Arch:

It is significant because it converts tensile stresses in spanning structural members into compression stresses only. Stone is weak in tension and cannot span significant distances without collapsing under its own weight. By configuring it into an arch, significant spans can be achieved.The Roman round arch contains "voussoirs" (voo/swars'), or bricks. The "keystone" is the center voussoir that supports the other bricks. The push or thrust of the cemented voussoirs push outward and downward in the arch.

A row of arches is called an "arcade."

If a person takes the legs of an arch and stretches them length-wise, this is called a "barrel vault." Barrel vaults are used today as entrances and exits in stadiums. Before you arrive at your seat at a baseball or football game, you probably will have to walk through a barrel vault.

In a tall building, such as a church, where two barrel vaults meet and divide each other into half, this is a "groin vault." A groin vault supports high ceilings and allow a building to have several entrances and exits, at least four.

A dome is a common structural element of architecture that resembles the hollow upper half of a sphere. Domes do not have to be perfectly spherical in cross-section, however; it is sufficient that they simply be curved surfaces. A dome can be considered as an arch which has been rotated around its vertical axis. As such, domes have a great deal of structural strength.

Take an arch and rotate the one leg in a circle (360 degrees). You have made a "dome."

                              

What is Roman concrete and how did the development of this technique contribute to the creation of a new mode of space-making and architectural thinking?

Roman concrete (opus caementicium), like modern concrete, is an artificial building material composed of an aggregate, a binding agent, and water.

Aggregate is essentially a filler, such as gravel, chunks of stone and rubble, broken bricks, etc.

Historically lime or gypsum, mixed with rubble stones, have been used as binding agents in making a strong mortar. Roman contribution to this basic structural mixture was the addition as primary binding agent pozzolona, a special volcanic dust found in central Italy.

Concrete, as the Romans developed it, had some very definite technical and practical advantages over the traditional, and mainly Greek, methods of enclosing space by the use of cut-stone and post-and-beam structures.

1. it was exceptionally strong and could span great distances when shaped into arches, vaults and domes.2. it had greater flexibility in molding space since concrete was virtually "poured" (or layered) into a formwork and took the shape of its container 3. it did not requite special, skilled labor, therefore, it was cheaper; 4. it was much faster to construct than laboriously cut ashlar masonry. 5. since concrete-vaulted roofing was fireproof, unlike the wooden-beamed roofs of traditional systems, it was safer

•Temple of Fortuna Virilis (temple of Portumnus)

While the Greek temple is a sculptural building on all sides, Roman rectangular temples are built to be seen from the front. Normally they sit high on a raised platform, with a long stairway leading up to the portico. The side walls have attached half-columns (engaged columns)which are called pseudo-peripteral. Primarily used as a treasury, the celIa is the width of the building. In general Roman, architecture employs columns for decoration instead of support.

This characteristic Roman style came from Etruscan temple style. The early Roman temple style composed with Etruscan composition and Greek detail and concepts.

•The aqueducts and bridges in Roman period exist in Rome, Merida, Segovia, Tarragon in Spain and Nimes in France.Pont du Gard in Nimes is one of the famous one which preserve original style of Augustus era. Now the bridge exists about 300m long, 49m above of the river.

•The pont is thought to have been built around 19 BC. It was part of a nearly 50 km (31 mi) aqueduct, bringing water from springs near Uzes to the Roman city of Nemausus (Nimes).. The pont itself was built so that the water could cross the small Gardon river valley, delivering 20,000 cubic meters (44 million gallons) of water daily to Nîmes.•It was constructed entirely without the use of mortar, the stones - some of which weigh up to 6 tons - being held together with iron clamps. The masonry was lifted into place by block and tackle with a massive human treadmill providing the power for the winch. A complex scaffold was erected to support the aqueduct as it was being built. The face of the aqueduct still bears the mark of its construction, in the form of protruding scaffolding supports and ridges on the piers which bore the semicircular wooden frames on which the arches were constructed. It is believed to have taken about three years to build, employing between 800-1,000 workers.

