URBAN DESIGN HISTORY

ASSIGNMENT MODULE 1

PREPARED BY:
FIZA HIROLI
GAURY PADMACHANDRAN
SHREETHA HEGDE
PRE HISTORIC
ACTITECTURE
Background of Prehistoric Architecture
        The term "prehistory" was coined by French scholars, referring to the time
before people recorded history in writing. This is the longest period in the past
of modern man (homo sapiens) that lasted about 400,000 years. Prehistory is
not associated with a particular place or time. In some areas in the Near East it
continued until the 4thmillennium BCE, while in Central America it lasted until
500 BCE. In Hawaii, it lasted until January 17, 1779, when Captain James Cook
arrived to the coast of Hawaii. Due to lack of written documentation, prehistoric
research is based on remains, which are used as evidence
Prehistoric buildings
3,500  years BCE , man has developed a form of architecture based on megaliths
(megalith - a big rock; literally in Greek: lithos - stone, megas - big) - structures
made of rough huge stone blocks, probably intended for burial ritual.
During prehistoric times, as well as throughout history, stones and rocks were
associated with divinity. Examples to this can be found in different cultures:
Persian god Mithras was considered as having been born from a rock, marrying
a rock and whose father was a rock, Moses struck the rock to get water, the
meaning of the word "Petra" in Greek is a stone, hence the name of St. Peter's.
Prehistory saw three main types of using megalith stones known to us:  menhir ,
dolmen, and stones arranged in a circle.
PREHISTORIC AGES

 Prehistoric / Archaeological Periods

 Stone Age
 Metal Age
 Golden Age
 Metal
 Copper (Chalcolithic, Eneolithic or neolithic) Age
 Bronze Age
 Iron Age
 Categories of Time
 Cosmological Period
 Geological Period
 Prehistoric (Archaeological) & Historic Periods

The Stone Age

Archaeologists and historians place the Stone Age as that period of human
development when most of the tools used by human beings were made from
stone. The evidence available to us currently shows that while the this phase
of early human development took place in different parts of the globe, the
dates for the Stone Age was different for different parts of the world. It varies
depending on the dates assigned to stone implements discovered in a region.
As a consequence, dates for the Stone Age have changed with every
discovery and the development of dating methods. There is evidence of stone
implements having been used in Africa as early as 2.5 million years ago, 1.8
million years ago in Asia, and a million years ago in Europe. Therefore, current
theory places the earliest development of human beings in Africa. 

During the Stone Age of human development, the earth also experienced
an Ice Age some 1.6 million to 10,000 years ago. 
The Stone Age in an area ends with evidence of the earliest known
metal implements, and generally ends between 6,000 and 4,000 BCE.
The Stone Age is further divided into:

 Palaeolithic Age (Old Stone Age - 2.5 million

to 15,000 years ago - a
time period that spans 95% of human history): the age in which stone
tools were chipped or flaked

 Mesolithic Age (Middle Stone Age, also called the Epipaleolithic

Age - 15,000 to 10,000 years ago): the age in which microliths, small,
geometric-shaped stone artefacts were attached to wood, antler, or
bone to form implements such as arrows, spears, or scythes. 

 Neolithic Age (New Stone Age - 10,000 to 6,000-4,000 years ago): the

age in which ground and polished stone axes became prevalent.
Metal Age
The Metal Age starts when human beings began to use metal to make tools.
For archaeologists, the transition from the stone to the metal age occurs when
these metal tools appear alongside stone tools. The type of metal used
initially was probably influenced by the surface availability of the metal in
natural form, and appears to have been either gold or copper, both being
softer, lower melting point metals. A lower melting point was probably critical
since the development of metallurgy closely paralleled the ability to produce
hotter fires as well as the development of containers to hold and cast the
melted metal. The use of gold may even have started with the mechanical
shaping of the metal, first in cold form, then heated and softened, and finally
melted and cast.

Golden Age
ARYAN and SAKA legends place the use of gold before the use of copper -
possibly a few thousand years earlier. Gold was the more readily available
metal in Central Asia. The legends of Ferdowsi state that gold was used in
ancient times to make surgical knives used to perform Caesarean operations. 
Most of the ancient gold artefacts were plundered, smelted and reused.
The unearthing of gold artefacts that predated copper tools, requires
finding sites that were hidden or otherwise inaccessible to robbers. We
will have to await archaeological evidence to support the legendary
evidence that the use of gold preceded the use of copper.

Copper (Chalcolithic, Eneolithic or neolithic) Age

The Copper Age in Central Asia and the rest of the Aryan lands is currently
said to begin in the late 5th millennium BCE and lasted for about a
millennium (4,300-3,200 BCE) leading in to the Early Bronze Age.
Transition from the European Copper Age to the Bronze Age occurs about
a millennium later - between the late 4th and the late 3rd millennia BCE. 

