02 ARCHITECTURE OF ANE

Architecture of the Ancient
Near East

Historical Background
Location
the valley of Tigris and
modern Iraq
Mesopotamia or land
defined edges
Mediterranean to eastern
• Located in and around
Euphrates rivers in
• Area is also known as
between two rivers
• The land had poorly
• The land stretches from
borders of present Iran
*for educational purposes only*

Location
• To the south and west, it
fades into the Arabian desert
• To the north and west, it
fades into the plains of Syria
• The Tigris and Euphrates
rivers sit in the land as dominant
physical feature
• The Rivers were
unpredictable, being subject
to alternating flood and
drought

Period
• The area witnessed the earliest rise of human
civilization
around 4500 BC
• Transformation from prehistory, to villages and cities
occurred there
• Civilization there lasted for 5000 years
• Cultural development was not homogenous during the
period
• Different cultures established city states and empires
at different periods
• The cultures include Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian,
Babylonian, and Persian

Period
the history of the cultures
3300 BC
• It has not been possible to trace a neat order of
• An acceptable order is presented
• Sequence of Civilization
– 4500 to 2000 BC Sumerian culture, peaking in
– 2350 – 2200 BC Akkadian Period
– 2000- 1600 BC Babylonian Culture
– 1600 – 1717 BC Kessites and Hittites
– 1350 – 612 BC Assyrian Culture
– 612 – 539 BC Neo Babylonian culture
– 539 – 330 BC Persian culture

Social Characteristics &
Beliefs• Mesopotamia is the cradle of civilization
• What do we mean by civilization?
– Civilization is usually associated with the cultural practices
of cities and urban living, the presence of writing and written
law
• In Mesopotamia, earliest cities were
established and urban culture took hold
• Between 4000 and 3000 BC, large number of
people began living in a small area creating first
cities
• Many people began to have jobs that is
unrelated to agriculture*for educational purposes only*

Beliefs• Once established, cities grew and increased power and
importance
• As cities grew in power and importance, rivalries
developed between them for military and economic
control
• The ANE was land without natural defenses
• Warfare was common throughout its history
• The Tigris and Euphrates also suffered from alternate
drought and floods
• Combination of warfare and frequent drought and flood
made a continuous homogenous civilization impossible
• The result is that several cultures flourished and died out
during the ANE period

Beliefs
authority residing in an assembly of male
time, kingship evolved
defeated weaker ones to create empires and
sovereign king
• Cities in the ANE initially developed with
citizens
• Short term leaders were selected during wars
• When war leaders were retained during peace
• It was initially elective and later hereditary
• As some cities became more powerful, they
kingdoms
• This led to collective rule of city states by a

Beliefs• With kingship also came monumental palaces
as place of residence and administration for
the king
• Almost all ANE culture worshiped many gods
and goddesses
• ANE people did not believe in immortality or
eternal life
• They believed only gods were immortal
• Rather, they believed in divine rewards for
moral conduct

Social Characteristics & Beliefs
numerous offspring and long life
related to fertility
crops
were explained by the actions of gods
elements- sky, earth, water, sun, moon, etc
• The reward was enjoyed in this life
• The rewards include increased worldly goods,
• The most popular and earliest religious cults
• Fertility goddesses influenced the growth of
• Aspects of life such as war, weather, disease,
• The Sumerian had a religion based on the

Beliefs
society
they needed a means of communication and
of writing based on pictograph
called the cuneiform
to produce historical records
• This reflected the agrarian nature of their
• As ANE people came together to live in cities,
record keeping
• Around 3500, the Sumerians invented a system
• This was later developed into a simpler writing
• Development of written language enabled them

Beliefs• Written records also led to the development of
written law as in the code of King Hummurabi
• Cities in ancient Mesopotamia were enclosed
by wall fortifications
• The fabric of the cities are a blend of
residential, commercial and industrial
buildings
• Houses were one story high and mostly of
mud brick
• Rooms were arranged around courtyards