The bottom arches, which spans are 15.75m to 21.5m, are about 155m long, 20m high.On the top of the bottom arches is a 7m wide road which has expanded for the trafic of cars in 1743.The middle arches are same spans of the bottom arches and the length is about 265m in total. The height of middle part is about 21m and width is 5m.On the top of the 35 small arches, about 8.5m high 3m wide, support the waterway.The big arch, the bottom arch and middle arch, have 3 times or 4 times of the small arch in span and 6 times of the small arch in height.

The statue represents a Roman patrician (member of a leading family), dressed in a tunic, over which is draped the toga, or cloak.Although the head is ancient, it does not belong and has been heavily restored in modern times.The figure carries in his hands two portrait busts of old men.* these busts stop just below the neck* that in his right hand rests on a support in the form of a palm tree trunk* the other is held freely in his left hand* both are probably to be imagined in reality as having been made in a material much lighter than the marble used for this structure* wax is a possibility - writers describe the Republican practice of creating wax death-masks for funerals and for display in the family home/ but these are not death-mask faces* a more durable material, clay or bronze, is more likelySince the busts are of old men they must represent the patrician's ancestors rather than his children;* it is now considered that the bust in his left hand is in the style of ca.50BC, and probably represents the man's grandfather* the other bust is in the style of ca.40-30BC and may be that of his fatherOnly patricians had the right to have portrait images of their ancestors. The more one had, the longer and more illustrious one's pedigree; they were in effect, status symbols, which any newcomer to the patrician class would have lacked

Most surviving Roman portraits of the Republican period (i.e. down to the time of Julius Caesar) have been carved out of marble* they were made in the 1st century AD so that various members of a family might have their own copies for display in their own houses

Romans believed that each family had a unique genius, or spiritual gift.  Caesar claimed his family was descended from the Trojan hero Aeneas, and from the goddess Aphrodite.  These are impressive ancestors indeed!  This pedigree was meant to impress Romans that his genius was truly divine and  was associated with the foundation of Rome itself. 

The whole family--dead and alive--were brought to be present at important occasions.  Romans loved commemorative portrait busts to honor the departed ancestors, a tradition with a long history in Western Civilization.

Roman sculpture sought truthfulness -- verism -- in art beyond all else, at least initially.  Roman sculpture, with the proverbial "warts and all," was determined to portray the individual as he or she actually looked, whether an ordinary person or an emperor.  That the appearance of an individual was important says something about the value of the individual in Roman society.

The statue of Augustus from Livia's villa at Prima Porta is a marble copy of a bronze statue that celebrates the return in 20 BCE of the military standards captured by the Parthians in 53 after the defeat of Crassus at Carrhae. It was probably set up in 15 CE, the year after Augustus' death. It is 7 ft. (2.08 m.) tall (Augustus was 1.70 m., about 5'7") and shows him as a young man. He is barefoot (a sign of divine status) and Cupid (riding on a dolphin beside his right foot) reminds the viewer of Venus, the divine ancestress of the family of Augustus, the gens Iulia. Augustus holds a spear in his left hand, and his right hand is extended as he addresses his armies. His stance is that of the Doryphoros (spear-bearer) by the fifth century Greek sculptor, Polyclitus

. The shoulder-clasps of the cuirass (breastplate) are in the form of sphinxes: the Sphinx was the image on Augustus' seal (later he used an image of Alexander, and finally his own portrait).

Recent photo taken outside of Caesar’s Palace, Las Vegas.

What a laugh!

