Fire: Illuminating Caves, Sculpting the Land, ca. 1.

8 million BC - 7000 BCE

➢ The will to build.

➢ Materials strongly influenced architectural character.
➢ Structural Materials: Tension (fibers are pressed together) and/or Compression (fibers are pulled apart).
➢ All structures respond to the vertical pull of gravity
○ Live Loads: People/Animals that inhabit the structure.
○ Dead Loads: The weight of the building itself and of its inanimate objects (furniture, etc…)
○ Wind Loads: Diagonal Bracing
○ Seismic Loads: flexible connections.
➢ Structural Systems can be classified into 5 categories according to the geometric configuration of their members and
the ways in which the loads are resisted.
○ Post and Lintel (Column and Beam) (Most Common)
■ The possible distance between posts is primarily determined by the spanning capability of the
beams.
○ Corbel and Cantilever
○ Arch and Vault
○ Truss and Space Frame
○ Tensile
➢ Stone was the most durable building material available to early societies.
➢ Corbeling (Stones laid in horizontal courses, with the last stone in each course projecting slightly beyond the one below
it to form a corbeled arch.) helped strengthen the stone's capabilities.
➢ Same concept in corbeled dome and cantilever construction. (eave and jetty)
➢ Masonry arches and vaults are composed of wedge-shaped stones called voussoirs that must be supported on a
temporary framework, called centering, until the arch or vault is completed, at which time the stones press tightly
against one another and become self-supporting.
➢ Arches and Domes vary in profile.
➢ The steeper the arch or dome’s profile, the less lateral thrust
➢ Vaults: Linear extensions of arches.
➢ Intersected Vaults = Groin Vaults

➢
➢ The trussing method of spanning space calls for short wooden or metal elements to be connected in triangular
configurations.
○ Seen with the Romans, hinted at in church construction, and presumed during early 19th century bridge
construction.
➢ Tensile Forces
○ Fabric tents with upright posts. Suspension bridges.
○ Fibers and/or cables woven together
 ➢ Structural systems are selected based on available materials, economics, spatial requirements, and the esthetic
sensibilities of the architect and client.
➢ Throughout history, architects have learned from those who preceded them. These buildings became design precedents.

Short Reading - 8/30

➢ We are a fire-adapted species: pyrophytes.

Movie
➢ Chevaux CaveFire as a way of storytelling - the flick of the flame helps animate the figures - Bison w/ eight legs, etc…
➢ Animals were probably seen under the torch light.
➢ Artist connection. trying to understand the work and the intention of the artist from so long ago. Is there a vast void in
understanding from two very different contexts of time? Landscape is the connecting point. Context is the connecting
point. Building is the connecting point.
➢ Human shadows from fire to show animation.
➢ Caves only used for paintings and ceremonies.
➢ Played with the contrast and the shape of the wall. Very strong contrast and impression on the wall.

Chapter 1: The Beginnings of Architecture

➢ Paleolithic Cave paintings in France and Spain (33,000 BCE).

○ Animals and hunting scenes.
➢ Human settlement seems to have originated at the small clan or family level. Enough people for hunting and protection.
➢ Earliest Sites: central Russian Plain (14,000 BCE)
○ Constructed of mammoth bones and pine poles, with a lining of animal skins and a central hearth
○ Skin-covered huts between Moscow and Novgorod found (12,000 BCE)
○ Open at the top to allow smoke to escape.
➢ The existence of urban settlements depended on agricultural surplus that enabled specialization.
○ Jericho, Israel and Catal Huyuk were the earliest urbanized settlements.
➢ Jericho
○ Fortified settlement. Stone Wall. circular mud huts that may have had conical roofs. Farmers and hunters that
buried their dead beneath their floors.
➢ Huyuk
○ Unfortified. Dense packing of dwellings without streets. Access through roofs and high ceilings for
ventilation. Mud-brick walls and post-and-lintel timber framework enclosed rectangular spaces. Windowless
shrines containing decorative motifs of bulls and cult statuettes of deities.
○ Precursor of more sophisticated communities that developed in the fertile valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates
rivers at the beginning of the 4th millennium.
➢ Western Europe
○ Transition to urban communities was slower in coming.
○ Shift from hunting-and-gathering societies to larger agricultural groups under the direction of a priest-king
was similar to the experience of societies in the eastern rim of the Mediterranean sea.
○ Megalith constructions, composed of large stones and boulders.
○ Before 4000 BCE, chambered tombs of dry-wall masonry with corbeled roofs were constructed in Spain and
France.

Reading 9/2 - The Great Northern Continuum

➢ These societies also had strong relationships to animals that could define a person's core being.
➢ The concept of describing bears, eagles, or mountain lions as wild would be incomprehensible in these cultures. Animals gave shape
to a cosmological energy that pervaded everything.
➢ Property was associated with the rights to control certain things, such as hunting and fishing grounds, but it also
extended to the usage of symbols and stories.
➢ Wealth was to be distributed to members of the family.
➢ Rainforest Environments - Building Type
○ Made buildings with a domed frame that was covered with leaves, grass, or reeds.
○ Ropes and vines tied elements together.
○ Made exclusively by women.
➢ Northern Continuum Environments - Building Type
○ 2 Varieties:
■ Shaped structures out of poles (Cone Houses)
● Could serve winter and summer.
■ Earthen lodges with sunken cores and roofs made of logs and planks and covered with dirt. (Pit
Houses)
● Best suited for winter.
● Facilitated winter rituals and story-telling.
■ Interior of both types of structures had to accommodate large groups of people for long stretches of
time.
● Interior the microcosm of the community
➢ Fire
○ The implements of fire making were sacred.
○ If fire was at the cosmological center of the architecture, producing a vertical axis, the horizontal axis
connected the entrance and the fire with the rear of the house.
○ Ancestor spirits inhabited the far rear of the structure, which faced east. - where the elder male sat
➢ Conical Hut
○ Easy to erect and reinforced by horizontal bands.
➢ Earth Lodges
○ Substantial structures
○ Designed to last several years
○ Rarely meant to be lived year round. - Primarily Winter Residences
○ Had an internal structure of posts and beams on which logs rested that in turn supported the weight of the
earth.
○ Building was the product of communal activity. (4 - 5 days to complete)
○ Dug pit, Vertical beams around perimeter, horizontal beams on top, roof stamped pine needles.
○ Were arranged facing a river or in a communal space
○ The Floors were covered with reed mats or furs.
➢ The pit house tradition was brought to the Americas by ocean and riverine specialists.
➢ Sami Structures
○ Several types of summer and winter houses
■ The most basich being the goahti
● Supported by three or more evenly spaced forked/notched poles that are placed as a
tripod. - run in a circle and are positioned towards the top of the tripod to form a cone.
● Sometimes reinforced by curved birch rods.
● Apex left as a smoke hole.
● Attachable flap door.
● Covered in reindeer skins in the winter
● Three zones: dirty, sleep, and clean (ancestors and special guest)
■ Winter: gamme
● Conical form
● Earth huts
● Made of large curved poles joined in the form of two parallel ribs. Horizontal elements
are placed about three meters above the ground to hold them together. Lean poles to form
walls. Walls are made typically from clay and sod.
● Hearth is in the middle with a smoke vent in the dome.
● Could last for two decades.
➢ Sioux: Plains Indians
○ Most typical: Tipi
 ■ Tipis were tilted to have a long side and short side. Shifts the location of the smoke. Possible to
close the top and prevent external elements from coming inside.
■ No horizontal elements - the skin fits tightly over the poles.
■ Tipi can be erected by one person.
■ Poles are elevated to make a conical shape - joined by the apex of the cord - wraps skin around -
structure pegged into the ground.
■ Roped made from buffalo hair and strips of hide. Wood: Pine or Cedar
■ Skin was a sacred surface - flaps called “arms”
■ Men would sometimes paint the covers with war records and other insignia identifying their clan
and its history.
■ During the winter, the insides are lined with furs.
■ Tipis could weigh up to 400 pounds - dogs were often used to help
■ Women responsible for the management and construction of the Tipi.
➢ The Bison Hunt
○ Would lure bison to cliff-edges and then rush them. - Team effort
○ Tipis facilitated ritualistic events - Bisons honored for their food and essentials.