Beliefs• Houses looked inward
• Rooms were narrow with thick walls and flat,
vault or dome roofs
• Timber and stone were scarce, clay was
abundant and mud brick was most common
building material
• Buildings were usually raised on platforms to
protect them from the floods
• Clay was also used for pottery
• Mesopotamians invented astrology, wheeled
vehicle & made advances in science & math

Sumerian Architecture
Introduction
• The transition from prehistory
was made around 4500 BC with
the rise of the Sumerian
civilization
• Sumerians established an
irrigation system that made the
capable of food production to
support urban living
• They were also skilled in metal
craft
• The Sumerians invented the
cuneiform system of writing

Introduction
cuneiform system of writing
Sumerian civilization were
civilization to make a
designing public buildings
material
sun dried and built into
• The Sumerians invented the
• The major cities of the
Kish, Uruk and Ur
• The Sumerian were the
first
conscious attempt of
• Mud was their building
• Mud was formed into brick,
massive walls *for educational purposes only*

Introduction
• Mud was their main building material
• Mud was formed into brick, sun dried and built
into massive walls
• Walls were thick to compensate the weakness
of mud
• They were reinforce with buttresses
• Spaces were narrow because of the walling
material

Introduction
• Spaces were narrow because of the walling
material
• Façade of buildings were whitewashed and
painted to disguise the lack of attraction of the
material
• Buttresses and recesses also relieve the
monotony of the plastered wall surfaces
• Temples was their major building type
• We will examine Sumerian house organization
and their temple forms

Introduction
• The clearest example of
the cities of the ancient
Near East is found in the
Sumerian city of Ur
• Cities were enclosed in
walls with Ziggurat
temples and palace as
centers of the city
• Fabric of the city is made
up of residences mixed
with commercial and
industrial buildings

Introduction
• The houses are densely
packed with narrow
streets between them.
• Streets were fronted by
courtyard houses of one
story high
• The houses streets were
usually punctuated by
narrow openings that
serve as entrance to
houses

Architectural Monument-
Temples
• Temples were the principal architectural
monuments of Sumerian cities
• Temples consist of chief and city temples
• We will examine two examples of chief
temples- the white temple at Uruk and the
Great Ziggurat at Ur
• And we will examine on city temple, the
Oval temple at Khafaje

White Temple Uruk
• Uruk was a major Sumerian
city by 3300 BC
• Uruk is also known as warka
in arabic
• The name Iraq is derived from
Uruk
• The city covered an area of 2
square kilometer
• Had a population of 40,000
people
• White temple was located at
Uruk

White Temple Uruk
• The white temple was built
around 3000 BC
• The white temple is an
example of earliest
development of Sumerian
temples and Ziggurat

White Temple Uruk
great mound of earth called
12 meters above ground
built with mud bricks
shape
supported by buttresses
temple was a long
alter and offering table
• The temple is place on a
Ziggurat, rising more than
• The ziggurat and temple are
• The temple is rectangular in
• Temple walls were thick and
• In the inner part of the
sanctuary, that contains an

White Temple Uruk
• Rooms oblong and in shape
and vaulted surrounded the
long side of the sanctuary
• The temple had imposing
doorways located at its
either end
• Worshippers to the temple
however enter through a
side room

White Temple Uruk
• Series of staircases and
stepped levels lead
worships to the entrance of
the temple
• The temple was plastered
white externally, making it
visible for miles in the
landscape

Great Ziggurat Ur
• Ur was a Sumerian city
located near the mouth of
the Euphrates river
• The city was a thriving place
by 2600 BC
• It was considered sacred to
Nnanna, the moon god
• The white temple was built
around 2113 to 2048 BC by
the ruler Urnammu
• It was built on the ruins of
previous temples and
incorporated their remains

Great Ziggurat Ur
bricks reinforced with thin
of twisted reeds
located as part of a temple
the ziggurat and its court
attached to it called the
priest of the temple and
• It was constructed of mud
layers of matting and cables
• The Great Ziggurat was
complex
• The complex comprised
of
and a secondary court
court of Nannar
• The king was the chief
lived close to it *for educational purposes only*

