddess of love and beauty
 Hermes: God of Commerce
 Hephaestus: God of Fire
 Demeter: Goddess of Earth
 Dionysos: God of Wine, Feasting
 Poseidon: God of Sea
There were other Gods like:
 Hestia: Goddess of Hearth, or Sacred Fire
 Helios: The Sun God
 Selene: The Moon Goddess
 Pan: The God of Flocks
Two mortals hailed as Gods were:
 Heracles (Hercules) meaning “The Glory of
Hera” – The God of Strength (Son of Zeus and a
mortal woman called Alemene)
 Asclepius: The God of Healing
 ARCHITECTURE IN SERVICE OF
RELIGION
 Greek developed a system of building proportion
that reflected those of the human body.
 The principal building material of the ancient
Greeks was stone.
 Timber was used mostly for roofing.
 The most common buildings are amphitheatres,
council halls, public fountains and theatres,
gymnasia, schools and libraries, public baths and
lavatories.
 Roofs were of wood beams and rafters cut to
square shapes with tile roof.
 GREEK ARCHITECTURE
(650 B.C.- 30 B.C.)
It is divided into two main periods:
a.) The Hellenic Period
b.) The Hellenistic Period
 THE HELLENIC PERIOD
(650 – 323 B.C.)
 The term “Hellenic” is used to describe the early
Greek’s civilization.
 Greek architecture is essentially a columnar
and trabeated style.
 It is evolved from wooden hut of upright posts
and supporting beam and sloping rafters.
 The architectural style was simple in
appearance and self-evident in design.
 Arches, domes and vaults were not used by
Greeks.
 Greeks used timber in the beginning but soon
they started using the marble.
 THE HELLENISTIC PERIOD
(323 – 30 B.C.)
 It describes the Greek Civilisation when it
was partly influenced by Middle eastern culture.
 Civic sense developed, town-planning came
into being as early as in 4th century B.C.
 Roof trusses came into use to cover the larger
spaces.
 Corinthian Order was more popularly used,
than Doric and Ionic Orders.
 ARCHITECTURE OF THE
CIVILIZATION
THE ORDERS
 Refer to the entire set
of form that makes up
the principal elevation
of a temple.
 Composed of a base,
an upright column or
support with its
capital, and the
horizontal
entablature.
 All the parts of an order are proportionally
derived from the size of the base of the column.
 It determines all aspects
of the elevation of a
building including its shape
and the arrangement and
proportion of its parts.
 Greeks are credited with
originating the three orders
of the classical language of
Architecture:
• Doric
• Ionic, and
• Corinthian
 Columns were understood by the Greeks to be
anthropomorphic (representative of the body of a
human).
 The base suggests the
feet, the shaft - the torso
and the capital - the head.
 Each order had its own
conventions about the
design of the entablature.
 The entablature is divided
into three sections; the
cornices, the frieze and
the architrave.
 THE ORDERS OF
GREEK ARCHITECTURE
 THE GREEK DORIC ORDER
 The Doric order was the
earliest to be developed.
 By the 6th century, a set
of universal proportions
for the Doric temple had
been developed.
 Of the three columns
found in Greece, Doric
columns are the simplest.
 The Doric order is made
up of three elements;
Stylobate, Column and
Entablature.
 The Stylobate is a
podium raised three
steps on which the
temple sits.
 There is no base in
the Doric order.
 The Doric column is
further divided into the
shaft and a square
capital.
 It had a height of
between
5 and 6 times its
diameter.
The shaft is tapered
and made to bulge
slightly to provide
correction for optical
illusion, usually
divided into 20 shallow
flutes.
 The entablature is
divided into an
architrave, a frieze and
the cornice.
 They have a capital
(the top, or crown)
made of a circle topped
by a square.
 Doric, like most Greek styles, works well
horizontally on buildings, that's why it was so good
with the long rectangular buildings made by the
Greeks.
 The area above the column, called the frieze,
had simple patterns.
 Above the columns are the metopes and
triglyphs.
 The metope is a plain,
smooth stone section
between triglyphs.
 Sometimes the metopes
had statues of heroes or
gods on them.
 The triglyphs are a
pattern of 3 vertical lines
between the metopes.