Notes - 8/30/22

➢ The use of fire as a creative concept.

Weeks:
Nov 15 (Weeks 11 and 12)
Dec 6 (Weeks 14 and 15)

W/E 9/3/22

➢ Poverty Point World Heritage Site

○ NE Louisiana
○ Named after Plantation that was constructed
○ Home to the largest community of hunters and gatherers in Northern America - Ancient City
○ Series of 5 man made mounds and elliptical ridges.
○ Indian Mounds
■ Signaled a place of power and wealth
○ Central Open Area - the Plaza - for large gatherings
■ Holes in a form of a ring - held posts - may have been used for social/ceremonial events
○ Mound A - Largest Mound - Landscaped was altered, leveled, and raised
■ Shifted dirt by hand - woven baskets and animal hide bags.
○ Residence sustained themselves through foraging, hunting, and fishing
○ Stone was NOT available
○ Established trading networks - allowing them to import stone and other items.
➢ Reading: Public Buildings, Palaces, and Temples
○ Public Building
■ Architecturally Unique, unique investment in size, location, decoration, and materials. - recognized
as exceptional.
■ Connected w/ public functions
○ Palace - implies the existence of a secular political authority
○ Temple - implies that the society had representatives of the spiritual world.
■ Functional differentiation of its members - office bearers
○ Mesopotamian societies created the first urban environment.
○ Uruk - first Urban center - home of Sumerian God Emil - religious center of Sumer during the third
millennium.
○ Eanna, Uruk
■ Layer VI - ‘Stone Cone Temple’
■ Layer V - Limestone Temple
● Tripartite building plan
● All structures were rectangular, open, conforming to the tripartite floor plan, two parallel
rows of rooms with an open hall in between.
■ Layer IVb - ‘Square Building’
● A square basic form, four wings that enclosed the courtyard.
■ Layer IVa - Building C
● Followed tripartite plan
■ Layer IVb
● Eanna was visibly walled off from its neighborhood - was the tradition in danger?
■ Eanna Building as Public
● Size, overall planning, spacious design, central and visible location. - made it a public
space.
● Temple - those that had required the highest building effort and cost.
● Creation by the powerful elite plausible.
■ Eanna
● Religious elite was their builder.
■ Political authority was responsible for both worldly and religious concerns in Uruk.
■ Architecture is one of the most powerful instruments of political propaganda for presenting the will
and the world view of the ruling powers.
■ Monumentality and an accumulation of monumental buildings signal unlimited availability of
resources - and unlimited power in those responsible for constructing.
■ Monumentality = Visibility
■ The demolishing of buildings representing a transition in power
● The closer the layers and destruction of one building to another correlates to how
effective the ruling power was or the longevity of the ruling power itself.
■ Eanna Timeline
● Religious Center - followed by religious and political functions - followed by a revisit
back to the former.
■ Built environment represented the needs of the elite.
■ Floor plan representing how the spaces were used - small groups, large groups, gatherings,
passings, etc…
■ Eana was walled off - controlling the accessibility.
■ Cult district of Khafajah
● Rooms, floor plans, and outer forms are arranged irregularly.
● Temples, Walls, increased building cost
● Small Temple
○ One roomed building
○ Long rectangular shape - position of the doorway - table-like installation in
front of the northern side of the room.
● Sin Temple
○ Statuette found in the building
○ Votive offerings; decorated vessels; semi-precious stone.
○ Possessed monumentality but wasn’t overbearing in relation to other houses.
● Used most likely by people in the cultic sphere - elements like lighting and layout were
used to separate worldly and unworldly spheres.
● New Building - monumental and built by excavation and assembled by brick - oval in
shape with statuettes - most likely place of religious, economic, and political activity.
● Break in traditional design = new social order/power
■ A king is a ‘public person’ and as such he built ‘public buildings’, serving to represent the ruling
power and demonstrating the economic ability of the community, this in turn was presented as the
result of a good reign.
First Reading
➢ Various Regions
➢ Near East, Andes, Mexico
➢ None of them were alike
➢ Huts varied from 16 - 26 ft diameter; male, female, married, or unmarried
➢ One thing was common - how the ritual buildings were similar
➢ All had animal carvings into the walls - used as ornaments to decorate the outside
➢ Structural ritual things - built as T- shape (Limestone pillars)
➢ Early ritual houses - All round and oval built out of dry stone masonry-
➢ evolved to rectangle shape - limestone
➢ Roof made from grass, branches, thatch
➢ After they moved ritual houses - destroyed their old ritual houses - didn’t want a different tribe to try to re-use it.
➢ Heavily influenced by plants and agriculture. - experimentation
➢ As they moved they found something easier (Agriculture)

Notes 9 - 20 (9/2/22)

➢ Western Europe Continued…

○ Constructing these communal graves for cremated or skeletal remains - expression of reverence for ancestors
- means of establishing claims to land.
○ Megalith tombs are frequently located on prominent sites.
○ Passage Grave at Newgrange
■ Earthen mound
■ Decorated boulders surround the perimeter of the mound.
■ South-facing entry leads to a 62 ft long upward sloping passage covered by stone lintels.
■ Incised Patterns
■ Astronomically attuned
○ Working w/ large stone and observing astronomical phenomena merged w/ the most celebrated megalith
productions.
○ Stonehenge, Salisbury, England.
■ Three distinct building phases
■ Circular ditches
■ 82 coffin-sized stones were erected in a double ring w/ 38 pairs.
■ 35 Lintels & 40 sarsen stone - in a circle - enclosing 5 trilithons
■ Exemplifies the ability of some civ. to org. Workers and materials to create evocative ceremonial
places.
■ Observed the solstices; Circ. layout = the heavens