Great Ziggurat Ur
• The temple sits on a three
multi-tiered Ziggurat
mountain
• Access to the temple is
through triple stairways that
converge at the summit of
the first platform
• From this stage, one
passed through a portal with
dome roof to fourth
staircase

Great Ziggurat Ur
• The fourth staircase gave
access to the second and
third stages of the ziggurat
and to the temple
• The temple is usually
access only by the priest,
where gods are believed to
come down and give
instructions

Great Ziggurat Ur
• The ziggurat is believed by
the Sumerians to unit the
heavens and the earth
• The people believed that
climbing the staircase of the
ziggurat gives a holy
experience
• The chief temple was also
used as a last line of
defense during times of war
• Most of what is known about
what exist on top of the
ziggurat is projection

Oval Temple- Khafaje
• Oval temple is an example of
second type of Sumerian
temples
• It was constructed around
2600 BC
• The temple is named oval
because of its massive oval
walls surrounding the temple
• Located in the city, emphasis
in its organization is on
enclosing space within
courtyards

Oval Temple Khafaje
• Space is enclosed to create
island of peace from a busy
city
• The temple is raised on a
simple platform enclosed
within the oval walls
• It had subsidiary chambers at
the ground level
• The outer wall was extended
to protect a priestly
residence with its own chapel

Oval Temple Khafaje
• The inner court had an
offering table and showed
evidence of animal sacrifices
• The inner court also had
basins for ablution as well as
workshops and storage
rooms

Assyrian Architecture
Introduction
• Assyria is the name for a part
of ancient Mesopotamia
located on the upper Tigris
• The principal cities of Assyria
were Nineveh, Dun,
Khorsabad, Nimrud and Assur
• The Assyrians were great
warriors and hunters, and this
was reflected in their art
• They produced violent
sculptures and relief carving in
stone that was used to
ornament their houses

Introduction
temples lost their importance to
in which palaces took precedent
platforms, and their principal
guardian figures of human
lined with pictures and
stone slabs up to 9 feet high
• During the Assyrian periods,
palaces
• Assyrian kings built walled cities,
over religious buildings
• Palaces were raised on brick
entrance ways were flanked by
headed bulls or lions of stone
• Their halls and corridors were
inscriptions carved in relief on

Introduction
• The interiors were richly
decorated and luxurious.
• The walls of cities were
usually strengthened by many
towers serving as defensive
positions
• The city of Khorsabad
demonstrate the might and
authority of the Assyrian kings
• It is also at this place that the
remains of Assyrian
architecture can be found

City of Khorsabad
• Khorsabad was designed as
the royal capital of Assyria
• The city was built on a flat land
with an area of about a square
mile and was enclosed by a
double wall with seven city
gates
• Only a part of the city including
palaces, temples and
administrative headquarters
was built
• The palace was located on the
north west side of the city

Palace of Sargon
• The palace is approached at
ground level through a
walled citadel
• Within the citadel is found
the main palace, two minor
palaces and a temple
dedicated to Nabu
• The main palace was set on a
platform located on the
northern side of the citadel
• All the buildings within the
citadel were arranged
around courtyards

Palace of Sargon
• The palace was arranged
around two major courtyards
about which were grouped
smaller courtyards
• The palace consisted of
large and smaller rooms with
the throne room being the
largest
• The building was decorated
with relief sculpture and
glazed brick

Babylonian Architecture
Introduction
• After the fall of Nineveh in
612 BC and the end of the
Assyrian civilization, focus
of Mesopotamian civilization
shifted to old Babylon
• A new dynasty of kings,
including Nebuchadnezzar,
revived old Babylonian culture
to create a Neo- Babylonian
civilization
• Old Sumerian cities were
rebuilt

Introduction
enlarged and heavily
magnificent new buildings
Mesopotamian building
period
enhanced by a new form of
of figures designed in
• The capital old Babylon was
fortified
• It was also adorned with
• The traditional style of
reached its peak during the
• Traditional building was
façade ornament consisting
colored glazed brick work

City of Babylon
• The city of Babylon is
shaped in the form of a
quadrangle sitting
across and pierced by
the Euphrates[64]
• The city was
surrounded by a
fortification of double
walls
• These had defensive
towers that project well
above the walls