The use of copper required the development of metallurgy - the science

of extracting metal from metal ores - and casting the molten metal in
castings.
Bronze Age
Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin that is more hard than either pure copper or
tin. In addition, bronze has a lower melting point than copper or tin making it
easier to form into finished shapes by moulding, casting, or machining. While a
harder metal, bronze still did not break easily under stress and was corrosion
resistant. Bronze was better suited for weapons and tools than either copper or
tin. 

The manufacture of bronze required the development of alloy-making technology. 

Current reports suggest that the Bronze Age in Central Asia extended from about
3,300 to 1,300 BCE.

Iron Age
With the ability to create higher smelting temperatures came the ability to extract
and work with iron, a metal that was in earlier ages considered more precious than
gold. Simple iron mixed with some residual slag (the residue when iron is extracted
from its ore) is called wrought iron - the earliest form of iron. Wrought iron is
weaker than bronze, but because iron was more readily available than copper or
tin, wrought iron was less complicated to manufacture than bronze. It was also
more easily sharpened than bronze. 
 Wrought iron was eventually replaced by steel - iron with
between 0.02% and 1.7% of carbon. Steel weapons and tools
were about the same weight as those of bronze, but
stronger. 

The Iron Age in Central Asia is estimated to have extended

from about 1,300 to 900 BCE
CATEGORIES OF TIME
The broad categories of time are:
 Cosmological Period

The Cosmological Period consists of time periods in the origin and

evolution of the universe. According to current scientific theory the
Cosmological Period begins with the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago
and ends with the formation of the earth 4.5 billion years ago.
 Geological Period
The Geological period consists of time periods in the origin and
evolution of earth. The earth is about 4.5 billion years old. The time
from the origin of the earth to the present is divided into super eons,
eons, eras and periods. 

The Precambrian period is a super eon that is sub-divided into three

eons: 
• the Hadean Eon (4.5 to 3.8 billion years before present),
• the Archean Eon (3.8 to 2.5 billion years before present),, and
• the Proterozoic Eon (2.5 billion to 570 million years before present)
  Prehistoric (Archaeological) & Historic Periods

The Prehistoric Period consists of time periods in the origin and evolution
of humankind from about 2.5 million years to about 900 BCE. the
Prehistoric Period is divided into the Archaeological Periods of the Stone,
Bronze and Iron Ages. 

The Historic Period records the activities of humankind from about 900
BCE or from that time when records are available or can re reconstructed.
The Historic Period overlaps with the Prehistoric Periods such as the Iron
Age when it is possible to reconstruct timelines of a people's history.

Gabriel de Mortillet, a French  Palaeolithic Age

investigator, started the
practice of naming cultural  Mesolithic Age
divisions in the manner of
 Neolithic Age
compartments or stages. Yet,
it is generally classified as  Chalcolithic Age
follows:- 
 Copper Phase
 Iron Age
 Pre History

Palaeolithic Mesolithic Age Neolithic Age

Age or or or
Old stone age Late Stone Age New Stone age
(500,000- (10,000-4,000 (6,000-1,000
10,000 BC) BC) BC)

Palaeolithic Age cab be further divided into following:-

Palaeolithic Age

Lower Palaeolithic Middle Palaeolithic Upper Palaeolithic

Culture Culture Culture
(5,00,000 - 100,00 (100,000 - 40,000 BC) (40,000 - 10,000 BC)
BC)
 The Antiquity of Man.--We do not know when man first appeared
upon the earth. We only know that in ages long past, when both the
climate and the outline of the continents were very different from what
they are at present, primitive man roamed over them with animals
now extinct; and that, about 5000 B.C., when the historic curtain first
rises, in some favored regions, as in the valleys of the Nile and the
Euphrates, there were nations and civilizations already venerable with
age, and possessing arts, governments, and institutions that bear
evidence of slow growth through very long periods of time. [The Book
of Genesis, which the Christian Church holds to be a divinely inspired
record, fixes no definite date for the beginning of human life on the
earth.]
Ancient Egypt
The clearest evidence for the legacy of Ancient
Egypt can be seen in architecture.  The later
Egyptian temples look very similar to early Greek
temples; and it has been suggested that the
Ancient Greeks got the very idea of monumental
building in stone from the Egyptians.
Urbanisation began as early as 5000 B.C. during
the Ubaid period in southern Mesopotamia, where
walled cities were sometimes so densely positioned
along the waterways they were within sight of each
other (Pollock 2000, Rothman 2001).
Peripheral settlements also had fortified garrisons
nearby for protection. The typical Sumerian city
was comprised of three parts: the inner city (libbi
ali, Akkadian), outer city or suburb (uru.bar.ra) and
the harbour (kar) (Oppenheim 1969).
The harbour was the hub of commercial activities,
while the city itself was comprised of several
quarters, including the palace, the temple and private
housing. The palace and temple inter-operated as
“internal-circulation organisations” centred on the
ruler, with resources from the sanctuary beneficial to
both the elite (overland trade) and commoners
(available economic resources) (Oppenheim 1969).
Over 80% of early Sumerians lived in cities, including
many farmers seeking protection (Trigger 1995). The
available economic resources enabled the cities to
support specialised craft production (Peregrine 1991)
and facilitated commercial exchanges between the
settlements and their hinterlands, thus encouraging
the growth of markets.
Ithas been estimated that 10-20% of the population was non-food
producing (Trigger 1995). These developmental differences in
urbanisation, as expressed through evolving nature and functions,
are the underlying premise of Wilson’s (1960) claim that ancient
Egypt did not possess cities until the New kingdom.