➢ Ancient Mesopotamia
 ○ Earliest literate civilizations developed in independent urban communities - “city-states”
○ Tigris, Euphrates, and Nile (Mesopotamia & Egypt)
○ Regulated rivers by constructing elaborate irrigation canals. - Abundant crops and surplus
○ Urbanism = Specialization
➢ Sumerians, Akkadians, and Neo-Sumerians
○ Sumerians - first civ. - typ. form of settlement was city-states.
■ Pol. and religious centers.
○ Urban communities developed around religious shrines, the dwellings of gods, and the repositories for
surplus food stores. - lead to dev. Of monumental; temple complexes at the heart of Sumerian cities.
○ Buttressed walls enclosed a rectangular shrine room flanked by smaller side chambers.
○ Facades articulated by buttressing pilasters.
○ Most Sumerian buildings were laid up in sun-baked brick - not very resistant to weathering - therefore only
left with foundations in modern day.
○ Roofs - wooden members or reeds
○ Uruk - White Temple
■ 40 ft high base of rubble from earlier buildings - protective coat of white wash over sloping walls
of sun-dried brick.
■ Entrance through chamber in one long side “bent-axis”

■
➢ Eanna
○ 2 groups of temples flanking a courtyard ornamented by a mosaic of terracotta cones.
➢ Akkadian overthrew Sumerians
➢ Period witnessed dev. Of temple forms - Ziggurat
➢ Ziggurat - commonly constructed of sun-dried brick bonded together with bitumen, reed matting, or rope. Finished w/
weather resistant exterior layer
○ Inward sloping base - stepped platforms
○ Designed to elevate the temples to the gods.
➢ Three Long Stairways = Three dif. Elevations

➢
➢ Houses of the ordinary population were set in densely packed neighborhoods. - orthogonal - constructed around open
courtyards
➢ Babylonians, Hittites, and Assyrians
 ○ Strongly fortified citadels built for each capital reflect the Assyrians’ relentless warring as well as the ruthless
character of their kings.
○ Assyrian King Sargon II’s Royal city of Khorsabad - designers employed architecture and art to
communicate the awe-inspiring power of their ruler.
■ 25 Acre Palace - on top of 50 ft plateau - organized orthographically around multiple courts - 7-
stage ziggurat - represented some cosmic order - embedded in massive surround wall - reinforced
by repetitive towers - towered gate entrance - winged bulls with human heads - relief from stone
blocks

■
➢ The Persians
○ Impressive ruin at Persepolis
○ Borrowed freely from cultures they conquered
○ Stone columns supported wooden roof beams resting on the unique double-headed capitals carved in the form
of bulls and lions.

Reading Notes: On Mesopotamia, and ‘Not-So-Primitive’ Democracy

➢ Everyone had to do corvee. - Aristocracy to lowest tier.

➢ Seasonal projects were undertaken in a festive spirit, laborers receiving copious rewards of bread, beer, dates, cheese,
and meat. Even the most autocratic rulers of later city-states were answerable to a panoply of town councils,
neighborhood wards, and assemblies. Women alongside Men
➢ Occasional glimpses of corporate bodies rising up against unpopular rulers or policies, often successfully.
➢ 9th and 7th centuries - Assyrian Emperors - famous for bloody vengeance - fairly hands off to loyal subjects and let
councils govern collectively.
➢ Neighborhood wards were active in local administration, and sometimes appear to have replicated certain aspects of
village or tribal governance in an urban setting.
➢ Participatory government in Meso. cities were organized in multiple levels.
➢ Most Mesopotamian urbanities were organized into autonomous self-governing units, which might react to offensive
overlords either by driving them out or by abandoning the city entirely.
➢ Pnyx, a low hill, equipped with seating for the Council of Five-Hundred citizens.
➢ Houses of Gods - mimicked more like factories than churches.
○ Had human labor and produced quantities counted.
○ Large-scale temple workshops.
➢ This kind of work was routinely carried out under central administrative control.
➢ Uruk was establishing colonies along strategic points on trade routes.
➢ Urban temple-factories were outputting products in uniform packages, with the houses of the gods guaranteeing purity
and quality control.
➢ Warrior aristocracy - heavily armed and living in hill forts or small palaces. - spirit of extravagance as seen in their
tombs. - “Heroic Societies” but term turned into disfavor - although pattern of heroic burials
➢ Indus civilization
○ Brick-made bathing floors and platforms also were a standard fixture in most dwellings of the Lower Town.

Note - 9/8/2020

➢ Toolkit to help interpret the past

➢ More of a sense of hierarchy in an urban setting - civic centers vs. houses; etc…
➢ Catalhoyouk
○ 1900 BCE - Central Turkey - oldest urban settlement - people lived there for about 1500 years
○ No monumental center (palace, temple, etc..)
○ Just this massive houses mushed up against each other - streets are really absent - some courtyards -
surprisingly uniform with each other
○ Access these houses by climbing rooftops - opening from above
○ Walls crafted from quarts - bullhorns most frequent motifs - some murals - depicted scenes like cattle
○ Raised platforms spread around the edges of interior - where ancestors are buried - beneath the floor
○ Inhabitants did practice agriculture
○ Bullhorns - center of each house is a shrine - but not actually shrines - just weirdly decorated living rooms. -
horns of these places were from wild instead of domesticated
○ Figurines - female figures - same prehistoric female motifs - wide hips, etc… - represents fertility - female
elders in the community
○ Took there hunting traditions seriously
○ Every house was inhabited for about 100 years - house was deconstructed and then rebuilt on old foundation -
town looks renewed but also looks exactly the same.
○ Spring/Summer - out on the fields and working
○ Winter - concentrated in towns and indoors - concentrated on the ritual of family life.
➢ Agricultural Revolution
○ People start domesticating crops - building more larger and permanent settlements.

