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| Temple of Portunus |
I signed up last autumn for an online course from Yale University
Department of Classics on Roman Architecture. To my pleasant surprise its really fabulous. There is either a free option or $50 if you want to receive a
certificate upon completion. Basically, it is an opportunity to virtually
participate in a 3 credit hour Spring semester course, including some
fantastic forum discussions with on site students and teaching
assistants as well as moderators and online students around the
world. There are lectures, homework, exams, the full experience of
which I would like to share some of it with you!
Early Rome
When Rome was founded in the 8th century B.C.E., the Etruscans
were still the most dominant culture on the peninsula, based out of
Tuscany to the north. Before long the Greeks would begin to establish
colonies to the south in Nea Polis (Naples) and on Sicily. The Romans
were influenced by both cultures yet established themselves as
unique. One way the Romans distinguished themselves was in their early temple
architecture. We'll take the well preserved 1
st century
example of the Temple of Portunus on the Tiber river to illustrate
this point.
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| Temple of Portunus plan |
Etruscan temples were typically a masonry structure fronted by deep
porticoes, sitting on high podiums, with a single stair oriented to a
dominant façade. These features are often preserved by the Romans;
however, the tripartite cella and a rather simple 'Tuscan' order of
wood construction that allowed for wide intercolumniation typical of
Etruscan design was eventually rejected.
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| Tetrastyle façade, Ionic order |
Greek temples used the Doric or Ionic order, featured a single
cella, and had narrower intercolumniation that was peripteral, in
other words having supporting columns going around the entire temple.
The Romans worked out a compromise, incorporating elements of both
styles resulting in a temple design that was more Etruscan in plan
but featured peripteral, engaged columns or pilasters resembling
Greek prototypes in elevation.
Does
New Technology Lead to Revolution or Revolution to New Technology?
Our initial assignment was to write a short essay considering whether the discovery of a new technology leads to the creation
of new forms or conversely whether the desire to express something in a
different way leads to the invention of a new medium. Below was my response:
I would venture that the modern Western perspective of the role
technology in architecture and culture is fundamentally different
than that of the Ancient Romans.
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Illinois Institute of Technology
S.R. Crown Hall |
A principal leader of the Modernist architectural movement, Mies
van der Rohe, emphatically declared at an address in celebration of
the addition to the Institute of Design to Illinois Institute of
Technology that “Architecture depends on its time”,
going on to state that his real hope would be that architecture and
technology would “grow together, that someday the one be the
expression of the other”. Certainly in his own work and teaching,
Mies was a proponent of using technology (specifically modern
concrete and steel) as a driving force in pushing the limits of
structural possibility.
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Sanctuary of:
Jupiter Anxur
1st century B.C.E. |
Everything I have studied and come to understand of Roman
architecture and culture has led me to the conclusion, that by
contrast, the Romans understood architecture not as a temporal
phenomenon but a locational one. That “locus” was Rome, in the
sense of an actual place, likewise in the sense of a powerful
culture. The use of technological innovations such as the arch,
vault, dome and Roman concrete served as a physical representation of
their profound sense of history and identity. If there was a
revolution, it did not manifest itself as a radical rejection of
historical precedent. Rather, what we see from the Romans is a
deliberate, measured, incremental sophistication expanded upon over
centuries, of which we today can appreciate as a harmonious legacy.
Contributed by Patrick Webb
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