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[German version] ('crematorium'). An architectural cremation place for Roman rulers, of which often only an altar remains. The best-known example is the Ustrinum of Augustus on the Field of Mars in Rome (Campus Martius; Roma III.) near the Mausoleum Augusti; Strabo (5,3,8), describes it as lavishly built and preserved, after the act of cremation, as a monument. Remains of other ustrina on the Field of Mars are assigned to the emperors Hadrianus, Marcus Aurelius and Antoninus Pius. Höcker, Christoph (Kissing) Bibliography A. Danti, s. v. Arae Consecrationis, LTUR 1, 1993, 75 f.  H. …

[German version] Passed down in Vitruvius [1. s.v. l.], an architectural technical term, on many occasions there also designated as lacunaria (pl.), for the sunken panels that decorated the ceiling between wooden beams crossing one another ( Roofing), the Greek equivalent being phátnōma, gastḗr, kaláthōsis [2. 45-52 with additional terms for details of the lacunar]. Lacunaria were as a rule three-dimensionally recessed and decorated with paintings or reliefs (mostly ornamental). In the temple or columned building, the place where they were first app…

[German version] Wall decoration with a structure imitating architecture misleadingly described in Vitruvius (7,5) as stucco facing in the sense of the 1st Pompeian style ( Stucco;  Wall paintings); as an archaeological technical term incrustation (from Latin   crustae sc. marmoreae, Greek πλάκωσις/ plákōsis) in contrast describes solely the interior facing of walls of lesser material with marble slabs (however, the relationship of this ‘genuine’ incrustation to the 1st Pompeian style which imitates incrustation and therefore is frequen…

[German version] 1. Central room in the ancient Italian and Roman house with lateral cubicula (sleeping chambers) and rear tablinum (room serving as passage between the atrium and the peristylion) flanked by the   alae which had no door. Early forms of the atrium are reproduced in Etruscan chamber tombs (Cerveteri), the oldest evidence is represented by Etruscan domestic architecture at the end of the 6th cent. BC in Rome (the Palatine) and in the Etruscan Marzabotto. The early Roman atrium served as a reception room for the clientes whom the patron received while sitting on the solium. In …

[German version] (πνύξ/ pnýx). Conspicious large hill built with houses in the urban area of Athens to the west of the Acropolis (Athens II. 3, Hill of the Muses). From the late 6th century BC this was the place of the people's assembly (Ekklesia). Initially they held sessions on a gently sloping piece of ground following a natural semi-circle, which was almost undeveloped; the only structure was a rostrum (βῆμα/ bêma). In the late 5th century BC the whole site was architecturally shaped and in the process turned through c. 180°. The lavishly and representatively built orchestra-sha…

[German version] Distinct  ornamentation in the decorative canon of Ionic architecture, in modern architectural terminology also known as the ‘Ionian  kymation’: a profiled ledge with an arched cross section whose relief or painted ornamentation consisted of an alternation of oval leaves and lancet-shaped spandrel tips and which often concludes at the lower end with pearl staff (astragal) corresponding to the rhythm of the egg-and-dart moulding. Apart from decorating the  epistylion or the  frieze…

[German version] According to Varro (Ling. 5,161) and Vitruvius (6,3,1f.) the customary formation of the roof opening of all types of the  atrium in the Roman  house. The funnel-shaped roof surfaces of the compluvium, which slope inward, conduct rainwater into the  impluvium, a basin at the atrium's centre. In the older displuvium the roof surfaces slanted outwards. Höcker, Christoph (Kissing) Bibliography E. M. Evans, The Atrium Complex in the Houses of Pompeii, 1980 R. Förtsch, Arch. Komm. zu den Villenbriefen des jüngeren Plinius, 1993, 30-31.

I.Near East and Egypt [German version] A. Near East From the earliest times clay was the most important building material in Mesopotamia, along with reeds in the marshlands of the extreme south. With only a few exceptions, stone architecture, in a fairly strict sense of the term, is not found either in Babylon, which was lacking in raw materials other than limestone lodes, or in Assyria. When stone was used it was mainly for functional purposes, e.g. in laying foundations. Only in late Assyrian monumenta…

[German version] I. General Town planning is the designing of urban settlements (Town, city) on an organizational basis, with the central and particular functions of the town, e.g. as a port or a political centre, having an effect on its external and internal form. Most towns and cities in the Middle East and Egypt arose in the earliest times (in the Middle East from the 5th millennium onwards) at economically or strategically important points (trade routes, river crossings, anchorages). Towns and c…

(Ἀπολλόδωρος; Apollódōros). Political figures [German version] [1] Athenian politician (4th cent. BC) Son of  Pasion of Acharnae, Athenian rhetor and supporter of Demosthenes (394/93, died after 343 BC). A. was one of the richest Athenian citizens after 370. He undertook costly trierarchy liturgies (cf. IG II2 1609,83 and 89; IG II2 1612, b110; Dem. Or. 50,4-10; 40 and 58) and in 352/51 gained a victory as   choregos (IG II2 3039,2) but had only limited success in obtaining a political post commensurate with his wealth. From 370 to 350 BC he indulged in litigat…