Non-agricultural activities would have included defence,

administration, trade, manufacturing, religion and personalised
interactions.
These activities may be reflected in a territorial state spatial
organisation with settlements hierarchical in character, tending
towards activity boundaries being defined and the activities
themselves becoming the domain of specialists (Bietak 7 1979,
Trigger 1972).

Thus activities would be focal in nature, designed to take

advantage of the scaled settlement patterns (Trigger 1972)
relating the city to its hinterland (Trigger 1985) and to minimise
the fluctuations in agricultural yield, caused by the unpredictability
of the Nile flood levels, through food transportation networks
Cities in ancient Egypt grew out of the development of agriculture
and the emergence of the state as the unifying and predominant
form of political organization. However, even as early as 3500 BC,
towns and cities (if they can be called such), consisted of regional
capitals linked to the population centers of smaller administrative
districts.

urban planning in ancient Egypt is a matter of continuous

debate. Because ancient sites usually survive only in fragments,
and many ancient Egyptian cities have been continuously inhabited
since their original forms, relatively little is actually understood
about the general designs of Egyptian towns for any given period.

The Egyptians referred to most cities as:

either nwt or dmi. Nwt usually refers to unplanned cities that grew
naturally, such as Memphis and Thebes, while dmi can be
translated as "settlement" and usually refers to towns that were
laid out along a plan. The archaeological evidence of such cities is
best preserved, and has been most thoroughly excavated, at el-
Lahun, Deir el-Medina, and Amarna, though some evidence of
urban planning exists at other sites as well.
knowledge about Egyptian cities, and settlements in general
is limited. Every aspect of ancient Egyptian cities conspires to
limit our understanding.
Settlements and cities were located on the floodplain, with a
preference for proximity to the Nile, in order to receive goods
by boat and for its source of water.
Unlike temples and tombs, most housing and public buildings
in these cities and settlements were made of mud brick
throughout pharaonic times and shifts in the course of the
Nile, the build-up of the floodplain by the annual deposition of
silt and the impact of high Nile floods have all led to their
destruction, which has sometimes been complete.
Many cities, such as Thebes, have been built over by modern
settlements, and even when some remains have survived, the
mud brick has been harvested by farmers to use as fertilizer.
Finally, archaeological investigations since the nineteenth
century have focused on temples and tombs, with their rich
and spectacular art, sculpture and architecture, rather than
the few less thrilling ancient Egyptian towns.
GREEK CITIES
FACTORS INFLUENCING GREEK CITIES
 Topography
- mountainous with limited fertile area in the form of isolated valley, plains and plateaus.
- resulted in separate city states, rather than a single unified nation.
 Climate
- winter was severe in mountains
- summer heat is tempered with daily alternation of land and sea breeze
- rainy season – late winter and autumn season
- encouraged open air communally oriented attitude
 Construction material
- readily available high quality marble
- allowed them to work on fine details

GREEK URBAN FORM COMPONENTS

 Acropolis – the religious centre
 Agora – multipurpose everyday heart
 Enclosing city wall
 Residential districts
 Leisure and cultural areas
 Religious precinct if separate from the Acropolis
 Harbour and port
 Industrial District
Acropolis
- orignal defensive hilltop nucleus.
- fortfied citadel of colonial foundation.
- evolved into the religious sanctuary overtime from a site of urban area.

Agora
- public space in the centre zone of the city.
- Intense and sustained concentration of varied activities.
- daily scene of social business, life and politics.
- located mostly in the middle or along the port in harbour cities.

Housing
- houses were considered subordinate to public buildings.
- drainage and refuse disposal were non-existent.
- courtyard houses, but had no standard or typical arrangements of rooms.

