CH4: Greek Architecture
By Kimnenh TAING
Religion Geography
• Aegean religion: • On the mainland, rugged mountains made
communication difficult
➢ Primitive stage of nature worship
➢ Priestesses conducted religious rites, sacred • Mountains separated inhabitants into groups,
games, clans, states
➢ Ritual dances, worship on sacrificial altars
• Archipelago and islands: sea was the inevitable
means of trade and communications
• Greek religion:
➢ A highly developed form of nature worship • Between rigorous cold and relaxing heat
➢ Gods as personifications of natural elements, or
deified mortals • Clear atmosphere and intense light - conducive
➢ Gods could influence events in the human world to creating precise and exact forms
➢ Greeks sought advice from oracles – oracle at
Delphi • Judicial activities, dramatic presentations,
public
ceremonies took place in the open air
Period/Style Construction System
• Aegean • Columnar and trabeated
➢ Rough and massive
• Roof truss appeared, enabling large spaces to
• Hellenic be unhindered by columns
➢ Mostly religious architecture
➢ "carpentry in marble“ - timber forms imitated in
stone with remarkable exactness
• Hellenistic
Material
➢ Not religious in character, but civic – for the
people • Timber and terra cotta
➢ Provided inspiration for Roman building types
➢ Dignified and gracious structures • Stone
➢ Symmetrical, orderly
HOUSE
• On islands:
➢ Flat roofing
➢ Drawn together in blocks
➢ Two to four storeys high
➢ Light admitted through light wells
• On mainland:
➢ Single-storeyed house with deep plan
➢ Columned entrance porch with central
doorway
➢ Living apartment proper with sleeping room
behind
TOMBS
• rock-cut or chamber tombs - “tholos” tomb
Treasury of Atreus, Mycenae
PALACE
Palace at Tiryns
PALACE
The lion gate
TEMPLES
• Chief building type
• Earliest ones resembled
megaron in plan and
construction
• Number of columns at
entrance :
➢ 1 column – hemostyle
➢ 2 columns – distyle
➢ 3 columns – tristyle
➢ 4 columns – tetrastyle
➢ 5 columns – pentastyle
➢ 6 columns – hexastyle
➢ 7 columns – heptastyle
➢ 8 columns – octastyle
➢ 9 columns – enneastyle
➢ 10 columns – decastyle
➢ 12 columns – dodecastyle
MOULDING
OPTICAL ILLUSION TECHNIC
• Certain refinements used to correct
optical illusions
• Horizontal lines built convex to correct
sagging
• Vertical features inclined inwards to
correct appearance of falling outwards
• On columns, entasis was used, swelling
outwards to correct appearance of
curving inwards
GREEK ORDER
• Shaft, Capital, and Horizontal entablature
(architrave, frieze, cornice)
• Originally, Doric and Ionic, named after the two
main branches of Greek race
• Then there evolved Corinthian, a purely decorative
order
GREEK ORDER - DORIC
• Without base, directly on crepidoma
• Height (including capital) of 4 to 6 times the
diameter at the base
• Shaft diminishes at top from 3 / 4 to 2 / 3 of base
diameter
• Divided into 20 shallow flutes separated by
arrises
• Doric capitals had two parts - the square abacus
above and circular bulbous echinus below
• Doric entablature :
➢ Height is 1 and 3 / 4 times the lower diameter in
height 3 main divisions:
• Architrave, principal beam of 2 or 3 slabs in depth
• Frieze
• Cornice, mouldings
GREEK ORDER - IONIC
• Volute or scroll capital (derived from
Egyptian lotus and Aegean art)
• Ionic column :
➢ More slender than Doric
➢ Needed a base to spread load
➢ Height was 9 times the base diameter
➢ Has 24 flutes separated by fillets
➢ Upper and lower torus
• Ionic entablature :
➢ Height was 2 and 1 / 4 times the diameter
of column
• Two parts :
➢ Architrave,with fasciae
➢ Cornice
➢ No frieze
GREEK ORDER - CORITHIAN
• Decorative variant of Ionic Order
• Corinthian column :
➢ Base and shaft resembled Ionic
➢ More slender
➢ Height of 10 diameters
➢ Capital: much deeper than Ionic, 1 and 1 / 6
diameters high
➢ Capital invented by Callimachus, inspired by
basket over root of acanthus plant
• 3 parts:
➢ Architrave
➢ Frieze
➢ Cornice, developed type with dentils
Temple of Nike Apteros
The Panthenon
TEMONOS
• Enclosure designated as a
sacred land
• Entire groups of buildings laid
out symmetrically and orderly
Acropolis
Acropolis
AGORA
AGORA
STOA
PRYTANEION, BOULEUTERION, or ASSEMBLY
HALL
THEATER OR ODEION
• Carved or hollowed out of the
hillside
• Acoustically-efficient
Theater of Epidauros
STADIUM