 The Doric column
represents the proportions
of a man’s body, its
strength and beauty.
 The Doric order is very
plain, but powerful-
looking in its design.
 ENTASIS
 A characteristic of the
Doric order is the use of
entasis.
 Entasis refers to the
practice of optical
correction in Greek Doric
temples.
 All buildings are
arranged with a slight
curve to correct for optical
illusion when they are
viewed.
 Diagram one on top
shows how the ancient
Greeks wanted the temple
to appear.
 If the temple is built
without correction, then
diagram two shows how it
would actually appear.
 To ensure that it
appears correctly as
desired in one, the Greeks
introduced the distortions
shown in diagram three.
 This is done to counteract the concave
appearance produced by straight edges in
perspective.
 The shaft of the column is built to be slightly
convex in shape for optical correction.
 Columns were also built with a slight tilt.
 The application of entasis is an expression of the
desire for perfection by Greek architects.
 The best example of the application of entasis is
found in the Parthenon.
 THE GREEK IONIC ORDER
 The Ionic order evolved
and took its name from
Ionia in modern day
Turkey.
 The Ionic column
including the capital and
base had a height of 9 to
10 times its diameter.
 It had 24 flutes were
rounded at the top and
bottom, which is more than
that of the Doric column,
even though it is smaller in
diameter.
 The Ionic order had a
capital developed from a
pair of volute about two-
thirds the diameter of the
column in height.
 Ornaments are used to
decorate the area between
the capital and the volute.
 The Ionic column has a
base.
 One of the limitations of
the Ionic order is that it is
designed to be seen from
the front only.
 At the corner of rectangular buildings, an
angular volute had to be used.
 Entasis was not applied to the ionic column. The
shafts also had a special characteristic entasis,
which is a little bulge in the columns make the
columns look straight, even at a distance.
 Ionic shafts were taller than Doric ones. This
makes the columns look slender.
 The frieze is plain.
 The bases were large and looked like a set of
stacked rings.
 Ionic capitals consist of a scrolls above the
shaft.
 The Ionic style is a little more decorative than
the Doric.
 The Ionic column is said to represents the
shape of a women with its delicacy and feminine
slenderness.
View of Interior Ionic Frieze running around the Inner Cella
Running Ionic Frieze with Painted Restoration
 THE GREEK
CORINTHIAN ORDER
 The rich decorative effect of the Corinthian
capital made it attractive.
 Because of its symmetry, the Corinthian capital
unlike the ionic capital
is designed to be
seen from all
directions.
 The Corinthian
column, the most
beautifully ornate of the
three orders represents
the figure of a maiden.
 The Corinthian order
takes its name from the
city of Corinth in
Greece.
 This order was not
extensively used during
the Greek period, it
became popular during
the ancient Roman period.
 It however appeared to
have been developed in
Athens in the 5th century
B.C.
 This order is similar in its
proportions to the Ionic order but has a
different capital.
 The core of the capital is shaped
like an inverted bell.
 The bell-like capital is decorated
with rows of
carved
acanthus
leaves.
 COLUMN CONSTRUCTION
 Each column was made
up of several drums of
marble.
 They were held together
by a stone peg in the
center.
 The stones were
assembled and put
together in their rough
form.
 The capital was also
carved out.
 After they were put
together, the grooves
called flutes were cut
up and down the shaft
of the column and all
around it.
 This gave the column
its slim and elegant
look.
 TEMPLE ARCHITECTURE
 The most important Greek building was the
temple, most complex of architectural form.
 The temple had the finest building materials
and the richest decoration.
 It was designed not to hold worshippers, but as
symbolic dwelling of the gods.
 The temple is usually rectangular in plan.
 It is lifted on a podium, and in plan has
colonnades (portico around the temple) on all its
external sides.
 The number of columns is always even to allow
the location of the entrance in the center; temples
with odd number of columns are uncommon.
 Temples with 2 columns in front are diastyle, 4-
tetrastyle, 6-hexastyle, 8-octastyle and 10-
decastyle.
 Greek temples usually have twice the number of
columns in front plus one by the side. A hexastyle
temple = six columns in front & thirteen on side.
