Page:History of Architecture in All Countries Vol 1.djvu/327

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Bk. IV. Ch. IIL ORIGIN OF STYLE. 295 CHAPTER m. ROMAN ARCHITECTURE. CONTEXTS. Origin of style — Tlie arch — Orders: Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, Composite- Temples — The Pantheon — Koman temples at Athens — at Baalbec. CHKONOLOGICAL MEMORANDA. DATES. foundation of Rome B. c. 753 Tarquliiius Prisons — Cloaca Maxima, foundation of Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus 616 Temple of .Jupiter Capitolinus dedicated 507 Scipio — tomb at Literium Is-t Augustus — temples at Rome .... 31 Marcellus — theatre at Rome — died. . '23 Agrippa — portico of Pantheon — died . 13 Nero — burning and rebuilding of Rome — died A. D. C8 Vespasian — Flaviau amphitheatre built 70 DATES. Titus — arch in Forum A. D. 79 Destruction of Pompeii 79 Trajan — Ulpian Basilica and Pillar of Victory 98 Hadrian builds temple at Rome, Temple of .Jupiter Olympius at Athens, etc. . .Septimius Severus — arch at Rome . . . Caracalla — baths Diocletian — palace at Spalatro .... Maxentius — Basilica at Rome .... Coustantine — transfer of Empire to Con- stantinople 328 117 194 211 284 300 THE earliest inhabitants of Rome were an Aryan, or, as they used to be called, Indo-Gernianic race, who established themselves in a country previously occupied by Pelassfians. Their principal neighljor on one side was Etruria, a Pelasgian nation. On the other hand was Magna Graecia, which had been colonized in very early ages by Hellenic settlers of kindred origin. It was therefore impossible that the archi- tecture of the Romans should not be in fact a mixture of the styles of these two people. As a transition order, it was only a mechanical juxtaposition of both styles, the real fusion taking place many long centuries afterwards. Throughotit the Roman period the two styles remain distinct, and there is no great difficulty in referring almost every feature in Roman architecture to its origin. From the Greeks were borrowed the rectangular ])eristylar temple, with its columns and horizontal architraves, though they seldom if ever used it in its perfect purity, the cella of the Greek tem])les not being sufficiently large for their purposes. The principal Etruscan temples, as we have already shown, were square in plan, and the inner half occupied by one or more cells, to the sides and back of which the portico never extended. The Roman rectangular temple is a mixture of these two : it is generally, like the Greek exam])les, longer than its breadth, but the colonnade never seems to have entirely surrounded the building. Sometimes it extends to the two sides as well as the front,