Communal Requirements
- economy based on slave labour, hence citizens had enough time for public activites.
- specialised buildings for communal requirements (theatre, gymnasium, stadium, etc..)
were developed .
Miletus
- Rebuilt from 479 BC, older city was a product of centuries of
haphazard organic growth.
- Agora area is centrally placed in the form of a rectangle with
the long side leading from the defended harbour inlet.
- 3 distinct residential groups – southern most one has
A – Acropolis
considerably larger houses. B – Main Harbour
- west of agora – theatre, stadium and gymnasium C – Agora Complex
D – Communal
Requirements
PLAN OF MILETUS
ROMAN CITIES
Roman Urban Planning
- General Principles:
- built fortified legionary camps called Castras.
- these were temporary centres for local military services.
- permanent urban settlements had simple standardised pla. With square/rectangular
perimeter.
- streets: Decamanus – centre of the town
Cardo – bisects Decamanus at right angles.
- Forum area - equivalent of Greek Agora
- located at the intersection of decumanus and cardo
- had collonaded courtyard and meeting hall at one end
- Main temple, public baths, theatres located in the centre of the town, near the Forum.
 Amphitheatre located outside the town.
 3 classes of imperial towns - coloniae – newly funded settlement
- municipia – important tribal centres
- civitates – market and administrative centres
Rome
- city of seven hills.
- each of the hills had it’s village settlements.
- flooding, disease (malaria in particular), river pollution,
related drinking water problem, poor bearing capacity and hilly
topography were the hassles faced by Roman planners and
engineers.

Urban Form Components

 Sewer and water Supply
- system of elevated aqueducts and associated fresh water
reservoirs which restricted subsequent redevelopment of the city
.
- sewers drained the lower lying parts of the city, took surface
water from the streets and collected sewage of residences and
public toilets; no effort made to connect the private latrinesof
upper storey flat.
- water supply was sourced from the river Tiber until 4th century
BC, when the volume of the sewage disposed in to the river
resulted in unacceptable pollution level.
ROME: DAIGRAMMATIC PLAN OF THE CITY
- resulted in the construction of aqueducts and reservoirs.
 Fortification
 Street System
- Hierarchy of streets: iteria – tracks only for men on foot
actus - tracks for one cart at a
time
viae – tracks allowing two carts to
pass
- during Caesar’s reign the streets got overloaded and
resulted in conflict between pedestrian and vehicular traffic, as
result of which carts (except for the builders’ carts) were banned
in daylight.
 Housing
- 2 types: Domus
- for privileged single family
occupation
- Sequence of rooms facing into courtyards
Incula
-building block
- divided into number of apartments called
cernacula
- no running water supply to the upper floors
- ranged from one to three storeys
 Markets
- Rome sustained by imports on a large scale.
- city include warehouses near the ports and
harbours.
- included small shopkeepers trading from
ground floor premises of insula

 City Centre
- linearity of Forum Romanum determined by
topography.
- extended due overcrowding and multifarious The Forum Romanum Magnum
activites.
 Recreation
- provided for wholesome past times for the people.
- included enormous baths, Colloseum, theatres, etc..
BYZANTINE ARCHITECTURE
Byzantine

527 to 565 AD. After Constantine moved the capital of the Roman empire to
Byzantium (now called Istanbul) in 330 AD, Roman architecture evolved into a
graceful, classically-inspired style that used brick instead of stone, domed roofs,
elaborate mosaics, and classical forms. Emperor Justinian (527 AD to 565 AD)
led the way.

Byzantine architecture is the architecture of the Byzantine Empire, also known

as the Later Roman or Eastern Roman Empire. This terminology is used by
modern historians to designate the medieval Roman Empire as it evolved as a
distinct artistic and cultural entity centered on the new capital of
Constantinople rather than the city of Rome and environs. The empire endured
for more than a millennium, dramatically influencing Medieval architecture
throughout Europe and the Near East, and becoming the primary progenitor of
the Renaissance and Ottoman architectural traditions that followed its collapse.
In 330 A.D., the first Christian ruler of the Roman empire, Constantine
the Great (r. 306–337) (26.229), transferred the ancient imperial capital
from Rome to the city of Byzantion located on the easternmost
territory of the European continent, at a major intersection of east-west
trade. The emperor renamed this ancient port city Constantinople ("the
city of Constantine") in his own honor (detail, 17.190.1673–1712); it
was also called the "New Rome," owing to the city's new status as
political capital of the Roman empire. The Christian, ultimately Greek-
speaking state ruled from that city would come to be called Byzantium
by modern historians, although the empire's medieval citizens
described themselves as "Rhomaioi," Romans, and considered
themselves the inheritors of the ancient Roman empire.

The emperor renamed this ancient port city Constantinople ("the city of
Constantine") in his own honor.
The Beginning of Byzantium
The first golden age of the empire, the Early Byzantine period, extends from
the founding of the new capital into the 700s. Christianity replaced the gods
of antiquity as the official religion of the culturally and religiously diverse
state in the late 300s (2006.569). The practice of Christian monasticism
developed in the fourth century, and continued to be an important part of
the Byzantine faith, spreading from Egypt to all parts of the empire.