City of Babylon
• The walls also had a large
moat in front, which was
also used for navigation
• The length of the wall and
moat is about five and a
quarter miles
• The city had a palace,
Nebuchadnezzar’s palace,
located on its
northern side on the outer
wall

Ishtar Gate
procession street that cuts
the ground to the tower of
the city through the famous
the double walls of the city
projecting towers on each
• From the palace originated a
through the city raised above
Babel
• The procession street enters
Ishtar gate
• The Ishtar gate is built across
fortification
• The gate had a pair of
wall

Ishtar Gate
and adjoining streets
glazed bricks and
of heraldic animals- lions,
relief and glazed in other
old Babylon has survived
• All the facades of gates
were faced with blue
ornamented with figures
bulls, and dragons
• These were modeled in
colors
• None of the buildings
of
to the present age

Architecture in the city of
Babylon• Nebuchadnezzar’s palace
covered a land area of 900 feet
by 600 feet
• It had administrative offices,
barracks, the king’s harem,
private apartment all arranged
around five courtyards
• The palace is also praised for its
legendary hanging garden
• This is recorded as one of the
seven wonders of the ancient
world, but exact knowledge of
the nature of this garden is not
known *for educational purposes only*

Architecture in the city of Babylon
also prominent
Babylon
Babel located at the end of
mentioned in the Christian
information about the
the tower
on the tower is hypothetical
• Temples and towers were
architectural elements of
• The legendary tower of
procession street is
bible
• There is also no
design and construction of
• Most of what is available

Persian Architecture
Introduction
• The Persian empire started in about 560 BC when Cyrus
the great from the province of Fars swept over the
region with his powerful cavalry
• By the end of the century, Cyrus and his successors,
Darius 1 and Xerxes had conquered the entire civilized
world from Indus to Danube River with the exception of
Greece
• It was the wish of the Persians to construct great
buildings
• They were to achieve greatness with their architectural
solutions
• The architectural solutions were a synthesis of ideas
gathered from almost all parts of their empire and from
the Greeks an Egyptians

Introduction
• Their materials of construction was also from
different locations
• Material included mud-brick from Babylon,
wooden roof beams from Lebanon, precious
material from India and Egypt, Stone columns
quarried and carved by Ionic Greeks
• Despite sourcing materials and ideas from
different areas, their architecture was original
and distinctive in style

Palace at Persepolis
its greatest monumentality at
capital for the Persian Empire
and finished in 460 BC
mountain leveled to create
feet
a
fortification wall
covered by buildings
• Persian architecture achieved
Parsepolis
• It was constructed as a new
• The city was started 510 BC
• It is set along the face of a
large platform 1800 feet by 900
• It was surrounded by a
• The site was more than half

• The palace consisted of
three parts:
• An approach of
monumental staircases,
gate ways and avenues
• Two great state halls
towards the center of the
platform
• The palace of Xerxes, the
harem, and other living
quarters at the south end
of the site

Persian
Palace
Architecture
at Persepolis
relied on a hypostyle
spaces of varying scale
very big and generally
by mud brick walls
of the palace was the royal
• Structurally, the buildings
scheme throughout
• They used it to achieve
• Some of the spaces were
square in plan
• The spaces were enclosed
• The most impressive
aspect
audience hall

• The Royal audience hall was a
square 250 feet in length
• It contained 36 slender columns
widely space & 67 feet high
• The columns had a lower diameter of
only 5 feet
• The centers of the columns were
spaced 20 feet or 4 diameters apart
• The column was the greatest
invention of the Persians
• The columns were fluted and stand
on inverted bell shaped bases
• Their capital combine Greek motifs
with Egyptian palm leaf topped by
an impost of paired beast

palace at parsepolis was the
of a 100 columns
were 37 feet high, with a
apart or seven diameters
created room and spacious
compared to the audience
• Another famous aspect of the
throne room
• This was also known as hall
• The columns in the room
diameter of only 3 feet
• They were spaced 20 feet
from axis to axis
• The slim nature of the
column
feeling in the room when
hall

