Roman architecture

history of Roman architecture....

1. Roman Architecture

2. 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.

3. 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

4. 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

5. 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

6. General Characteristics
building system
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

7. 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

8. General Characteristics: Building techniques


Opus incertum Opus testaceum Opus reticulatum



Opus spicatum Mortar in the foundations Barrel Vault

9. General Characteristics
Walls were made in one of these ways:
Ashlar Masonry Brick

10. General Characteristics
Material combinations in walls:

11. 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

12. 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

13. 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

14. 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.

15. Caesar Augustae (Zaragoza) plan

16. Paved Roads
Paved roads were needed to reach to any point
of the empire
They facilitated both communication and
political control

17. 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

18. 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

19. 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.

20. 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.

21. 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.

23. 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.

24. 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.

25. 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

26. 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

28. 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.

29. 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

31. 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

32. Caracalla´s Bath House

33. 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

34. Merida’s Roman Theatre

35. 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.

37. 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.

39. 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.

40. 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.

41. 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.

43. 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.

45. 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.

47. Palaces
There were the
residence of the
emperor
They consisted of a
numerous series of
rooms
Their plan tended to
be regular

48. Diocleciano’s Palace at Splitz