In the Early Byzantine period, Byzantium's educated elite used Roman law,
and Greek and Roman culture, to maintain a highly organized government
centered on the court and its great cities (1980.416; 1998.69; 1999.99). In
later decades, urban decline and the invasions of the empire's western
territories by Germanic tribes, especially in the fifth century, led to the
diminishment of western centers including Rome, sacked in 410 by the Goths
and in 455 by the Vandals. Despite the territorial gains of the emperor
Justinian I in the sixth century (17.190.52,53), many of the empire's Italian
provinces were overtaken by Lombards in the late 500s. In the 600s, Persian
and Arab invasions devastated much of Byzantium's eastern territories.
Several shining examples of secular architecture survive from these
early centuries, including vestiges of an atrium in the Great Palace in
Constantinople, decorated with a lavish mosaic program representing
daily life and the riches of the empire. Also surviving from the capital
are the remains of two aristocratic homes, the palaces of Antiochus
and of Lausos. Other great ancient cities of the empire, including
Antioch and Ephesos, also preserve remains from this secular building
tradition. For ecclesiastical architecture in the early Byzantine period,
domed churches, the most important being Constantinople's Church of
Hagia Sophia, and other domed sacred buildings began to appear in
greater number alongside traditional basilica forms, first seen in the
large-scale churches sponsored by Emperor Constantine I in the early
fourth century. In the 700s and early 800s, the Iconoclastic controversy
raged over the proper use of religious images, resulting in the
destruction of icons in all media, especially in the capital of
Constantinople.
Middle Byzantium
 Middle Byzantium
The resolution of the Iconoclastic controversy in favor of the use of icons
ushered in a second flowering of the empire, the Middle Byzantine period
(843–1204). Greek became the official language of the Byzantine state and
church, and Christianity spread from Constantinople throughout the Slavic
lands to the north. Efforts to recover eastern territories lost to Arab armies in
the seventh century, including Syria and Crete, met with some success early in
the period. The Byzantine system of military governorship over themes
(administrative divisions), existing from the seventh to twelfth centuries,
provided administration for the state's distant and expanding territories.

Art and architecture flourished during the Middle Byzantine period, owing to
the empire's growing wealth and broad base of affluent patrons. Manuscript
production reached an apogee, as did works in cloisonné enamel and stone
and ivory carving . An intensified revival of interest in classical art forms and
ancient literature reflected Byzantium's continuous and active engagement
with its ancient past throughout the empire's long history
Church builders of the ninth to twelfth centuries in general favored smaller or
mid-sized churches of domed, centrally planned design, with the "cross-in-square
plan" emerging as one of the most popular. Several supports for processional
crosses take the form of such church designs . The mosaic and fresco programs
decorating the vaulted and domed spaces of these buildings often utilized their
curved surfaces for dramatic effect or to complement narrative. Such monumental
decoration reveals a careful consideration of how images would relate and
respond to one another across space, both vertically and horizontally. During the
Middle Byzantine period, figural images and especially icons were increasingly
employed for the decoration of the templon, or eastern sanctuary barrier of the
Byzantine church, and its adjacent wall spaces. The first great monasteries were
built on Mount Athos (Greece), which would become one of the most important
and enduring centers of Byzantine Christianity.

A number of impressive Byzantine architectural projects and outstanding

artistic monuments survived the travails of the Latin Occupation. Some of
these take their inspiration, at least in part, from designs and artistic
styles popular under the Komnenoi, the last reigning dynasty before the
Latin conquest. In other instances, there is a fascinating fusion of
Byzantine and western European elements in a single monument.
Late Byzantium
Late Byzantium
While the political boundaries of Late Byzantium under the Palaiologan
emperors were drastically reduced from the expansive lands of the Early
and Middle Byzantine periods, Byzantine religious influence still extended
far beyond its borders (2006.100). The focus of Byzantine power was
now centered in Constantinople, and extended westward to northern
and central Greece, and south into the Peloponnesos. In the east, the
Byzantine Empire of Trebizond, which had flourished during the Latin
Occupation, continued to exist as an independently ruled Byzantine
territory in competition with the Palaiologan-ruled empire with its capital
at Constantinople. The last Byzantine lands would be conquered by the
Ottoman Turks in the mid-fifteenth century, with Constantinople taken in
1453, and Mistra and Trebizond in 1460. These Islamic conquests
brought an end to an empire that endured more than 1,100 years after
its first founding. Long after its fall, Byzantium set a standard for luxury,
beauty, and learning that inspired the Latin West and the Islamic East
Art and architecture flourished for significant periods in the Late Byzantine
centuries. This stands in surprising contrast to the desperate military and
political circumstances endured by Byzantine rulers. Despite shrinking funds
for support of the arts, patrons of all social levels founded new buildings and
renovated older structures damaged or neglected during the Latin
Occupation. These buildings were decorated with new monumental
programs, icons, and church furnishings . Hagia Sophia in Constantinople was
one important church that was repaired and its decoration embellished by
the Palaiologan emperors. Monasteries, in particular, including the surviving
Chora Monastery in Constantinople, were the beneficiaries of this enduring
interest in architectural and artistic patronage. In the portable arts,
devotional works of art, including icons for private devotion, continued to be
made, albeit in more economical materials, with the lesser metals replacing
gold, silver, and fine cloisonné enamel once popular in Middle Byzantine art.
The medium of the miniature mosaic icon enjoyed particular popularity
during the Late Byzantine centuries, with their brilliant surfaces and illusion
of luxury formed from more modest materials such as colored stone,
semiprecious gems, and glass embedded in wax or resin on a wooden
support
 