The reliefs on the cuirass focus on the return of the standards. In the center the Parthian king hands over a standard with the eagle on its end and embellished by military decorations, coronae (garlands) and phalerae (disks). The Roman receiving the standard may represent Romulus or Tiberius, Livia's son and the commander of the Roman expedition in 20 BCE. Beside him is a canine, perhaps the wolf of Romulus. To the right and left of the central figures are women representing conquered Roman provinces, perhaps Gaul (with a boar and a trumpet in the form of a dragon) on the viewer's right and Spain on the left (this figure may also represent client tribes in Germany and the east). At the top of the cuirass the Sky (Caelus) unfolds the canopy of the heavens: to the left Apollo drives the chariot of the Sun, and to the right Aurora (the Dawn) holds her urn, and above her is Luna (the Moon) holding a torch. At the bottom, in the center, reclines Mother Earth (Terra Mater) holding a cornucopia: to her right Diana rides a stag and to her left Apollo rides a griffin

The Altar of Peace was dedicated to pietas and the pax romana of Augustus on July 4, 13 BC, near Campus Martius on the Via Flaminia. Replacing a temporary structure of wood and paintings, this beautiful altar was later rebuilt in Luna marble (covering a tufa and travertine base). It has been reconstructed near its original site on the Tiber in Rome. Remarkable for its classical style (it was perhaps the work of Greek sculptors), the Altar is decorated with reliefs representing allegorical, historical and mythological scenes. On the flanks can be seen processions of the First Family & friends--both alive and deceased--who were present at first sacrifice, as well as senators, magistrates, priests, Vestal Virgins and ceremonial attendants. All of them were depicted in the classically idealized manner that was deliberately appropriated from the reliefs of fifth century BC Periclean Athens, an which Augustus and his age unquestionably emulated.

The Emperor himself makes mention of the altar in his autobiography: ¨When I returned to Rome from Spain and Gaul in the consulship of Tiberius Nero and Publius Quintilius, after successfully settling the affairs of those provinces, the senate, to commemorate my return, ordered an altar of the Augustan Peace, to be consecrated in the Campus Martius, on which it decreed that the magistrates, priests and Vestal Virgins should make an annual sacrifice.¨

. It was consecrated on the Campus Martius in 9 BC with solemn ceremony. It consists of a rectangular marble precinct wall on a podium with two doors, each reached by a staircase. Inside, at the top of three steps, is the richly decorated altar. The precinct wall has magnificent sculptural decorations both inside consisting of festoons with paterae (vessels) and bucrania (ox skulls) - and on the outside, where it is divided into two sections horizontally. The lower band has an elegant repeating frieze of acanthus volutes with swans and animals, while the upper band portrays four mythological scenes (one on each side of the doors) and the procession to mark the consecration of the altar, divided between the two shorter sides.

While the one on the north side is badly damaged and less important, the group of characters on the south side is of great interest because it includes Augustus together with priests, magistrates and members of the imperial family.. The procession is headed by two of the lictors, followed by Augustus between two consuls; then come the four Flaminian priests and the Flaminian lictor. This scene shows Agrippa, his son Gaius Caesar( Caligula) and the former's wife Julia, Augustus' daughter; Tiberius; Antonia the Younger (Augustus' niece) and her husband Drusus, Tiberius' brother, with his son Germanicus;Antonia the Elder (Augustus'niece) with her children Domitius and Domitia, and finally her husband, Domitius Ahenobarbus.

Roman frescoes are the closest examples of extant Greek monumental paintings. Ancient authors write that the wealthy men of Rome liked to fill their homes with reproductions of Greek masterpieces. The original paintings were copied freehand and adapted for the Roman home.

The most complete and majestic Roman frescoes are found in the houses at Pompeii and Herculaneum that were buried and preserved under 15 to 20 feet of hot ash and debris when Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 C.E. Astounding landscapes, complex vistas of architecture, narrative scenes from mythology, and even still lifes decorate the walls of these cities.

Styles range from great detail and precision to quick, almost impressionistic, brushstrokes. Shading is used, although the light doesn't come consistently from one direction. Textures are carefully rendered so that a piece of fruit and a glass full of water are clearly distinguishable. In a famous series of scenes from the Odyssey, the colors of the mountains in the background decrease in intensity to indicate that they are farther away — an early attempt at atmospheric perspective.