Giza and the Pyramids, Lehner - 9/9/2022

➢ Builders first had to organize the landscape to lay out the sites for the pyramid, causeway, and temples, workyards,
etc…
➢ Also had to set up supply lines. - materials. Food for workers, etc…
➢ Plumb bobs, string, rope, ramps, embankments, wood/stone hammers, levers, hauling sledges, chisels, saws
➢ Selecting a site
○ Required that the pyramid be close to the valley floor, where a canal could reach it, yet far enough out in the
desert to achieve the dramatic approach by the long causeway.
○ Ideally flat plane
○ Resources had to be close to feed workers, extract materials, and relatively hospitable
○ Location easy to transport and receive materials from more distant locations.
➢ A large quarry would be the source for core stone for the inner bulk of the pyramid.
➢ Geological stratification of the local limestone bedrock would determine the quality and the size of the core blocks.
➢ Builders also required granite from Aswan
➢ Iron tools for cutting limestone.
➢ Other tools used may have needed frequent up-keeping.
➢ Due north was found and lines were measured from there.
➢ Ancient Egyptians held the northern sky in high regard. - used the northern stars in orientating other buildings.
➢ Egyptians may have used flint chips as disposable chisels in making sharp-edged hieroglyphs and minute details in
reliefs.
➢ Large quantities of wood were needed for fuel for the fires needed to forge and mend copper tools, roast raw gypsum to
make mortar and to bake bread/bear for workers.
➢ Food came from provincial farms - wood from local trees.
➢ Transported supplies by river.
➢ Alabaster was also used for statuary - Granite, gneiss, diorite, and quartzite were needed for pounding and polishing
tools.
➢ The Nile and its boats were the means of transport of such bulk stone from distant sources.
➢ Hauling tracks were needed to get the load (stone) from the quarry to the river, and then from the waterway to the
building site.

Buildings Across Time Pg. 20 - 33 (9/9/22)

➢ Agriculture is facilitated by the warm climate and the annual flood deposits of organic silt, which renew the fertility of
the fields.
➢ Inhospitable desert provided security from outside invasion. Mediterranean provided security for the Nile Delta.
➢ Egyptian life was organized around the annual flooding of the river.
➢ The use of pyramid shapes at the top of stone shafts was a visual symbol of the connection between the ruler and the
sun god.
➢ Elaborate rituals were performed inside the tomb chambers - preservation of the physical body.
➢ Construction of enduring tombs for royalty - built to prevent mishaps in the physical life by the unrisen soul.
➢ Tombs became the most lasting religious structures.
➢ Mastabas: the earliest tombs, were built as eternal houses for the departed - based on design of the dwellings of the
living.
○ Brick - retained characteristics details provided by the customary reeds/woods of Ordinary houses.
○ Block-like structure - above ground - small room for offerings - another for body and a statue of the
deceased.
○ Attracted thieves - to solve this, created deep shaft under the building, then filled with rubble.
○ Serdab: Above ground chamber - statue of deceased would receive offerings.

○
➢ Ordinary Houses
○ Reed, thatch, wood.
➢ The First Pyramids
○ As the religious ritual evolved to enhance the significance of the pharaoh, the mastaba was likewise enlarged,
eventually producing the pyramid.
○ Peak caught the first rays of morning light - also symbolic reference to the annual rebirth of nature.
○ Imhotep - credited with designing the first pyramid. - Djoser’s funerary complex at Saqqara
■ Large rectangle - surrounded by wall 33 ft. high. - small door that leads into narrow colonnaded
processional hall - main courtyard - mass rising in 6 steps - exterior faced with dressed limestone
■ North of the pyramid is the mortuary temple - pre-burial ritual was performed - statue of Djoser
looking outward sits in a small chamber.
 ■
■ Djoser’s complex includes areas for the practice of rituals. - important symbols of the bond
between Upper and Lower Egypt.
■ Djoser had 2 burial chambers. - Represented Upper and Lower Egypt
➢ Before the final form of the Pyramid - some developmental forms took place throughout time. - Sneferu’s Pyramids

➢
➢ Fourth Dynasty Pyramids at Giza
○ Khufu, Khafre, and Menkaure
○ Largest and first pyramid - 755 x 755 ft. base. Apex at 481 ft.
■ Most of the stone is limestone - large pharaoh’s chamber is made of granite.

○
■ Three buria; chambers are built within it.
● Lower - to represent the underworld.
● Middle - Queen’s Chamber - life-size statue of Khufu - serves as spirit chamber
● Top - red granite - granite sarcophagus - where Khufu was buried.
○ 11 pairs of granite beams were set as a gabled brace/saddle roof extending into
the mass of the pyramid above the chamber.
■ Both the King’s and Queen’s chambers have pairs of small shafts angling upward through the mass
of the pyramid - may have been intended for ventilation.
○ Khafre’s Pyramid - middle
■ Single tomb chamber in the center at the base level - passageway in the north side provides access
to the room.
○ Menkaure - smallest
○ Associated with each of the pyramids were ancillary temples
○ Giza Valley Temples
 ■ Square in plan - thick limestone walls - encased in red granite - central hall is an inverted T-shape -
Red granite piers supported a roof with a clerestory - 2 levels of narrow storage rooms extended
into the solid wall mass.
■ Beside the Sphinx
● Carved in situ out of a natural rock ledge
■ Mortuary Temple
● Rectangular in plan - series of axially disposed interior spaces - limestone structure was
cased w/ finer material - floor was alabaster.
■ Center of the temple was a large courtyard - surrounded by enormous pillars - 12 large statues of
the pharaoh.
○ Quarrying was accomplished w/ metal saws
○ Construction of the pyramids was done by large teams of laborers during the flood season when agricultural
work was impossible.
➢ Virtually all Egyption art and architecture was very practical, intended to assist one’s passage to the next world and
ensure comfort and pleasant living upon arrival.
➢ The Middle Kingdom
○ Middle Kingdom tombs generally neither endured nor intimidated grave robbers.
○ Tomb of Mentuhotep II
■ The complex, approached by an axial route from the Nile, had two levels of colonnaded terraces
surrounding a masonry mass - flat roofed hall
■ Mentuhotep's actual burial carved in the rock cliff
■ The two levels of columns seen upon approach are dramatized by the contrast of their sunlit shafts
with the shadowed recesses behind.
■ Served as a prototype for the complex built by Hatshepsut
○ More typical tombs:
■ Beni-Hasan - location
■ Cut into rock cliffs and provided with sheltering porticos - built for minor nobles and court officials
■ Replicated spaces and details associated with ordinary dwellings.
➢ The New Kingdom
○ Continued Middle Kingdom tradition of burial rock-cut tombs - eliminated monumentality to deter grave
robbers
○ Bahari - new location - valley of kings - modest chambers - entrances hidden by dirt and sand.
○ Queen Hatshepsut
■ Temple complex was a mortuary chapel dedicated to Amun
■ Ramps lead up to three broad terraces - each defined by colonnades
■ Columns in the north colonnade of the 2nd terrace are faceted in a manner suggesting the flutes of
later Doric columns.
■ Relief carvings and wall paintings
○ New Kingdom Pharaohs arranged for their bodies to be buried in concealed tombs in the Valley OK, where
priests guarded against robbers.
○ Terraces of the temple were embellished with incense trees. - buried irrigation pipes
➢ Temple complexes built to honor both gods and pharaohs became more extensive and elaborate.
○ Hypostyle halls are sizable chambers created by rows of large columns placed closely together.
○ Each day the priests performed purification rites in the sacred lake within the temple precinct, dressed the
statue of the deity in rich garments, and placed others in the sun for rejuvenation ritual.
○ Monumental masonry entrance gates or pylons lined processional routes to represent the eastern mountains of
Egypt through which the divine early-morning sunlight emanated.
➢ Akhetaten was a linear town nearly 7 miles long - new capital city
○ Lacking consistent overall plan
○ Transportation was facilitated by waterway.
○ Temples had altars set in open courtyards, and there were no segregated areas for the priest class.
○ Thick mud-brick walls moderated the extremes of heat and cold.
○ No wall surrounded the city. - free standing guard houses instead.
 Buildings Across Time: pg. 35-44 (9/10/22)

