Greek Architecture

This survey takes the reader through the history of Greek architecture from Minoan Crete to the Hellenic era, and its expansion in the Mediterranean world during the 5th century BC. The book begins with a detailed analysis of Minoan Crete, the birthplace of Western architecture in the second millennium BC, describing the palaces at Mallia, Knossos, and Zakro. Straightforward, readable text placed side-by-side with large photographs and drawings covers the functional and organic composition of the palaces; columns, pilasters, and porticoes; the organization of volumes and interior spaces; decorative aspects, polychrome, and murals. The book continues through Mycenae (the famous Lion's Gate, Palace of Nestor, the "Treasury of Atreus") to the birth and evolution of the doric and ionic orders, religious architecture (with emphasis on the temples of Paestum, Corinth, Delphi, and the Acropolis), to the temples and structures of Classical Greece. The book dedicates a section to civic architecture, which in its massiveness reflected the creation and evolution of the political community, the most original aspect of ancient Greece. The author discusses the spatial composition of the major urban complexes, the relationships between buildings (stadiums, theatres, agoras) and between the complexes and their urban surroundings, and the birth of urbanism. Important centres outside Greece are discussed, including Agrigento and Segesta in Sicily. The final section documents the Hellenic phase, with its unparalleled innovations and its influence on the greater Mediterranean.