 The temple building is made up of four walls
enclosing a rectangular space called the naosor
sanctuary.
 This was the house of the god to whom the
temple is dedicated.
 The interior rectangular space of the naosis
framed by a pair of colonnades on the long side
creating a central processional space.
At the head of the
processional space is
the statue of the
god to whom the
temple is dedicated.
 The temple
interior was
generally dark, with
only the entrance as a
source of light.
 The temple
always faced east so
that the rising sun
would light the
statues inside.
 Temples were
designed to be
admired from the
outside rather than
used.
 The Greek temple is
believed to originate
from the Mycenaean
megaron, and it went
through several stages
of evolution.
 By 500 B.C., the
final form of the
Greek temple had
emerged.
GREEK TEMPLE
 DORIC TEMPLE
 The Doric temple is
based on the Doric
Order.
 Both the Doric
order and temple
went through a
simultaneous process
of evolution.
 The Basilica at
Paestum (550 B.C.)
is an example, built
during the archaic
period of Greek
civilization.
 The columns on
the front are 9, while
on the sides are 18.
 The Doric
columns appear
heavy in comparison
with later temples and
have a bulge, pointing
to the practice of
optical correction or
entasis by the time of
its construction.
 The capitals are
also huge, heavy and
very wide.
 Running Ionic Frieze: an Ionic
innovation used in a Doric temple
 TEMPLE OF APHAIA AT AEGINA
 The Temple of Aphaia at Aegina 490 B.C. is a
later temple and much less heavy than the
Basilica at Paestum.
 The entablature is less thick and the columns
are slimmer with less entasis or bulge.
 The capitals are also smaller.
 This temple is hexastyle but has only 12
flanking columns-early temple.
 The interior columns are divided into a row of
two columns separated by an architrave.
 This allowed the designers to avoid using
columns with a large diameter.
 The temple has triangular pediment on the
Eastern and Western sides decorated with stories
from Greek myths.
 TEMPLE OF HERA ARGOVA
AT PAESTUM
 The Temple of Hera Argiva (or Neptune) at
Paestum 460 B.C. was built later than the
Temple of Aphaia.
 It is one of the best preserved of all Greek
temples.
 It is more mature in its proportions than all
the others examined.
 The columns are 8.8 meters high and about 4.3
times their lower diameter.
 IONIC TEMPLE
 Ionic temples were built using the Ionic order.
 The most famous of the Ionic temples is the
Temple of Artemis at Ephesus.
 It was considered one of the seven wonders of
the ancient World.
 It was commissioned by Alexander the Great
and was believed to have been built and destroyed
several times.
 Unfortunately the temple has not survived to the
present time.
 There are also uncertainties about its
arrangement in plan.
 The temple stands on a platform 2.7 meters
high.
 It had 36 columns in its front and they had an
additional relief sculpture at the base.
 The best
surviving Ionic
temples is the
Temple of
Athena
located at the
Acropolis at
Athens.
 CORINTHIAN TEMPLE
 The Corinthian
order was not
widely used
during the Greek
period.
 The Temple of
Olympian Zeus
in Athens was in
the Corinthian
order.
 The column was
constructed in 131
A.D.
 CIVIC ARCHITECTURE
 During the Hellenistic period, Greeks became
very fascinated by civic buildings.
 Treatments once reserved for temples and the
gods, were gradually extended to civic and
government buildings.
 The Agora or market place also became very
important in Greek cities.
 The theatre and council chamber are
examples of civic buildings found in every Greek
city.
 THEATRE, EPIDAURUS
 The Greeks invented the theatre design that is
still used in movies and auditoriums today.
 Every important Greek city had a theatre, built
into a hilly landscape.
 The theatre had a bank of seats steps created
from the landscape.
 It would usually commands a view to the
landscape.
 This was the largest theatre in ancient Greece,
still in use today.
 THEATRE OF DIONYSOS,
ATHENS (500 B.C.)
 It was hollowed out of Acropolis rock.
 It contained orchestra (a complete circle),
auditorium and skene building.
 The auditorium was designed on a sloping
ground having three banks of seats and two
diazomata (horizontal path-ways).
 In the front row, there were 67 marble thrones
of classic design for the kings, priests and city
dignitaries.
