Greek Architecture Up To The Doric Order

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Greek Architecture

Aristotle once said “The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.+” The architecture of ancient Greece is represented by buildings in the sanctuaries and cities of mainland Greece, the Aegean islands, southern Italy and Sicily, and the Ionian coast of Turkey. Monumental Greek architecture began in the archaic period, flourished through the classical and Hellenistic periods, and saw the first of many revivals during the Roman Empire. The roots of Greek architecture lie in the tradition of local Bronze Age house and palaces. The following paper will cover the basic forms of Greek architecture. One of the many types of Greek building structures was Sacred Architecture. The Greeks conceived of their gods in human form, as anthropomorphic representations of the forces and elements of the natural world. These gods and goddesses were worshiped with sacrifices made at an outdoor altar. At many sanctuaries, the altar was much older than the temple, and some sanctuaries had only an altar. The temple designed simply as a shelter or home for the cult statue and as a storehouse for offerings. This shelter consisted of a cella (back wall), a pronaos (columned porch),an opisthodomus (enclosure), an antae (bronze grills securing the porches), and a colonnade that provided shelter for visitors.

The earliest monumental buildings in Greek architecture were the temples. Since these were solidly built and carefully maintained, they had to be replaced only if destroyed. The architectural orders, Doric on the mainland and Ionic in the eastern Aegean, were developed in the archaic temples, and their lasting example tended to make Greek architecture conservative toward changes in design or in building technology.

The Archaic period evolved after the Mycenaen palace collapsed in 1200 BCE during the dark ages when people began rebuilding. This era brought about the int...