Did you know that many modern buildings are based on ancient Greek architecture?
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Hello and welcome to World History Encyclopedia! My name is Kelly, and today's video is all about
the incredible architecture that not only went on to influence Hellenistic and Roman architects
but which provided the foundation for much of the architecture of the modern Western world.
Today we are looking at the architecture of ancient Greece. Don't forget, the easiest way
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so make sure to check it out via the pop-up in the top corner of the screen or via the Patreon
link down below. Some of the most exceptional and distinctive buildings from the ancient world were
crafted by the architects of ancient Greece, and some of their structures, like theatres, temples
and stadia, became staple buildings in cities and towns from Antiquity onwards in the Western World.
The architectural feature of all or most of these buildings and the one most commonly associated
with the Greeks are columns. There are five of what are called orders of classical architecture,
and an order is basically a combination of a type of column, either with or without a base,
with an entablature, which is what the column supports (this could be something like a frieze
or a beam called an architrave). The five classical orders are Doric, Ionic Corinthian,
Tuscan and Composite. Though it was not the Greeks but the Romans who gave them these names.
The Greek architects created the first three, and those three influenced the latter two. The
Doric column evolved from early wooden pillars. It is thinner at the top, it doesn't have a base,
and it has a simple capital at the top. The Ionic order with origins in
the mid-6th Century in Ionia, on the western coast of Asia Minor, had a base and volute,
which is a scroll capital and is a slimmer and straighter column. Then in 5th Century BCE Athens,
the Corinthian was invented, which is much like the Ionic column, but it's topped with a more
decorative capital of stylised acanthus and fern leaves. For the public buildings in Greece, marble
was definitely the material of choice, although wood would have been the initial material, not
only for architectural elements like columns but for the entire building. From the late 7th Century
BCE onwards, though, buildings were constructed using more durable stone, such as limestone,
which was sometimes covered by a protective layer of marble dust. The best marble that could be
sourced came from the Greek islands of Naxos and Paros, as well as Mount Pentelicon near Athens.
The classical orders can still be seen on modern buildings such as the Lincoln
Memorial in Washington DC, USA, which features 36 Doric columns, the Prado Museum in Madrid, Spain,
with its annex adorned by Ionic columns and the U.S Capitol building with its Corinthian columns.
The ancient Greeks are well known for their incredible Doric and Ionic temples,
and none are quite as famous as the Parthenon atop the Acropolis of Athens, built under the
direction of the general Pericles and envisioned by the architect Phidias in the 5th Century BCE.
Of course, there are other famous temples, including the Doric Temple of Zeus at Olympia,
which was completed in circa 460 BCE and the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, which was
completed in circa 430 BCE and was considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
It's clear that a whole lot of time and thought went into the creation of these buildings as not
only were many temples built at prominent sites like the Temple of Poseidon at Sounion, but they
employed optical tricks using sophisticated geometry like thickening the bottom of columns
or having columns lean slightly inwards so that from a distance, the building seemed perfectly
straight. This technique was actually employed in the building of the Parthenon, but you can't
actually see these refinements with the naked eye, so if you visited the Parthenon today, the columns
would look perfectly straight. Temples, especially on the mainland, all followed a similar plan;
they were almost all rectangular and peristyle, which means that their exterior sides and facades
consisted of rows of columns. Although, of course, not every temple was the same, and you just have
to look next to the Parthenon to the Erechtheion, which has the famous porch of the maidens, where
the columns are women and known as caryatids. The regular style of temple was peristyle, which is
when columns surround an inner chamber or space in a building like a courtyard, and the whole thing
was atop a platform, and the interior was paved with rectangular slabs. It usually had a raised
roof which had a slope of approximately 15 degrees and was constructed of wooden beams and rafters,
which were then covered in overlapping tiles made of either terracotta or marble. The doors
to the temple would often be made of either Elm or Cypress wood and would be decorated with bronze.
Temples were often decorated, and the architectural sculpture would be arranged to
tell a narrative. Pediments, friezes, and metopes, often in high relief, run around the temple and
would be brightly decorated in colours like blues and reds and metals such as bronze. The stories
told in the artworks would often be popular tales from mythology or a part of their history.
The ancient Greek architects knew how to keep a building's foundation stable with water drainage
and building the base on top of various layers of film material. Many ancient Greek buildings
that have fallen have done so not because of a natural weakening of the building but from
human intervention, such as people removing blocks or metal fixtures for personal use.
When buildings aren't interfered with, like the Temple of Hephaestus in the Athenian
Agora or the Temple of Aphaia on the island of Aegina, they continue to stand tall. Sometimes,
temples would have a monumental entrance near it, like the Propylaia of the Athenian Acropolis.
Modern-day buildings with impressive entrances mirroring ancient Greece include the British
Museum, Downing College, Cambridge and the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne, Australia.
Common to many temple complexes from the 7th Century BCE onwards,
but a separate building is the stoa. A stoa is a long roofed building with columns on
each side and backed by a plain wall. It would often be used as a meeting space or for storage
and many agora of ancient Greek towns would have a large open space surrounded by a stoa.
The stoa in the Hellenistic period served a different function in the gymnasium and palaistra
complexes; these stoas were used to create an enclosed space, not just for markets, but for
physical exercise and a space for practicing sports like throwing javelin and discus.
One very distinctive addition to architecture from the Greeks was the amphitheatre.
The oldest archaeological evidence for theatres dates back to the late 6th
Century BCE, but we know that earlier, even as early as the Minoans in the Bronze Age,
people gathered in large stepped courts as a space for spectacles or religious processions.
From Thorikos in Attica comes the earliest example of the rectangular theatre-like structure from the
late 6th Century BCE, which had a temple to Dionysos on one end which suggests it played
a part in the Dionysian festival where dramas were performed. It was from the 5th Century BCE though,
that the Greek amphitheatre developed into the recognisable and influential form that we're all
familiar with. These Greek amphitheatres were open air, so there was no roof and were built
as a semicircle with rising rows of seats. They had incredible acoustics, and the stage
or orchestra was semi-circular and backed by a skene or a screen. There were often monumental
arches or paradoi on either side of the stage for entrances. One of the best-known ancient Greek
theatres is the Theatre of Dionysos Eleutherius on the slope of the Athenian Acropolis and was
the place where plays by tragedians Sophocles, Aeschylus and Euripides were first performed.
The Theatre of Argos is one of the largest, which had a capacity for over 20,000 spectators, and the
Theatre of Epidaurus is one of the best preserved and is still used to this day. There was also the
stadium which was named after the distance of 600 ancient feet or around 180 metres of the foot race
known as the state or stadion. The stadia evolved into having rows of stone or marble steps that
were used for seating which had divisions which made the rows of seats easy to access. Conduits
were included to drain any excess rainfall, and during the Hellenistic times, vaulted corridors
were added for a dramatic entrance for athletes and judges. The two most famous stadia are at
Nemea, which seated 30,000 and Olympia, the home of the ancient Olympic games that seated
45,000 spectators. These ancient buildings became the models for later ones right up to the stadiums
and arenas of the present day. Can you see any features of Greek architecture in your hometown
or city? Let us know in the comments below! If you enjoyed this video, make sure to give it a thumbs
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