➢ The Aegean Cultures

○ By the beginning of the 2nd millennium, the seafaring people of this region had learned how to exploit
natural resources, such as timber, stone, metallic ores, and clay for pottery, to produce distinctive artifacts.
○ Traded with Egypt and settlements along eastern mediterranean
○ Small fortified communities and agricultural villages on islands along the coast.
○ Worshiped nature deities
○ Lions were associated with royal symbolism
○ Two Civilizations: the Minoans, the Mycenaens
■ Both produced luxury goods that were traded extensively
■ Both civilizations contributed to the cultural patrimony of classical Greece.
➢ The Minoans
○ Knossos
■ 1900 BCE - series of detached structures erected around a large rectangular court.
● Rebuilt in a unified scheme on multiple levels - ritual and ceremonial rooms - storage
areas - living accommodation connected by long corridors and staircases built around
light wells
■ Writing = Linear A
■ 1450 BCE - Knossos and all other Minoan palaces on Crete were destroyed - rebuilt
● Linear B
■ 1380 BCE = final destruction of site
■ Frescoes depicting priestesses and celebrants suggest the continuing centrality of religious practice.
■ Parts of the lower levels were built in ashlar masonry
■ Most of upper floors were supported on walls built of rubble contained within squared timbers.
■ Characteristic Minoan Capital = a downward-tapering shaft with a bulbous torus ring and abacus
block capital.

○
■ Knossos was unfortified. Complex sat on a hill overlooking the harbor.
■ Visitors entered through the west propylaea and then followed a corridor lined with frescoes to the
courtyard.
■ Left: the entrance to the antechamber of a lustral-basin (depressed pool) sanctuary, the Throne
Room
■ Cult statues and votive offerings
■ Long rows of underground storage rooms
■ Hall of the Double Axes - (Queen’s Megaron: space decorated with frescoes).
■ Standards of water supply and drainage at the complex was exceptional for the time.
■ Naturalistic portrayal of the young men and women in these frescoes creates the impression that the
Minoans were energetic and cheerful people who took delight in their own beauty and that of the
natural world. - movement
■ Women held positions of high status
➢ The Mycenaeans
○ Trading society - led by warrior-kings.
○ The citadel at Mycenae was built with a strong concern for defense.
■ Situated on high ground, protected by mountains and ravines.
■ Fortified and built walls surrounding - constructed of boulders set in position - Cyclopean - thought
to be constructed by giants from Greeks.
■ Principal entrance to Mycenae was made through Lion Gate
 ■
■ Gateway: single upright stones support a 14 lintel across the opening, corbeled arch - space above
the arch is filled by a triangular stone w/ relief sculpture of two lions w/ their forefeet on an altar
bearing a column of the tree cult.
■ Remains of shaft graves beyond the Lion Gate.
■ Palace at the highest elevation had many features derived from Crete.
■ Megaron: a simple rectangular space (domos) having solid long walls w/o openings and an entrance
in the center of one short side, generally w/. An attached anteroom (prodomos) preceded by a court.
● Precursor of the classical temple
● Largest room at site - central hearth
■ Surrounded by smaller settlements
● Family groups who lived in houses closely associated with the tombs of their ancestors.
○ Tholos - beehive tomb - Treasury of Atreus
■ Corbeled stone chamber rising 44 feet in 33 horizontal courses from a circular plan 48 feet in
diameter, with a small chamber to the right of the entrance.
■ All stone work is covered by earthen mound.
■ Entrance doorway was elaboratly decorated
■ Interior embellished w/ bronze plates

■
○ Houses
■ Entrance was made unto a court off which there is the 3-room megaron sequence of porch,
vestibule, and domos as the major spaces of the house.
■ Roof probably flat
■ Framed w/ wood - rubble stone foundations - court area paved w/ stone - floors were clay
■ Drainage at court

■
○ Tiryns - megaron layout - like Mycenae

Houses and Towns in the Neopalatial Period

➢ Minoans invested in domestic architecture during the Neopalatial Period.

➢ Many Neopalatial buildings had one or more of these “palatial” features like: ashlar masonry, pier-and-door partitions,
magazines, the Minoan Hall, etc…)
➢ Little Palace
○ Elaborate masonry - pillar crypt - peristyle court
○ The Minoan Hall is doubled in plan w/ 2 main rooms illuminated by light wells on 2 sides - pillar crypt has 2
pillars.
➢ Main living quarters were on the upper story - placing the Minoan Hall on the ground made it accessible to visitors.
➢ The South House
○ Part of a series of major constructions along the southern borders of the Palace.
○ Went through a series of renovations.
○ Constructed of ashlar masonry on N and E sides. - inner walls were rubble coated w/ painted plaster. - upper
story inner walls were of mud brick - gypsum floor panels
○ Wooden columns, stone pillars, and pier-to-door partitions.
○ Basement rooms - storage
○ Residents of these houses depended on the Palace for supplies.
○ Windows and light wells flooded the house w/ light and air.
➢ Builders contrived to make each building distinct. - as w/ forms and orientation of rooms
➢ During the Neopalatial period, features associated w/ the Residential Quarters of the Palaces begin to appear in houses
across much of the island.
○ Minoan Hall - Ashlar masonry - pier-and-door partitions, pillars, figurative frescoes, and masons
○ “Versailles Effect”: Builders around the island were imitating architectural forms associated w/ the Palace at
Knossos - “Palatialization”
➢ Vast majority of excavated houses had no palatializing features.
➢ Monumental architecture was the expression of power, wealth, and authority - display of social identity - palatialization
of houses - social climbing
➢ Neopalatial architectural language was an evolving process that required the active engagement of the residents and
their builders.
➢ Patrialization was an island-wide phenomenon - regional matter - stronger in Central Crete than in the rest of the island.
➢ Houses away from central Crete
○ Separate wings devoted to agricultural storage and industry.
○ Local traditions also continued to play a major role.
■ Palaikastro Hall
➢ Significant increase in the population of the island in the Neopalatial period. - new settlements founded and expanded.
➢ New Urban constructions: Caravanseri
○ Footbath, dining room, and stables
○ Fountain House:
■ Fresh water rises through the pebble floor - back wall w/ fine gypsum
➢ New Urban Constructions: Temple Tomb
○ Private tomb and public monument - tiny scale layout of Egyptian tombs w/ Knossian architectural features.
➢ Theatral Areas
○ Risers were supported on an artificial fill.
○ In a few towns, residents of the largest residential structures built miniature theatral Areas
➢ Urban Shrines
○ Cult equipment, sparse of cultic evidence - frescoes
○ Single, square room w/ a bench against the south wall.
➢ Rural Shrines
○ Popular rural cult - taken over by popular cult of the palaces
○ Sanctuary at Petsophas
■ Small building was placed over the earlier votive deposit.
■ Situated on a hill
■ Two rooms
➢ Gournia and Minoan Town Planning
○ Compacted community with tight roads and houses that filled every void. - court area that greatly juxtaposed
the entire area - large walls
 Notes 9/13/2022