 ROMANESQUE
ROMANESQUE
800 to 1200 AD As Rome spread across Europe, heavier, stocky Romanesque
architecture with rounded arches emerged. Churches and castles of the early
Medieval period were constructed with thick walls and heavy piers.
  Romanesque architecture is an architectural style of medieval Europe
characterized by semi-circular arches. There is no consensus for the beginning
date of the Romanesque style, with proposals ranging from the 6th to the late
10th century, this later date being the most commonly held.
Romanesque architecture is an architectural style of medieval europe
characterized by semi-circular arches. There is no consensus for the beginning
date of the Romanesque style, with proposals ranging from the 6th to the late
10th century, this later date being the most commonly held. It developed in the
12th century into the gothic style, marked by pointed arches. Examples of
Romanesque architecture can be found across the continent, making it the first
pan-European architectural style since Imperial roman architecture. The
Romanesque style in England is traditionally referred to as Norman architecture.
Combining features of ancient Roman and Byzantine buildings and other
local traditions, Romanesque architecture is known by its massive quality,
thick walls, round arches, sturdypiers, groin vaults, large towers and
decorative arcading. Each building has clearly defined forms, frequently of
very regular, symmetrical plan; the overall appearance is one of simplicity
when compared with the Gothic buildings that were to follow. The style can
be identified right across Europe, despite regional characteristics and
different materials.
Many castles were built during this period, but they are greatly
outnumbered by churches. The most significant are the great
abbey churches, many of which are still standing, more or less complete and
frequently in use . The enormous quantity of churches built in the
Romanesque period was succeeded by the still busier period of Gothic
architecture, which partly or entirely rebuilt most Romanesque churches in
prosperous areas like England and Portugal. The largest groups of
Romanesque survivors are in areas that were less prosperous in subsequent
periods, including parts of southern France, northern Spain and rural Italy.
Survivals of unfortified Romanesque secular houses and palaces, and the
domestic quarters of monasteries are far rarer, but these used and adapted
the features found in church buildings, on a domestic scale.
Characteristics

The general impression given by Romanesque architecture, in

both ecclesiastical and secular buildings, is one of massive solidity
and strength. In contrast with both the preceding Roman and
later Gothic architecture, in which the load-bearing structural
members are, or appear to be, columns, pilasters and arches,
Romanesque architecture, in common with Byzantine
architecture, relies upon its walls, or sections of walls called piers.
Romanesque architecture is often divided into two periods known
as the “First Romanesque" style and the "Romanesque" style. The
difference is chiefly a matter of the expertise with which the
buildings were constructed. The First Romanesque employed
rubble walls, smaller windows and unvaulted roofs. A greater
refinement marks the Second Romanesque, along with increased
use of the vault and dressed stone.
Architectural embellishment

Arcading is the single most significant decorative feature of

Romanesque architecture. It occurs in a variety of forms, from
the Lombard Band, which is a row of small arches that appear to
support a roofline or course, to shallow blind arcading that is
often a feature of English architecture and is seen in great
variety at Ely Cathedral, to the open dwarf gallery, first used
at Speyer Cathedral and widely adopted in Italy as seen on
both Pisa cathedral and its famous Leaning tower Arcades could
be used to great effect, both externally and internally, as
exemplified by the church of Santa Maria della Pieve, in Arezzo.
Gothic period
Gothic Art is the expression of the new city life
The term was coined with a deceptive sense
It is deter by a series of elements:

 Economic and social transformations of the late Middle

Ages
 Consolidation of the new monarchies and modern states
 A new spirituality, with the Cister reform

The style had an evolution:

 12th century: origin
 13th century: plenitude
 14th century until mid 15th century: international
 Second half of the 15th century: flamboyant
Gothic architecture first appeared in northern France in the mid 12th
century and evolved at a time of far reaching changes:

Population increase, new trade roots, economic revival,

technological advances and a renaissance of intellectual activity
best seen in the emergence of the universities in the 13th century:
e.g. Bologna, Paris, Oxford, Cambridge, Salamanca. 
For some 400 years, the Gothic style dominated the architecture
of Western Europe, inevitably leaving a profound legacy. 

