History of Architecture: Pre-Historic Architecture

• History of Architecture 1, Module 1 focuses on Pre-Historic Architecture.

Introduction to History of Architecture

• Definition and objectives.
• Principles and influences include influencing factors, architectural character, methods of construction, building materials, famous structures and architects, and developments on the period.

Prehistoric Architecture

• Paleolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic periods.

Pre-Classical Architecture: West Asiatic

• Ancient Near East, Babylonian, Akkadian, and Assyrian.
• History is a systematic, often chronological narrative of significant events relating to a particular people, country, or period, often with an explanation of their causes.
• Influences on the development of architecture include geographical, geological, climatic, religious, social, political, and historical factors.
• Architectural Character refers to all those visual aspects and physical features that comprise the appearance of every historic building.
• Architectural Character includes the overall shape of the building, materials, craftsmanship, decorative arrangements, interior spaces and features, various aspects of its site, orientation, and environment.
• Architectural Element focuses on the fragments, parts, or composition of the rich and complex architectural collage.
• Architectural Elements include windows, doors, facades, balconies, posts, ceilings, and corridors.

Architectural Styles Timeline

• Ancient Egypt (3050 BC to 900 BC): Monumental pyramids, temples, and shrines were constructed by powerful rulers.
• Early Christian and Medieval (373 to 500): European architecture moved from rectangular basilica forms to the classically inspired Byzantine style.
• Gothic Architecture (500 to 1200): Builders created the great cathedrals of Europe.
• Renaissance Architecture (1100 to 1450): A return to classical ideas ushered in an "age of awakening" in Italy, France, and England.
• Baroque Architecture (1400 to 1600): In Italy, the style is reflected in opulent and dramatic churches with irregular shapes and extravagant ornamentation.
• American Colonial Architecture (1600 to 1830): European settlers in the New World borrowed ideas from their homelands.
• Neoclassical/Federalist/Idealist (1650 to 1790): Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio inspired a return of classical shapes in Europe, Great Britain, and the U.S.
• Victorian Architecture (1720 to 1800): Industrialization brought many innovations in architecture.
• Art Nouveau (1730 to 1925): Known as the New Style, the style spread to architecture and furniture in the 1890s with asymmetrical shapes, arches, and decorative surfaces with curved, plant-like designs.
• Beaux Arts Architecture (1790 to 1850): Characterized by order, symmetry, formal design, grandiosity, and elaborate ornamentation.
• Neo-Gothic Architecture (1840 to 1900): Medieval Gothic ideas were applied to modern skyscrapers.
• Arts and Crafts Movement in Architecture (1860 to 1900): The movement revived an interest in handicrafts and sought a spiritual connection with the environment.
• Art Deco Architecture (1890 to 1914): Zigzag patterns and vertical lines on jazz-age buildings.
• 20th Century Trends in Architecture (1895 to 1925): Changes and diversity including Art Modern, Bauhaus, Deconstructivism, Formalism, Modernism, Postmodernism, and Sustainable/Green Architecture.

Prehistoric Architecture

• Architecture began as a response to nature and elements.
• Human migration spread from Africa to Southern Europe and Asia.
• Settling far north was limited by cold climate, arriving to North America from Siberia by foot, and to Australia from Southeast Asia by boat.
• Before 9000 BC: Nomadic life of hunting & food gathering.
• By 9000 BC: Farming and agriculture were practiced using fertile soil, and this led to settling down in communities.
• First villages: Middle East, South, and Central America, India, and China.
• Direct human ancestors evolved in Africa from 2.3 million years ago: Homo habilis, Homo erectus, homo sapiens.
• Success of the human race comes from tool development with stone, wood, and bone.
• Nomadism refers to prehistoric people, and fire was the chief invention.
• Prehistory refers to the time before human civilization developed and writing things down.
• Objects are the documents of record.
• Prehistoric times is divided into 3 periods, the Paleolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic Period.

Paleolithic Period (Old Stone Age)

• 40,000-8,000 BCE.
• Stone Age: Characterized by stone implements such as chipped stone tools.
• Caves and temporary shelters like tents were used from branches & animal skins.
• Paleolithic people lived in small groups of no more than 60 people because being nomadic made living in large groups difficult.
• Cave carvings had symbolic, religious, and aesthetic function.
• Ancient humans left behind art.
• Combinations of minerals, ochres, burnt bone meal, charcoal and water, blood, animal fats and tree saps were used to etch humans, animals, and signs.
• Small figurines were carved from stones, clay, bones, and antlers.
• This period ended with the last Ice Age, caused extinction of many large mammals, rising sea levels, and climate change.