➢ Great Pyramid of Khufu

○ Gabled roof on top of King’s Chamber w/ layers of granite - to relieve pressure
○ Narrow inclined passageway - corbeled stone (stone goes inward).

Notes 9/15/2022

➢ Crete as the center of trade - stitching crete into the large mediterranean world.
➢ Myceneans eventually destroyed the Minoens
➢ Lustral Basin
○ This was some sort of bath - descend down into them (ritual element)
■ Issues w/ that assumption - Gypsum Veneer and Public Space - no drain
➢ Palatial - mimics the palace in some way
➢ Palatial Houses
○ Architecture as a distinction
➢ Keep finding cracks to fill in - honeycomb of houses - expansion in urban
➢ Explosion once getting to the court - contrast between walking tight street - dramatic

Buildings Across Time Reading Pg. 44-54 (9/16/22)

➢ Greece: The Archaic Period

○ Seeking additional farmland - city-states began a program of colonization
○ Colonial settlements laid out in elongated rectangular blocks grouped around the market and temples at the
center of the city.
■ Public facilities, recreation, entertainment, protective walls.
○ The Temple
■ Based on the design of the Mycenaen megaron
■ Rear room (Opisthodomos), Naos/Cella, front porch (Pronaos)
■ Early temples were simple one-room structures
● Walls made from mud-brick
● Thatch sloping roof
○ Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
■ Wooden columns surrounding the temple chamber
○ Temple of Hera at Olympia
■ Larger-scale
■ Stone columns
■ Fired clay roof
■ Two in antis columns
■ Represents one of the earliest examples of the Doric order.
○ Stone column shafts in Greek architecture are characteristically fluted in a manner similar to Hatshepsut’s
mortuary temple.
○ The Greeks also developed a highly stylized treatment for bases, capitals, and the supported members, the
entablature. - Orders of Architecture
○ Classical Language of Architecture
■ Three Orders
● The Doric, the sturdiest, was based on the proportions of a man
○ No base and has the simplest capital atop the fluted shaft; its entablature
consists of a plain architrave and alternating metopes and triglyphs in the
frieze, which is crowned at the cornice.
● The Ionic, was lighter in character to reflect the proportions of a woman
 ○ Base supporting its fluted column shaft and a capital with volutes. Entablature
is also composed of an architrave and frieze.
● The Corinthian, slenderest of all, had a highly decorated capital to suggest the form and
proportions of a young maiden
■ The orders of architecture were specific but flexible
➢ Greece: The Classical Period
○ Athenian and Delian League Dominance
➢ The Parthenon, Athens
○ Parthenon: (448 - 432 BCE)
○ Architects: Iktinos and Kallikrates
○ Finest Marble - Use of column drums and metopes - Doric Temple
○ Ionic attributes
■ Slender column proportions, continuous frieze around the exterior of the cella wall. Use of Ionic
order in the western opisthodomos (Back room).
○ Backroom
■ Housed the Delian League Treasury
■ Four Ionic columns support the roof
■ Eight columns across the gable end
■ Six Prostyle columns
■ Entasis was used subtle here to create a sense of repose
■ Minute adjustments in the horizontal and vertical lines of the structure enhance the perception of
orthogonal geometry
○ The architects made these slight variations in the column spacing and other details to avoid strict geometrical
perfection and so to breathe life into their stone composition.
○ Sculpted figures adorned both the outside and the inside of the Parthenon.
○ A continuous frieze ran around the outside of the cella walls behind the colonnade.
○ Sculptor Phidias was responsible for the sculptural detail on the Parthenon
○ Large Statue of Athena housed in the cella.
■ Wooden Armature - Ivory used in all exposed parts of Athena’s body
■ Drapery/Armor - Gold
■ Eyes and robe/armor decoration = precious stone
○ Cella - intended to provide a proper setting for the enormous cult statue
○ Parthenon was oriented so that the sun would penetrate the cella interior on the morning of Athena’s birthday.
➢ Other Buildings on the Acropolis
○ The Acropolis is a plateau rising abruptly above the plain of the city
○ Symmetrical Entranceway amid asymmetries - entrance gateway - Propylaea - marks the transition from the
secular/profane world to the sacred one.
○ Propylaea - Doric portico flanked by projecting wings
■ Southside - there was a porch preceding the freestanding Temple of Athena Nike
■ Architectural device - marking the transition of profane to sacred - and controlling views toward
the Erechtheion and Parthenon.
○ The overall layout of the Acropolis was designed to enhance the sense of procession.
○ Small Temple of Athena Nike
■ Simple sanctuary - housed a wooden image of Athena - Four Ionic columns create a portico before
the eastern entrance and the western entrance.
○ Erechtheion
■ Under is a salt water spring - rock bearing the mark of Poseidon’s trident.
■ Ionic
■ Eastern Portico - Ionic columns - led to Athena’s sanctuary - ancient wooden image of the goddess
■ North Porch - Gave access to Poseidon’s shrine through an elongated Ionic Portico
● Monumental Entrance
■ Roof of the porch facing the Parthenon is supported by the six Caryatid maidens.
○ Architects fusing new constructions w/ elements from the site’s history
 ○ Architects sought to integrate the Doric architecture characteristic of Attica with Ionic elements in an attempt
to express the unity of the Delian League and Athen’s ascendancy among the city-states of Greece.
○ Architectural and sculptural detail was generally painted in vibrant colors and plain walls may have had
murals.