Like Romanesque, Gothic was a phenomenon admitting different

kinds of buildings (palaces, castles, hospices, town and guild halls),
but found its greatest expression in church related structures, in
particular the great cathedrals that span Europe.

The Church was after all the most prolific builder of the Middle Ages,
and the one body that could move people to a common cause and
gather money with relative ease to undertake large scale projects.
The spread of Gothic architecture
 Thespread of Gothic architecture from northern France to
other regions occurred partly through the movement of
architects and master masons or sculptors to new building
projects or, through widespread competition between
bishops, monasteries, and other patrons of cathedrals .

 The Gothic style was quickly absorbed in England, which

then had political ties with France. Durham cathedral,
consecrated in AD 1133 (which had already pioneered the
use of ribbed vaults) showed continuing early Gothic
influences in its construction.

 Themain breakthrough in England occurred in the 1170s

with the cathedrals of Canterbury, Lincoln, and slightly later
at Salisbury. Soon the first Gothic cathedrals were erected
on the Iberian peninsula, starting in the 1190s at Evora in
Portugal, and from the 1220s at Léon, Burgos, and Toledo in
Spain.
 The influence on cathedral art within the territories of
present-day Germany, the Netherlands, and Italy started
slightly later at about 1230-50, although some earlier
buildings had already introduced initial elements of the
Gothic style.
 Whereas Gothic architecture had difficulty establishing a
secure foothold in Italy, with its artistic traditions inspired
by the classical style, it had an enormous impact in
Germany, which eventually took over the leading role as
an innovative center of the Gothic tradition.
 As in England, where also specific, but more nationally
restricted Gothic styles developed, the German late
Gothic art survived into the 16th century.
 "The faithful were for the first time to be seen
pulling carts laden with stones, wood, wheat
and other supplies needed for the building of a
cathedral.  … People everywhere humbled
themselves, did penance and forgave their
enemies.  Men and women were seen carrying
heavy loads through bogs, singing and praising
the wonders of God….” “ Since the cathedral was
the symbol of God’s omnipotence, participation
in its construction became something akin to a
mystic experience. This explains the popular
character of Gothic style." Praeger 198.
Settlements and cities were located on the floodplain, with
a preference for proximity to the Nile , in order to receive
goods by boat and for its source of water.
Unlike temples and tombs, most housing and public
buildings in these cities and settlements were made of
mud brick throughout pharaonic times and shifts in the
course of the Nile, the build-up of the floodplain by the
annual deposition of silt and the impact of high Nile floods
have all led to their destruction, which has sometimes
been complete.
Many cities, such as Thebes, have been built over by
modern settlements, and even when some remains have
survived, the mud brick has been harvested by farmers to
use as fertilizer.
Finally, archaeological investigations since the nineteenth
century have focused on temples and tombs, with their rich
and spectacular art, sculpture and architecture, rather than
the few less thrilling ancient Egyptian towns.
Renaissance
 Renaissance and Baroque styles
 During the Renaissance (broadly, the 15th century), city-states
dominated by powerful rulers emerged in Italy. The papacy based
in Rome in the Vatican City was one of these. Florence was
another.
 Rome
 Rome had fallen into decay, and the Church needed to restore the
faith of the people in its mission. From the 1470s, several popes
began to remodel Rome. They aimed to glorify the Church and the
papacy, and enable pilgrims to move more easily within the city.
They adopted straight axial streets terminating in vistas marked
by columns, obelisks, fountains, and views of grand buildings.
 The most ambitious pope was Sixtus V (1585–90). His plan was to
cover Rome with a network of straight streets and mark their
intersections by obelisks. His legacy to Rome is a classic example
of Baroque planning.
 The architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404–72) redesigned Rome’s
water supply. By 1600 it was the best of any city in Europe. The
Baroque remodelling of Rome culminated in the colonnade for St
Peter’s Basilica by Giovanni Lorenzo Bernini (1598–1680).
 Florence
 The architect Giorgio Vasari (1511–74) remodelled Central Florence.
He created a dramatic vista towards the Uffizi Palace, and placed
statues at the end of axial streets.
 London
 Baroque Rome inspired John Evelyn and Christopher Wren in their
plans for a new urban form for London after the Great Fire in 1666.
 Versailles
 Louis XIV’s Palace of Versailles (built 1668–74), with its famous
gardens by André le Notre, had bisecting land and water axes that
created impressive vistas. It inspired Pierre L’Enfant when he
designed Washington DC as the new capital of the United States of
America in 1791.
 Paris
 When Baron Haussmann reordered Paris between 1853 and 1869, he
also looked back to Versailles for inspiration. By 1870, Paris was the
‘wonder of the world’. Haussmann drove a network of boulevards
through the city, straightened other roads, created public squares,
vistas and sites for important public buildings, and also made the
Bois de Boulogne and Bois de Vincennes into public parks.
Physical Realization of Renaissance Ideals in Urban Renewal Streets
of Italian Cities