(Σώστρατος/ Sṓstratos). [German version] [1] Of Cnidus, Greek architect, 1st half of 3rd cent. BC Son of Dexiphanes of Cnidus; architect of the early Hellenistic period (1st half of 3rd cent. BC), mentioned several times in ancient literature (Plin. HN 36,83; Lucian, Amores 11; Lucian, Hippias 2). He was also diplomatically active, as one of the philoi of Ptolemaeus [3] II (Str. 17,1,6). As well as with various canal constructions linked to the conquest of the Egyptian city of Memphis and buildings at Cnidus and Delphi (FdD III/1 nos. 198 and 299), h…

[German version] Ancient technical term related to  building technology (IG VII 3073, 121; 142). In Greek stone block construction, anathyrosis refers to the partial removal of material from contact surfaces between two stone blocks or column sections (usually by picking). By this minimization of the contact zone between two construction elements, not visible from the outside, their fit could be improved; viewed from the outside, the joints formed a network of superfine lines. The disadvantage of the anathyrosis is an increased pressure on the reduced bearing surfaces, w…

[German version] Architectural term recorded in Vitruvius (3,2,6; 3,8-9), used to label one of the forms of temple listed there. The pseudodipteros type was, according to Vitruvius (7 praef. 12), developed at the Temple of Artemis at Magnesia [2] on the Maeander by the architect Hermogenes [4], who omitted the inner row of columns of a dipteros. The characteristic result of this is the unusually wide ambulatory (Greek pterón) around the cella. In this sense e.g. the temple at Sardis, which also is dedicated to Artemis, is likewise considered a pseudodipteros.…

[German version] A. I. Middle East Since Neolithic times, the most important building material in Mesopotamia has been the unkilned clay brick. A more extensive use of stone can be found in western regions of the Old Orient, in particular Asia Minor, and in Iran during Persian times. The typical New Assyrian house is divided into two sections: a forecourt with utility rooms and an inner courtyard with residential quarters. By contrast, rooms in a Babylonian house as of the 3rd millennium are usually …

[German version] Gates that went beyond purely military aspects (for these cf.  Fortifications) are to be found in Greek architecture from the 6th cent. BC onwards ─ initially as imposingly designed entrances to sanctuaries, and from about 400 BC also in secular contexts (entrances to the  Agora,  Gymnasium,  Stadium or  Assembly buildings, e.g. in Miletus, Priene, Olympia). The development and extension of the própylon as a decorative entrance gate to a  sanctuary can be reconstructed, for example, from the Acropolis of Athens (cf.  Athens II. with locati…

[German version] Modern term for various buildings of the dynasty of the Ptolemies serving the ruler cult; the first Ptolemaeum is considered to be a building built by  Ptolemy [3] II adjacent to the tomb of  Alexander [4]  the Great (later amalgamated by Ptolemy [7] IV with Alexander's tomb into a connected mausoleum complex). There are further Ptolemaea e.g. in Athens (Gymnasion), Limyra (?) and Rhodes (Temenos). Höcker, Christoph (Kissing) Bibliography J. Borchardt, Ein Ptolemaion in Limyra, in: RA 1991, 309-322  Will, vol. 1, 329.

[German version] (Χερσίφρων; Chersíphrōn) from Cnossus. Father of  Metagenes; these two being the  architects of the archaic  dipteros of Artemis at Ephesus (2nd half of the 6th cent. BC), as recorded in Strabo (14,640), Vitruvius (3,2,7) and Pliny (HN 7,125; 36,95). Both of them wrote about this temple in a work which was evidently still known to Vitruvius (Vitr. De arch. 7,1,12), and is one of the earliest formulations of ancient architectural theory ( Architecture, theory of); through his develo…

(Μεταγένης; Metagénēs). [German version] [1] Attic poet of the Old Comedy, 5th/4th cent. BC Attic poet of the last years of the Old Comedy (end of the 5th and early 4th cent. BC), listed among the winners at the Lenaea with two victories, immediately before Theopompus [1. test. 2]. The Suda mentions the titles of five plays: Αὖραι ἢ Μαμμάκυθος , Θουριοπέρσαι, Φιλοθύτης, Ὅμηρος ἢ Ἀσκηταί (or Ὅμηρος ἢ Σοφισταί [1. fr. 11]) [1. test. 1]. The plays have been lost, except for a few fragments. In the most extensive fragment (11 V. from the Θουριοπέρσαι) the na…

[German version] As well as the column/monumental column, there was another possibility available for the displaying of monuments, in their placement on free-standing monumental pillars (on the incorporation of monumental pillars in buildings, cf. pilaster), a form of honouring rulers primarily found in Greece in the vicinity of sanctuaries. An early example of a pillar-mounted monument is the bronze Nike of the Messenians and Naupactians sculpted by Paeonius [1] and placed before the eastern front of the temple of Zeus at  Olympia, atop - and…

(Πολύκλειτος/ Polýkleitos). [German version] [1] Greek bronze sculptor from Sicyon, 5th or 4th cent. BC the Greek bronze sculptor Polyclitus. Neudecker, Richard (Rome) [German version] I. General Bronze sculptor from Sicyon, pupil of Ageladas in Argos. Biographical detail on P. is scanty. His sons were regarded as less successful. P. [2] may, judging by his name, have been a nephew, and Naucydes thus P.'s brother. Six pupils, with mostly unrevealing names, are recorded. However, various family and artistic lineages have b…