Reading BAT Pg. 54 - 61

➢ Greece: The Hellenistic Period

○ “Hellenistic” - Art and Architecture associated w/ the extended empire of Alexander and his successors.
■ Showier and freer interpretations
■ Favored more ornate ionic order
○ Temple of Apollo Epicurius at Bassai
■ Arch: Iktinos
■ Doric for the external colonnade; Ionic for the cella side columns; Corinthian for the single axial
column placed at the end of the cella.
■ Temple may be a fusion of historical references w/ innovative design.
○ Sanctuary of Asklepios
■ Corinthian order was employed on a substantial scale
■ Circular building - Colonnade: 26 Doric columns - 14 in inner circle - black and white rhomboidal
flooring pattern.
■ Ceiling had ornate coffers w/ floral decorations
○ Choragic Monument of Lysikrates - Athens
■ Small, cylindrical structure
■ Erected to display the prize awarded to Lysikrates
■ Corinthian order is used in the exterior of the building - 6 columns - supports a frieze
○ Sanctuary of Asklepios
■ Illustrates the change in design attitudes among Hellenistic architects.
■ Ascending terraces ad files of columns
■ New: conscious definition of exterior space using stoas bent at right angles to become enveloping
arms.
■ Single, central axis of movement runs through the embedded portico and up to the freestanding
temple
○ Permanent buildings for theatrical performances were constructed in many of the outlying cities.
○ Theater of Dionysos
■ Rising embankment to provide support for concentric seating focused on the circular orchestra
■ Skene (backstage) and proskenion(Arch framing the stage)
■ Built in two stages
■ Ring of seats closest to the orchestra - had backs - used by dignitaries - everyone else used
continuous benches.
➢ Greek City Planning
➢ The Athenian Agora
○ Civic and commercial heart of the city
○ Temples, shrine, senate house - built on the western side at the base of the Agora Hill
○ Bouleuterion - columned porch led directly to the senate chamber
○ Royal Stoa - small rectangular building w/ a colonnade and steps along the long side facing the Agora.
○ Hephaisteion - temple - doric - enriched w/ relief sculpture and an elaborate ceiling of stone coffers.
○ South Stoa - small rooms behind a double colonnade were used for commercial activities
○ Open spaces of the Agora were used both as a racetrack and as a setting for dramatic performances and
dancing.
○ Stoa of Attalos - erected w/ right angles to the Middle Stoa
○ Colonnade walkways of the stoas, one had a sense of shelter while at the same time being connected to the
larger open space.
○ Concept of colonnaded/arcaded space containing shops and facing major public open spaces
➢ Hellenistic Cities
 ○ Frequently employed orthogonal town plans for colonial cities
○ Number of towns - after war damages - were provided w/ grid blocks and carefully considered open spaces.
○ Hippodamus
■ Consolidated and articulated the religious, social, and commercial elements of the city center w/
regular blocks of houses adjusted to fit the particular circumstances of the topography.
■ Houses were consistently oriented w. Their major rooms opening to the south, and the megaron
form was used again as the basic living unit of the house.
○ During the Hellenistic period, both architecture and city planning became more elaborate and theatrical
○ Great Altar of Pergamon
■ High plinth on which the altar stood became the location for a frieze over 300 ft in length.
■ Contrasts the elegant colonnaded building above.

Notes: 9/20

➢ Vitruvius - 1st century architect

➢ Ten Books on Architecture - first book of architecture in western realm - however mentions other architects/texts -
earlier Greek and hellenistic architects.
○ POV (way of writing) - writing the book to the Roman Emperor
○ Liberal arts advocate
○ Symmetry: Balance in the way parts relate to one another
○ Harmonious and beautiful in the way parts add up to make the whole
○ Architecture as a body itself
➢ Nature of Greek Religion
○ Knew they were there instead of “believing” they were there - presence was there and embodied
○ Part of everyday life
○ Gods mettled in everyday affairs
➢ Earliest evidence of Greek religion in the built environment
○ Demarcation of a boundary around sacred object/place
○ Temenos - boundary - creates distinction between sacred and profane
○ Propylon
○ W/n Temenos is the alter - prized cow would be slaughtered
○ Temenos inside - food and decoration - dispersed around the space - festive atmosphere.
➢ Evolution
○ Based on plan of Megaron - Houses for the God - Thatched roof and stone - ritual still takes place outside of
the Altar - Storage of the statue
➢ Acropolis
○ Temples/palaces since the time it was settled
○ Foundation myth of the city
○ All encompassing space - Temenos

Technical:
➢ Roof of the porch facing the Parthenon is supported by the six Caryatid maidens.
➢ Architects fusing new constructions w/ elements from the site’s history
➢ Architects sought to integrate the Doric architecture characteristic of Attica with Ionic elements in an attempt to express
the unity of the Delian League and Athen’s ascendancy among the city-states of Greece.
○ Ionic temples were built w/ marble - superior stone - imposes a level of power
➢ Architectural and sculptural detail was generally painted in vibrant colors and plain walls may have had murals.

Narrative:
➢ Under is a salt water spring
➢ Rock bearing the mark of Poseidon’s trident.
➢ Worship for Athena
➢ Eastern Portico - Ionic columns - led to Athena’s sanctuary - ancient wooden image of the goddess
➢ North Porch - Gave access to Poseidon’s shrine through an elongated Ionic Portico
➢ Symbolic of the battle between the two gods.
➢ Movement of a person around and through the building was the medium that integrated the emblems that punctuated its
spaces. - circulation of the structure
➢ Plays on the element of monumentalism

Notes: 9/22/22

➢ Entasis - Taper of columns as it ascends to the top - makes it more visually appealing
○ Purely technical considerations - or appears more refined - debate on why that sort of detail was added
➢ Hellenistic Period
○ Greek culture spreads through massive region - Alexander the Great
○ Alexander died - led to political fracturing - however Greek culture still held influence
○ Temple of Apollo Epikourios
■ Theatricality of the space
■ Combines all three column orders
■ Apollo is shifted - not centered - light shines in on Apollo statue through door
■ Ionic - scrolls - vegetal - elaborately carved - Tree is abstracted and brought into the temple -
remnant of that earlier idea
○ Sanctuary of Athena, Lindos, Rhodes
■ Temples enclosures become more hierarchical - more rigid and monumental
■ Terraces that lead to the temple itself
■ Older Temple initially
■ Symmetrical composition
■ Transitional artifact from classical to hellenistic
○ Altar of Zeus
■ Mythic story of Athena and Pergamon
■ Could have functioned as propaganda by Athens
■ Was an elaborate altar space
➢ Vitruvius
○ Architects must have a liberal education - to make a more well-rounded educated individual - makes good
architect
➢ Urban Life
○ Agora - center of urban life - base of Acropolis
○ Stoas - long buildings - row of columns on one side - wall on the other.
○ Separation of facilities, however lumped into one big space
➢ Urban life w/n towns
○ Colonies or cities way outside of Athens
○ Topography allows for the larger landscape to be a part of the theater