The First Style Roman wall painting, "Incrustation" (right) is thought to imitate Greek painting that created flat areas of color and 'faux" finishes (like a fake marble or oak finish).

Many theories, but probably shows the mystical marriage of a female worshipper into a cult of Dionysus, god of wine.

Scenes on north and south walls seem to culminate in central east wall; gazes of figures from wall to wall suggests that frescoes should be read as a unified program .

Cinnabar produces brilliant "Pompeii" red, but is not usually used, because it is the most expensive and has a tendency to turn black; it is found in the Villa of the Mysteries and at the House of Vetii in Pompeii.

Second Painting Style - In the second style Roman wall painting, called the "architectural style," space extends beyond the room with various perspective ("illusion of three-dimensional space on a flat two-dimensional surface)  devices.  Roman artists came close to developing a true linear perspective

Apart from the statue of Augustus, the most well-known find from the Villa of Livia are the spectacular garden frescoes, often referred to in works on Roman painting. Once attached to the walls of a large underground room measuring 5 x 11 meters, these frescoes were moved to the National museum in 1955.. The frescoes exhibit not so much a cultivated garden as a subtle flourishing landscape, rich in trees, flowers and birds of all kinds. In the foreground  we find a low wickerwork fence running around the whole room; behind this comes a grassy walk, bordered on its far side by a stone parapet. This stone enclosure have recesses at some points for single trees — one pine, one oak and four spruces. The background consists of a great variety of vegetation, where the laurel is omnipresent in different shapes, ranging from shrubs to tall trees. In the midst of the leaves,  nightingales, orioles, magpies, swallows, blackbirds and many more species of birds can be identified. According to ancient sources, Augustus owned a talking magpie,  as well as a raven and a parrot. More important is the fact that all the flowers in the fresco bloom simultaneously and can directly be associated with love and fecundity. In the age of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, the motif of the fresco can be seen as a celebration of Augustan perpetual peace.

In the Third Style Roman Wall Painting, called the "Ornate Style," pictorial illusion is confined to "framed" images, where even the "framing" is painted on.  The overall appearance is flat rather than a 3-D illusion of space

The Fourth Style Roman Wall Painting, called the "Intricate Style," confines full three-dimensional illusion to the "framed images," which are placed like pictures in an exhibition.  The images themselves do not relate to one another nor do they present a narrative, as in the Second Style.

The Fourth Style is also characterized by the open vistas and the use of aerial perspective, as well as the elaborate architectural framing

Portrait of husband and wife, Pompeii,House VII, 70-79AD

This is a portrait of Paquius Proculus and his wife. This painting was once part of a fourth style painting but has been cut and placed in a frame in the National Gallery in Naples. He holds a scroll and the wife holds a stylus and wax writing tablet. Roman marriage portraits tended to show the couple with symbols of a fine education. The portraits are a sensitive rendition of what the couple actually looked like.

The Arch of Titus is a triumphal arch that commemorates the victory of the emperors Vespasian and Titus in Judea in 70 CE, which lead to the conquest of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Jewish temple there, and the triumphal procession the two held in Rome in 71 CE.

The arch was definitely erected sometimes after after the death of Titus in 81 CE, since Titus is referred to as Divus in the inscription. The deification of an emperor only happened posthumously after decision by the senate. It was most probably erected by emperor Domitian who succeeded his brother Titus in 81 CE, but it has also been suggested that it was built later, by Trajan, because of stylistic similarities with the Arch of Trajan at Benevento.

The Arch of Titus is a single arch, measuring 15.4m in height, 13.5m in width and 4.75m in depth, originally constructed entirely in Pantelic marble, with four semi-columns on each side.

The inside the archway the monument is decorated with reliefs in marble. The S. side shows the beginning of the triumphal entry into Rome of the victorious emperor and his troops. The soldiers, walking left to right, are carrying the spoils of war, which include the seven armed candelabrum and the silver trumpets from the temple of Jerusalem. The signs carried by some soldiers displayed the names of the conquered cities and people. To the right the procession is entering the city through the Porta Triumphalis.