 It accommodated about 80, 000 spectators.
THE THEATRE OF DIONYSOS, UNDER THE SOUTH SIDE
OF THE ACROPOLIS
THE REMAINS FROM THE THEATRE OF SPARTA
 COUNCIL CHAMBER –
BOULETERION, MILETUS
 The Bouleterion
is, where the
Bouleor council
of the city state
met.
 It was a
covered
chamber fitted
with banks of
seats like a
theatre.
 GREEK
ARCHITECTURE,
CITY PLANNING
AND DESIGN
 GREEK ARCHITECTURE
IN ATHENS
Athens (the capital of Greece) is a very good
example of a typical ancient Greek city.
 The city has the three components of Acropolis,
Agora and Town found in a Greek city.
 The Acropolis and Agora in Athens also have
some of the best examples of ancient Greek
architecture.
 THE AGORA
 The Agora in Athens was a space used for
social, commercial and political activities, located
at the base of the hill of the Acropolis.
 Civic and religious buildings were
progressively erected around the perimeter of the
Agora space.
 Of all the buildings, the stoas were the most
important and useful buildings in the context of
the Agora.
 They provided shelter and served for many
other purposes.
 They also served to embellish the boundary
of the Agora.
 The most important gathering place in a
Greek city, started as an open area where the
council of the city met to take decisions.
 With time, buildings were constructed to define
and enclose the space.
 It also transformed into a place for combined
social, commercial and political activities.
 It emerged as the heart of Greek intellectual
life and discourse.
 It was usually located on a flat ground for ease
of communication and was placed to be easily
accessible from all directions.
ANCIENT AGORA WITH ACROPOLIS ON TOP
 THE ACROPOLIS IN ATHENS
 The Acropolis in Athens was a religious
precinct located on one of the hills of the city.
 The earliest versions of the buildings in the
Acropolis existed until 480 B.C.
 In 480 B.C., the Persians under Xerxes burnt
Athens and the Acropolis to the ground.
 Not long after that the Greeks defeated the
Persians.
 The Acropolis in Athens was rebuilt in about
450 B.C.
 The rebuilding of the Acropolis was begun by
Pericles, the wise statesman who ruled from 460
B.C. to 429 B.C.
 The Acropolis combined Doric orders and
Ionic orders in a perfect composition in four
buildings: the Propylaea, the Parthenon, the
Erechtheumn, and the Temple of Nike.
 The best example of Greek emphasis on
visualization in design and site planning is seen at
the Acropolis at Athens.
 All the buildings on the Acropolis are designed to
be seen than use.
 All the temples on the Acropolis are place at an
angle that enables them to be seen on two sides.
 From the entry at the Propylaea, a visitor has
a view of all the prominent buildings in the
Acropolis.
ACROPOLIS
ACROPOLIS
 PROPYLAEA
 The Propylaea is the entrance to the Acropolis.
 It was built around 437 B.C. by Mnesicles.
 To reach the Acropolis, people had to enter
through the center section of the Propylaea.
 The two wings on either side were never
finished.
 The columns on the outside of the Propylaea
were Doric and columns in the interior were
however Ionic.
 If the Doric order were used in the interior, the
height of the roof would make its diameter very
large.
 To overcome this difficult, the designers used the
Ionic column which is much slender than the Doric
column.
 Inside the Propylaea was a library and picture
gallery with a place for people to read and rest.
 In times of peace, the gates of the Propylaea were
usually left wide open.
 When an enemy threatened, the wooden doors of
the Propylaea were closed and there was no other
access to the Acropolis.
 THE TEMPLE OF PARTHENON
AT ATHENS (447 B.C. – 432 B.C.)
 The Parthenon was the most prominent
building on the Athenian Acropolis.
 It was designed by Ictinus and Callicrates in
447 B.C.
 The Parthenon is the most perfect Doric
temple ever built.
 It was lighter and more graceful than previous
temples.
 It also embodies the perfection of the Greek
system of proportioning.
 The proportions of the Parthenon are based on
the proportions of a man, which is seven to one.
 The ideal human body was seven heads tall.
 The Parthenon is an octastyle temple with 8
columns in front and 17 columns by its side.
