Roman Architecture

Revision

Introduction

• Roman culture is the result of different influences:– Primitive cultures of the area Rome was

founded in (they were peasants and warriors)– Etrurian civilization: urban, offering cult to the

ancestors– Greek and Hellenistic: this was the model the

aimed at imitating.

Introduction

• Results:– From the Italian origins:

• Practical sense (functionalism)• Military expansion (imperialism)

– From the Etrurian• Realistic sense• Cult to the ancestors

– From Greece• Philosophy• Literature• Art

Introduction

• General characteristics of Roman Art– It is practical and utilitarian– Interest in public works and engeneering– Monumentality– Great technical advances– Colossal to show Roman power– It is commemorative and propagandistic

General Characteristics

• Special importance for the internal space

• Integral view of the art combining:– Beauty and sumptuosity with– Utility and practical sense

• Buildings are integrated in the urban space

General Characteristics

• Building systems:– Lintelled:

• Copied from the Greeks

• Spaces are closed by straight lines

– Vaulted• Taken from the Etrurian

• Use of arches

• Barrel vaults

– Use of domes

– Strong walls so that they do not use external supports

General Characteristics

• Materials:– Limestone– Concrete– Mortar

• Arches:– They used half point or semicircular arches – They could use lintels above these arches– Pediments were combined with them

General Characteristics: Building techniques

                                                                                                        

Opus incertum Opus testaceum Opus reticulatum

                                                                                                        

Opus spicatumMortar in the foundations

Barrel Vault

General Characteristics

• Walls were made in one of these ways:

Ashlar Masonry Brick

General Characteristics

• Material combinations in walls:

General Characteristics• Greek shapes assimilation:

– Architectonical orders were used more in a decorative than in a practical way– Order superposition– The use of orders linked to the wall created a decorative element– They used the classical orders and two more:

• Composite• Tuscan

Roman Town Planning

• Cities were the centre of Roman life– Need for infrastructures

• Water and sewer system

• Transport and defence

• Public spaces and markets

– Psychological effect: power and control

• There was a need of linking them throug paved roads

Roman Town Planning

• The plan of the city was based on the camp

• It had two main axes– Cardus E-W– Decumanus N-S

• Where the two converged was the forum

• The rest of the space was divided into squares in which insulae or blocks of flats were built

Roman Town Planning

• The most important part of the city was the forum, where political, economic, administrative, social and religious activity were centred.

• Main buildings were in this forum

• In big cities there were theatres, circuses, stadiums, odeons.

Caesar Augustae (Zaragoza) plan

Paved Roads

• Paved roads were needed to reach to any point of the empire

• They facilitated both communication and political control

Paved Roads

• The roads were made with strong foundations• Different materials were put into different layers• To meassure the distance they created the Milliarium or stones located in the sides

Section of a Roman paved road

Paved Roads

• The roads were not completely flat• They consisted of several parts

– The central and highest was the most important, it was convex to conduct the water to the

– Ditches that were built in the sides

Bridges• Roman engineers were true masters building them, since constructions were

essential elements for reaching places and cities often situated at the bank of rivers. • This location was due to defensive and infrastructural reasons -supply and drainage.• They are characterised by:

– Not pointed arches. – Constructions of ashlars masonry often with pad shape. – Route of more than 5 m. wide. – Route of horizontal or slightly combed surface "few curved". – Rectangular pillars from their basis with lateral triangular or circular

cutwaters that end before the railings.

Aqueducts

• Aqueducts were built in order to avoid geographic irregularities between fountains or rivers and towns.

• Not only valleys were crossed by superposed cannels, but also mountains were excavated by long tunnels, pits and levels of maintenance.

• They were used to bring water to cities.

Ports and Lighthouses

• Roman ships and those for commercial trade should travel from port to port with the speed and security adequate to the life of a great Empire.

• In these ports every necessity for the execution of the usual works in a port ensemble should be found: – gateways with stores and bureaux, – shipyards for stationing ships, – roads for taking ships to earthly

ground, – drinkable water fountains and – machinery for loading and

downloading merchandises. • Indeed, a system of indication was

necessary in order to mark the right access and exit to the port.

Walls

• Defence of cities has been one of the capital problems that civilizations had to solve in order to project the future of their citizens, goods, culture and ways of life.

• Romans were the first in the technique of improving different kinds of defence, using walls.