➢ Delos - trading hub - different type of people living everywhere -

○ Belonging and exclusion
○ Slaves - seperate quarters - a lot less decorated
○ Service rooms - much more sharply separated - poor decoration - small size - not much light get into -
alternate circulation routes - w/o intruding into the house
➢ Houses at Delos houses
○ Uniformity of the architecture - establishing conformity
■ Mid-century suburbs
○ Belonging through decoration - certain aspects of design hinted at different cultures - staking out cultural
claims

BAT: The Architecture of Ancient India and Southeast Asia Pg. 63 - 71

➢ An account of settlements along the Indus Valley and its associated coastal plain - culture remains sketchy - basis of
economy was agriculture - literate although writing can’t be deciphered
➢ Harappan Settlements
○ Laid out in orderly grid oriented to cardinal directions
○ Orthogonal town plans = high level of central gov. Control
○ Building built from fired bricks of uniform size - houses had underground drains - sewer system
○ Flooding = problem
➢ Cities
○ Terraced citadel - on high ground w/ ceremonial buildings
○ Storehouses for grain - mills
➢ Mohenjo-Daro’s citadel
○ Great stepped bath
➢ Small figurines suggest a reverence for trees and animals.
➢ Indus Settlements = egalitarian societies
○ No great temple complexes to indicate concentration of power and wealth
➢ Mohenjo-Daro
○ Tightly packed houses organized around internal courtyards - rooms were small - blank facades to street -
➢ Temples were the primary buildings erected in durable materials - houses/ palaces were constructed of less permanent
material.
➢ Religions of India
○ Simple shrines gave physical expression to this idea through a lings, or upright stone emblematic of the male
element, surrounded at the base by a yoni, representing the female principle.
○ Jain temples never developed a distinctive style, borrowing elements instead from other religious groups.
○ Caste structure - society is organized immutably into four classes.
○ Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism.
➢ Early Buddhist Shrines
○ Simple mound of rubble and earth - stupa - was erected over the relics (ashes) of Buddha - only 10 - once he
died
○ Buddhist monks settled in the vicinity of stupas to form viharas, or small monasteries, of individual cells
organized around open courts. - a processional path - clockwise
○ Oldest surviving Buddhist stupas were enlarged w/ successive coverings - during the reign of Asoka - also
caused the roads leading to Buddhist shrines to be marked w/ tall columns inscribed w/ Buddhist teachings. -
modeled by Persian originals - stupas - hemispherical forms - brick/stone - protected by verdica/closing fence
- crowned w/ harmica/square railing & chatra/three-tiered umbrella form.
○ Monastery at Sanchi
■ 120 ft in diameter - 40 ft in height - crowned by a chatra set inside a harmica
■ Base is encircled by two-tiered ambulatory
■ Massive stone verdica - four carved gates
■ Toranas - entrance gates - designed to reduce distractions outside the sacred enclosure from
disturbing the meditations of pilgrims circumambulating the stupa.
■ Accumulation of buildings
■ Buddhist monks lived in simple cells that were grouped around a square/rectangular open court
containing community facilities
■ Several enclosed chaitya halls
○ Monks increasingly sought remote sites for construction to avoid conflicts w/ Brahmins.
○ Cave Temple of Karli
■ Chaitya hall faithfully replicates the form and details of wooden architecture that provided its
prototype - hall is 45ft wide
■ Workers drove two tunnels 150 ft into the cliff to establish the length of the temple, and then
enlarged the excavation to create a barrel-shaped ceiling w/ arched “ribs”.
■ A recessed, arched porch marked by paired free standing columns supporting lion sculptures.
■ Porch was adorned w/ relief carvings
■ Dim light
➢ Hindu Temples
 ○ Buddhists built the earliest surviving shrines and established the model on which early Hindu architecture
was based.
○ Their temples are simultaneously dwelling of the god, places for worship, and objects of worship.
○ Specific forms, sacred geometry, careful orientation, and axial alignments. - holy mountain - sacred cave, and
the cosmic axis. - Mandala
○ Temple complexes are usually aligned on cardinal points.
○ Temple 17 at Sanchi
■ Set on a plinth and featuring a square sanctuary preceded by a pillared porch
■ Garbhagriha - womb chamber - sacred image/symbol of the god’s presence
■ Covered porch provides a transition between outside and sanctuary.
○ As builders became more skillful in working in stone, they gave increasingly elaborate formal expression to
the vertical mound arising over the sanctuary. - Lad Khan Temple
➢ Later Hindu Temples
○ Builders exploited architectural form as the basis for sculptural embellishment, sweeping masses upward in
imitation of entire mountain ranges.

In-Class Notes - 10/6

➢ The Traditional Architecture of China and Japan

○ Society has generally been defined by the Han Chinese - highest degree of cultural continuity
○ Before about 2000 BCE
■ Remains of farming and craft villages in the Yellow River Valley
■ Rectangular houses - sunk a half-story into the ground - truncated, pyramidal roofs
● Smoke from the central hearth escaped through a gap at the apex of the thatched roof.
■ Circular huts - side walls of clay
■ Doorway was recessed
■ Timber frame, earthen plastering, and thatch.
○ The primary impetus for building came from the government
○ Great Wall
■ Begun by feudal lords, unified by the first Qin emperor, and rebuilt/extended during the Ming
Dynasty
■ 4000 miles long
■ Was rammed earth - but then raised and turned into a casing of brick/stone
■ 19 - 39 ft in height
■ Capped by crenelated battlements with watchtowers at intervals connected by a road extendong
along the top.
○ Architectural ideas accompanied Buddhist teachings, resulting in Chinese buildings that have roots in Indian
practice.
○ Cave Temples found in China
■ Elements: elephants, lotus plants, scrolling vines, etc.. - acanthus leaf foliage
○ Practice of building Buddhist temple complexes with a hall for venerating images of the Buddha and a
separate pagoda, or tower, erected over relics symbolic of Buddha’s presence.
○ Songyue Pagoda at Dengfeng - 523
■ Tapering, 12 sided, parabolic cylinder, hollow through the center, with fifteen tiers of roofs.
■ Brick core and wooden perimeter galleries
○ Pagoda - Fogong Monastery
■ Entirely from wood
➢ Chinese Architectural Principles
○ Wood was the primary material of early Chinese architecture
○ Jian - was defined as the basic measure in construction
○ Chinese buildings have a certain interior freedom in plan, as lightweight, non-load-bearing walls can be
located in response to internal needs.
○ Ensembles organized around courtyards - different functions are generally located in separate structures
linked through connecting corridors.
 ○ Yingzao Fashi - a book of building standards.

In-Class Notes: 11/1

➢ Constantine
○ Edict of Milan
○ Arch of Constantine
➢ Baptism
➢ Early House Chapels

- What was this building type used for?

- By Whom?
- Where did it come from?
- Prototypes?
- Evolution?
- Symbolism?
- Octagonal Form - 8
- In Overall form?
- Decorative schemes?
- Key terms/concepts