The N. side of the arch is decorated with a relief of the emperor in the triumphal procession. The emperor is riding a quadriga, which is lead by the goddess Roma, and he is crowned by Victoria flying above him. The lictors are walking in front of the chariot with their long ceremonial axes. After the emperor follow as a young man, who represents the Roman people, and an older man in toga, representing the senate. In the middle, under the vault a small relief shows the apotheosis of Titus, flying to the heavens on the back of an eagle.

It was dedicated to the emperor in 113 AD and had a height of one hundred and twenty eight feet. Trajan was depicted on top but replaced with St. Peter. The base contains his ashes.

The tale begins above the base in the countryside of a place called Dacia (Hungary/Romania) and on the banks of the might Danube River. The Dacians wanted to be free and independent, but the Romans insisted that they become another piece in their huge jigsaw puzzle.

The historical episodes take the form of 155 vignettes, which run together and sweep around the huge column, giving it the feel of a sweeping and continuous narrative. Trajan is shown over and over again in many different contexts, but always majestic and larger-than-life. It was a story about him, his power, courage, and accomplishments, and the artists carved his image with this in mind. The detail given to the clothes, armor, and shields of both armies allows the viewer to easily differentiate between the Romans and the Dacians. Although no mistake can be made about who the victors were in the Dacian campaigns, the cruelty had no part to play on this monumental piece of art.. His column told the details of an historical event and was used to promote his position within a great empire.

Apollodurus, Column of Trajan,113 AD, 128’ high

Low relief carving makes imagery easier to view (less shadows). Narrative emphasizes military Fortifications, architecture, bridges in order to show technical superiority over foe. A pontoonbridge was built amazingly over the Danube River.

Trajan speaks to the troops.

The Colosseum or Flavian Amphitheater was begun by Vespasian, inaugurated by Titus in 80 A.D. and completed by Domitian. Located on marshy land between the Esquiline and Caelian Hills, it was the first permanent amphitheater to be built in Rome. Its monumental size and grandeur as well as its practical and efficient organization for producing spectacles and controlling the large crowds make it one of the great architectural monuments achieved by the ancient Romans. The amphitheater is a vast ellipse with tiers of seating for 50,000 spectators around a central elliptical arena. Below the wooden arena floor, there was a complex set of rooms and passageways for wild beasts and other provisions for staging the spectacles. Eighty walls radiate from the arena and support vaults for passageways, stairways and the tiers of seats. At the outer edge circumferential arcades link each level and the stairways between levels. The three tiers of arcades are faced by three-quarter columns and entablatures, Doric in the first story, Ionic in the second, and Corinthian in the third. Above them is an attic story with Corinthian pilasters and small square window openings in alternate bays. At the top brackets and sockets carry the masts from which the velarium, a

canopy for shade, was suspended. The construction utilized a careful combination of types: concrete for the foundations, travertine for the piers and arcades, tufa infill between piers for the walls of the lower two levels, and brick-faced concrete used for the upper levels and for most of the vaults.

The Pantheon is one of the great spiritual buildings of the world. It was built as a Roman temple and later consecrated as a Catholic Church. Its monumental porch originally faced a rectangular colonnaded temple courtyard and now enfronts the smaller Piazza della Rotonda. Through great bronze doors, one enters one great circular room. The interior volume is a drum above which rises the hemispherical dome. Opposite the door is a recessed semicircular apse, and on each side are three additional recesses, alternately rectangular and semicircular, separated from the space under the dome by paired monolithic columns. The only natural light enters through an unglazed oculus at the center of the dome and through the bronze doors to the portico. As the sun moves, striking patterns of light illuminate the walls and floors of porphyry, granite and yellow marbles.

The portico consists of three rows of eight columns, 14 m (46 feet) high of Egyptian granite with Corinthian capitals. They support an entablature facing the square, which bears the famous inscription in Latin, attributing the construction to Agrippa, although the extant temple was rebuilt later by Hadrian.