Mesolithic Period (Middle Stone Age)

• 8,000-7,000 ВСЕ.
• Bronze Age.
• Cultural period between the Paleolithic and Neolithic era marked by the appearance of cutting tools.
• Transition from old stone age to new stone age.
• Humans used small stone tools, polished and crafted with points and attached to antlers, bone or wood for spears and arrows.
• Hunter-gatherers began to store food in containers and rely less on large mammals for food.
• Domestication of animals and use of developed tools in cultivation.
• Slash and burn technique used by horticultural societies use and stick and hoe for cultivation.

Neolithic Period (New Stone Age)

• 7,000-2,300 ВСЕ.
• Iron Age.
• Humans began to settle all year round in houses made of timber and mud.
• Characterized by growing crops, domestication of animals, and settlements.
• Villages formed around fields, and jewelry, pottery, bigger houses, better clothing, and stronger tools started being made.
• People built houses and life in towns became easier, dividing up the work.
• People farmed, took care of animals, built houses, made tools/clothing/pottery, and traded.

Bronze Age

• 3,000 B.C. to 1,300 B.C.
• Copper and tin alloy used to create bronze.
• The harder metal was used for weapons and tools and replaced stone and helped spark innovations including the ox-drawn plow and the wheel.
• Use of bronze Introduced the need for specialized labor and led to advances in architecture and art.
• Organized government, law, warfare, religion, Egyptian hieroglyphs and petroglyphs developed.

Iron Age

• Discovery of ways to heat and forge iron.
• Iron was seen as more precious than gold.
• Iron replaced weaker bronze tools in the iron age.
• Also saw further advances in architecture, with four-room homes with stables, hill forts, royal palaces, and temples.
• Early city planning took place, with blocks of homes erected along paved or cobblestone streets and water systems put into place.

Building Materials

• Animal skins, wooden frames, and animal bones

Construction System

• Existing or excavated caves and megalithic structures.

Decoration

• Caves paintings in Africa, France, and Spain and sculpture.

3 Classifications of Primitive Architecture

Dwellings

• ROCK CAVE: Earliest form of dwellings like Tabon Cave, Palawan.
• TENTS: Made from tree barks, animal skins & plant leaves, temporary, and demountable.
• HUTS: Usually made up of reeds, brushes, and Wattles like beehive hut.

Religious Monuments

• MONOLITHs: Isolated single upright stone(menhir) = memorial of victory over one tribe.
• MEGALITHIC: Mega - "Large," Lithos – "stone."
• DOLMEN = 2 or more upright stones supporting a horizontal slab.
• CROMLECH(Stone Circle/Stone Row Enclosure)-formed by huge stones planted in the ground in circular form like Stonehenge, Salisbury, UK.
• Stonehenge, England used genuine architecture and stones transported by sea.
• Stonehenge stones were transported by sea or river hauled by sledges/rollers, and is a solar observatory – designed to mark the sun's path during sunrise on Midsummer Day (June 20th or 21st).
• Sarsen Stones are larger, outer stones made of a type of sandstone called sarsen, carefully shaped with mortise and tenon joints.
• Bluestones due to their blue-green hue are from the Preseli Hills in Wales, around 150 miles (240 kilometers) away.

Burial Mounds

• TUMULI or “Barrows"- earthen mounds use for burials.
• Newgrange is a passage tomb in the Boyne Valley in Ireland's Ancient East.
• The passage measuring 19m leads into a chamber with alcoves which is aligned with the rising sun during the Winter Solstice.

Early Cities

• The earth's climate warmed up from the Ice Age to the Neolithic Age
• Settlements became more permanent, and hunters started farming communities, and new architecture was developed to represent communal and spiritual values.
• Çatalhöyük is located in the Konya Plain of central Anatolia.
• The site is composed of multiple levels, with successive building layers.
• Jericho is the world's oldest continually-inhabited city.
• Jericho is a hilltop city where citizens lived in stone houses with plaster floors surrounded by high walls and towers.