URBAN RENEWAL IN RENAISSANCE ITALY

Physical Realization of Renaissance Ideals in Urban Renewal
Streets of Italian Cities
Changes in the ideas of theoreticians, and in the interpretation of the
functional needs of the city, brought about a new view of the street
during the 15th through 17th Centuries in Italian cities.  Generally
speaking, the medieval street was functionally inadequate,
aesthetically ill-considered, and lacking in unifying qualities.  Such a
condition contributed to the multi-centric quality of the medieval city. 
Its major focal points often floated in a tangled web of disjointed,
unplanned streets.  The major edifices thus existed as workable cores
of the city only at close range, and the city itself grew in a disjointed,
seldom planned, fashion. 
The ideas of the Renaissance planners, coupled with a creative use of
power upon the parts of leaders of church and state, brought a
reconstruction which gave a form of unity to cities of multiple powers,
and gave to the citizen a visible understanding of his position within
the hierarchy of power of the city.
 It is the judicious surgery upon the fabric of the city, the physical
realization of Renaissance planning ideas, with which this study is
concerned.
Church and State

The interplay of church and rising state powers during the Renaissance served
to vastly alter the social structure of the Italian city.  The importance of the
citizen declined markedly, and with it a citizen’s influence upon the scope and
scale of theory and planning for the public spaces which the citizen used.

The conceptual view of the role of the fabric of the city to connect the major
points of interest thus revolved around the nodes of church and palace.  The
streets which were conceived to connect such points did much to eliminate the
“social” aspects of the spaces that they penetrated.  This disruption of
traditional functions within pre-existing urban public spaces did, however, have
the utility of easing acceptance of their functions, and the resettlement of
activities into proper locations within the new pattern.

The major impetus for construction of a wide, orderly network of streets was, of
course, a functional one.  The natural increase of traffic which accompanied the
growth of the cities combined with the long ceremonial parades of Renaissance
aristocratic functions to severely overburden the medieval street system.  The
churches and palaces, as representations of the real power of the Renaissance
city, the real focus of the major activities of the citizen’s lives, were logical focal
points toward which to orient the new street systems.
Of course, the exact relationships which produced renewal plans varied
considerably from city to city, although producing solutions which were
remarkably similar in interpretation of concepts and the clarity achieved by the
use of these concepts as tools in the physical realization of the plans.
 Naples
 The most important city of Southern Italy has been Naples.  Rapid growth
away from the classical grid pattern centre of the city, combined with a
royalty which had vastly increased its physical domain and temporal powers,
brought forth a need to give the overall city a common bonding arrangement
during the 16th Century.  To this end, a relatively straight street was
constructed to connect the “country” palace in the hills behind the city with
the “city” palace, which was located in close proximity to the harbour.
 At the base of the hills, a redirection of the street was made necessary by
topography and the desire to retain essential existing features of the city. 
The redirection was facilitated with a “junction sector”, a wide avenue
section approaching a piazza in size and character.  Thus, the overall
concept of the street could be preserved by movement through the piazza-
like space, using the language of a piazza to preserve continuity where the
use of the normal language of the street would have been lost.
 The “city” palace, with its piazza, was strongly oriented towards the port,
redirecting the force of the street.  Thus, it connected with and met the force
of the economic life blood of the city, as well as with the forces which
controlled that artery.  The powerful new street, held taut by the two
palaces, which equally represented power in the city, was thus intended to
serve as a central axis, collecting all of the important activities of the city
into one viable core.
 Sources:
 Randy D. Bosch, B.Arch., M.Arch., University of California, Berkeley  (c)1969,
2010 Randy D. Bosch
 Renaissance Florence (c)2006 Randy D. Bosch
BAROQUE CITIES
- town planning was prevalent in the 17th century A.D.

- Baroque city plan appeared simultaneously with the emergence of strong states.

- strength and importance of the state dictates the need for walls around baroque
cities to protect them from other strong enemies.

- cities had various spaces pre-allocated for different purposes

- individual structures and edifices which were perceived as centres
of power – palaces, churches, statues and monuments – were used as formaI
organizational nodes for the surrounding cityscape.

- desire for the extension of organizing power across the urban fabric
which this practice expressed, however, existed in tension with another element of
the baroque conception of city: a reluctance to engage in the wholesale
reconstruction of existing urban centres.

-During the baroque period, the city was

seen as a phenomenon essentially beyond complete human control, as ‘an irreducible
fact of nature – something which might be artificially limited or extended and into
which new elements might be inserted but not as a totality capable of reorganisation
and improvement as such’.2

-this emphasis on the parts of the city rather than the whole which
distinguishes baroque city planning from the schemes of the preceding renaissance
and the later neoclassical periods.