 In the Parthenon, we also find the best example
of the application of entasis.
 The Parthenon had two rooms in plan; the
treasury, which is most often empty and the
naosor inner sanctuary.
 An ivory gold statue of Athena, 11 meters tall
carved by Phidasonce stood in the noasor inner
sanctuary of the Parthenon.
 The statue reached the wooden roof of the
temple.
 Parts of the inside and outside of the Parthenon
were once painted.
THE TEMPLE OF PARTHENON
ELEMENTS
 Processions and ceremonies were held outside.
 The temple’s alter was placed on the Eastern
side.
 During the Christian period, the Parthenon was
used as a church.
 Later the Turks converted it into a Mosque.
 In 1687, the Turks used it to store ammunition
and when they were attacked by the Venetians, it
exploded.
 In 1801, an English man gathered the broken
pieces and shipped them to the British museum in
England.
THE TEMPLE OF PARTHENON
AT ATHENS (447 B.C. – 432 B.C.)
THE IMAGES SHOWS WHAT REMAINS OF IT
 ENTABLATURE AND
PEDIMENT OF THE
PARTHENON, SHOWING
ARCHITECTURAL
SCULPTURE IN METOPES
AND PEDIMENT
THE TEMPLE OF PARTHENON
AT ATHENS (447 B.C. – 432 B.C.)
 MODEL OF THE RENDERING OF A POSSIBLE RECONSTRUCTION
CHRYSELEPHANTINE OF A POSSIBLE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE
(GOLD & IVORY) CULT INTERIOR TOGETHER WITH THE GREAT
STATUE OF ATHENA CULT STATUE BY PHEIDIAS
PARTHENOS
 THE ERECTHEUM
The Erechtheum is located at the point of a
mythical fight between Poseidon and Athena for
the possession of Athens.
 Athena is believed to have won the fight and so
Athens was named after her.
 The Erechtheum was named after Erechtheus,
the legendary king of Athens, whose mother was
the goddess of the earth and whose father was the
fire god.
 He was brought up by Athena and is believed to
have judged the fight between Poseidon and
Athena.
 The shape of the Erechtheum is not a perfect
rectangular and it does not have a colonnade
surrounding it.
 They killed all the men and brought back the
women as slaves.
 For revenge, the Greeks copied the Caryatid
slave women in stone and forced them to carry the
roof the Erechtheum for all time.
 The weight of the roof is carried from the top of
the head of the caryatid through their leg.
 A larger porch on the northern side has ionic
columns.
 The ionic columns have all the characteristics of
the Ionic order.
 THE TEMPLE OF NIKE
 Just beside the
Propylae is the Temple
of Athena Nike,
meaning victorious
Athena.
 It was built around
420 B.C. and was
designed by Callicrates
during the
Peloponnesian wars.
 The Athenians
worshipped Athena
Nike in the hope of
victory.
 This is an ionic temple.
 It had a pediment that no longer exist.
 The temple has an entrance of four ionic columns
on two sides.
 The temple looks the same from the front and
back.
Designed by the architect
of Parthenon Kallikrates,
build at 427 B.C. in pure
Ionic style from Pentelic
marble. Due to the of lack
of money, the
Peloponnesian war and
internal political strife's
the temple was not build
at once. The thorakion
with the victories was
constructed around 410
B.C., after the war
victories of Alkibiades. It
was damaged in the
explosion of 1645 AD, and
the columns were
restored, as close as
possible, to the originals.
MATERIALS, CONSTRUCTION
 Examination of Greek architecture points to
three common materials of construction: Stone
(the most common construction material for
buildings), Timber and Clay.
 Greece had an abundant supply of stone,
particularly marble.
 Stone was used for all types of building
elements, temple and civic construction.
 The characteristic grey colour of the stone of
the area is also what gives most ancient Greek
buildings their characteristics.
 Timber was used mainly for roofing.
 It was a very scarce commodity and it also had
limited length and this limited its use.
 The limitation in length meant that the width of
buildings was restricted and only very important
buildings such as the Parthenon could go beyond a
certain width.
 We did not examine Houses but clay was used
mostly in housing construction .
 Clay was made into sun dried blocks for use in
construction.
THANK
YOU !!!