The dome has a span of 43.2 m (142 feet), the largest dome until Brunelleschi's dome at the Florence Cathedral of 1420-36.

The interior volume is a cylinder above which springs the half sphere of the dome. A whole sphere can be fit in the interior volume, with the diameter at the floor of the cylinder of 43.3 m (143 feet) equaling the interior height. Five rows of twenty-eight square coffers of diminishing size radiate from the central unglazed oculus with a diameter of 8.7 m (29 feet) at the top of the dome.

The Arch of Constantine is a triumphal arch, erected c. 315 CE to commemorate the triumph of Constantine I after his victory over Maxentius in the battle at the Milvian Bridge in 312 CE. Constantine entered Rome victoriously, and the senate awarded him a triumphal arch. Construction began immediately, and the arch was finished in a few years, to be consecrated in 315/316 CE on the tenth anniversary of Constantine's rise to power. The arch is located in the valley of the Colosseum, between the Palatine Hill and the Colosseum, along the road taken by the triumphal processions.

                                                                                       

The decorative elements on the monument are from different periods and are generally considered to be spolia, that is, parts taken from earlier monuments. The arch has parts from the reigns of Trajan, Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius and Constantine himself. Some of the older, reused parts have been changed to give the images of former emperors the semblance of Constantine.

The reliefs that were executed expressly for the arch tell of episodes from the life of Constantine. These works, which form a band around the monument, can easily be differentiated from the earlier sculptures by their lack of realism -- the standards of artisanship had declined during the continual civil wars of the previous century.

Constantine is addressing the people and surrounded by his entourage in this relief. These figures are non-classical in their lack of proportionality, and do not move with any sense of nature. The repeated stance and gestures leave the figure mechanical or like puppets in comparison with traditional classical relieves. The forms are not modeled but incised.

The biggest single structure still standing in the Roman Forum is the remaining part of the Basilica of Maxentius, also known as the Basilica of Constantine. It has a double name, because it was one of the many projects started by Maxentius that were completed by Constantine after Constantine trashed co-Emperor Maxentius at the Battle of the Milvian bridge in 312 AD. Like the earlier basilicas, this one was built to provide space for political and commercial wheeling and dealing. It is likely that it also was used, as were the others, as a court for civil law cases: the magistrate (perhaps even the Emperor, although he soon moved his venue to Constantinople) would have sat in one of the apses.

We're talking about a really big building here. The platform on which it was built is solid concrete 100 meters long and 65 meters wide and nobody knows how thick. The central nave was a single open space 80 meters long, 25 meters wide, and 35 meters high. The side aisles, each with their three barrel-vaults, were 16 meters wide and 24.5 meters high. The skeleton of the Basilica was good late-Roman concrete faced with brick.. In front of the piers supporting the central and side vaults were eight marble monolithic-shaft columns. The ceiling was decorated with hexagonal and octagonal coffers and was probably modeled on the inside of Hadrian's Pantheon dome. The gilded bronze tiles, which covered the roof, were reused on the first Saint Peter's Basilica.

(For comparison, the statue of Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., on the same kind of throne, is six meters high.)

These marble fragments are from a colossal seated statue of Constantine, about 30 feet high. The body was made of less valuable materials, while the exposed parts (head, hands, feet) were made of marble. Like the colossal statues of gods placed in Greek temples, this statue of the Emperor was originally placed in the west apse (apse of the short end) of the Basilica Nova of Maxentius and Constantine in the Roman Forum.

Earlier portraits of Constantine depict him with a cropped beard; here he is beardless, the "archetypal Roman general of the distant imperial past, a new Augustus, a new Trajan" (Stylistically, this image still has some elements of individualistic portraiture (the hooked nose, for example); at the same time it illustrates the trends in late Roman works to focus on symbolic and abstracted elements: the "image" of authority or the "image" of spirituality, as indicated by the large otherworldly eyes.