Forums• Forums were cultural centres in cities. • They were often placed at the crossroads of important urban ways: cardo maximus and decumanus.• A great porticated square was the centre of a group of buildings around it. • They were communicated through it. • Temples for Imperial worship, schools, basilicae, markets or even termae had a direct access through

forum. • In many cases even buildings for spectacles -circus, theatres and amphitheatres- were communicated so. • Forums were a way in for important persons to tribunals.

Architectonic Typology• Roman Architecture has a rich typology that includes:• Religious building: temple• Civil buildings:

– Public: basilicas, baths – Spectacles: theatre, amphitheatre, circus– Commemorative: Triumph arch, column– Domestic: house, village, palace– Funerary: tombs

• Engineering works:– Bridges– Aqueducts

Religious: Temple

• It copied the Greek model

• It has only one portico and a main façade

• It tends to be pseudoperiptero

• The cella is totally closed

• It is built on a podium

• Instead of having stairs all around, it only has them in the main façade

                                                                                                   

Religious: Temple

• There were other kind of temples:

• Circular: similar to the Greek tholos

• Pantheon: combined squared and circular structures and was in honour of all gods.

                                                                                                   

Civil Buildings: Basilica

• It was the residence of the tribunal

• It is rectangular and has different naves

• The central nave is higher and receives light from the sides

• The building ends in an apse

• It is covered with vaults– Barrel over the central nave– Edged over the lateral naves

Civil Buildings: Baths

• There were spaces for public life

• They consisted of different rooms:

• Changing rooms– Different temperature rooms:

• Frigidarium (cold)• Tepidarium (warm)• Caldarium (hot)

– Swimming pool– Gymnasium– Library

Caracalla´s Bath House

Spectacles: Theatre

• It is similar to the Greek but it is not located in a mountain but it is completely built

• It has a semicircular scenery• The doors to facilitate

peoples’ movement are called vomitoria

• It does not have the orchestra because in Roman plays was not a chorus

• The rest of the parts are similar to those of the Greek theatre

Merida’s Roman Theatre

Spectacles: Amphitheatre

• It comes from the fusion of two theatres

• It was the place for spectacles with animals and fights (gladiators)

• There could be filled with water for naval battles.

Spectacles: Circus

• It was a building for horse races and cuadriga competitions.

• It has the cavea, the area and a central element to turn around, the spina.

Commemorative monuments: Triumphal Arches

• They were usually placed at the main entrance of cities in order to remember travellers and inhabitants the Greatness and strength of Roman world.

• At the beginning they were wooden arches where trophies and richness from wars were shown.

• This habitude changed: Romans built commemorative arches with inscriptions.

• They were a Roman creation and they succeeded: many of them have been constructed until the present days.

• Arches were used not only for commemorating Roman victories or military generals: they also marked limits between provincial borders.

Commemorative monuments: Columns

• They were columns decorated with relieves

• In them some important facts were related

• They were built in the honour of a person.

• The best instance of these works is the famous Traian Column at Rome. It is decorated with a spiral of relieves dealing with scenes of his campaigns in Danube and with inscriptions.

Houses: Insulae

• There are urban houses• In order to take advantage from

the room in cities, buildings up to four floors were constructed.

• The ground floor was for shops -tabernae- and the others for apartments of different sizes.

• Every room was communicated through a central communitarian patio decorated with flowers or gardens.

Houses: Domus• It was the usual housing for important people in each

city.• It was endowed with a structure based on distribution

through porticated patios: – the entry -fauces- gives access to – a small corridor -vestibulum-. – It leads to a porticated patio -atrium-.– Its center, the impluvium, is a bank for the water

falling from the compluvium. – At both sides -alae- there are many chambers used

as rooms for service slaves, kitchens and latrines.– At the bottom, the tablinum or living-room can

be found, and close to it, the triclinium or dining-room.

– This atrium gave also light enough to next rooms. – At both sides of the tablinum, little corridors led

to the noble part of the domus. – Second porticated patio peristylium, was bigger

and endowed with a central garden. – It was surrounded by rooms -cubiculum- and

marked by an exedra used as a chamber for banquets or social meetings.

Houses: Villa

• Houses far from cities, were thought for realizing agricultural exploitations -villae rustica-, or else as places for the rest of important persons -villae urbana-.

• Entertaining villa was endowed with every comfortable element in its age as well as gardens and splendid views.

• Country villae got stables, cellars, stores and orchards apart from the noble rooms.

Palaces

• There were the residence of the emperor

• They consisted of a numerous series of rooms

• Their plan tended to be regular

Diocleciano’s Palace at Splitz