• The monumental entrance
to Parsepolis is also one
of the unique aspects of
the Palace
• The monumental gateway
ensure a dramatic entry
to the Palace
• It was heavily adorned
with relief sculpture
ornamenting its stairway

• The relief structure
addresses different
themes relating to the
role of Parsepolis as
the capital of the
Persian Empire

• In some places, the
sculpture shows delegates
from the different parts of
the Persian bringing gifts
and rare animals to the
king during celebrations
• In some places, royal
guards and nobles of the
imperial court are shown
• Elsewhere, the king is seen
in conflict with animals or
seated beneath a
ceremonial umbrella

Assyrian
Palace
Architecture
at Persepolis
have survived to the
give a faulty expression
appearance
supporting the halls of the
the palace and its
perished completely
• The ruins of Parsepolis
present day
• Existing ruins however
of the city’s original
• Some columns
great halls have survived
• The mud brick fabric of
enclosing walls have

• Only the sculptures
which adorn
doorways or windows
and openings and the
relief ornamenting its
entrance way remain

Buildings & Other Arch.
Building Types
Elements
houses, temples and palaces
outstanding buildings types in ANE
and city fortification was also witnessed
organization led to the evolution of the inward
city with narrow passages to distribute people
• 3 building types examined in ANE; Cities and
• Temples and palaces were the most
• Significant development in house organization
• In Sumerian civilization, development in
house looking courtyard house
• Houses formed the dominant buildings of the

Buildings & Other Arch. Elements
Building Types
• Across all the civilizations, cities were usually
walled
• The walls were of massive brick material, with
evenly distributed towers serving as buttresses.
• Examples of city wall or fortification examined
include City of Khorsabad and Babylon
• The chief’s house at precinct of the Great
Ziggurat and the Palace at Parsepolis were also
fortified with brick walls.

Temples and Palaces
during the different periods of the ANE
and were also common during the Babylonian
Ziggurats, while the character of the Babylonian
of them
located outside the city and the city temple
• Importance of temples and palaces varied
• Temples started during the Sumerian period
period.
• The Sumerian temples were raised on
temples is not certain because there is no trace
• The Sumerian temples had chief temples
located within the fabric of the city

Temples and Palaces
• Neo-Babylonians also built great palaces. The
legendary palace of Nebuchadnezzar with its
hanging garden is widely reported in history
• Temple building declined during the Assyrian
period, when palaces took over as the
prominent building type
• The Palaces at Khorsabad and Parsepolis
shows the rise of the palace as the focus of
architectural development over the temple

Materials, Construction & Tech.
Materials
• Stone and timber suitable for building was rare
in the plains of the Tigris and Euphrates.
• Clay was however in abundance
• This was compressed in moulds and dried in the
sun to provide bricks for all buildings
• Sun dried brick became the standard building
material
• It was used across all the cultures of the ancient
Near East

Materials
• Wood was scarce but was imported from
Lebanon
• Wood was probably applied mainly for
roofing or for producing tools and ornaments
• Stone was used by the Assyrians but only for
relieve carving and for columnar support
• It was in ancient Persia that extensive use of
stone witnessed
• The Babylonians introduce glazed brick,
which was used in the façade of their gates and
prominent buildings

Construction
development of construction methods
to stone
reinforced with buttresses.
Sumerian temples.
Mesopotamian period
• The abundance of mud brick led to the
appropriate to its physical properties.
• Structurally Mud brick is weak when compared
• To compensate, walls were very thick and
• This construction system is evident in the
• Vaulting was known and used during the

Materials, Construction
Construction
& Tech.
vaults.
oblong spaces.
the ANE
and Neo-babylonian periods.
borrowed from other cultures in the region,
• Rooms were usually roofed with domes or
• Tunnel vaults were used to cover long narrow
• Columnar construction was not very popular in
• It was used in few instances in the late Assyrian
• It was however extensively used by the Persians
• Persian architecture, was an architecture that
including Egypt and Greek sources

Materials, Construction &
Technology
Tech.
commonly used in the Ancient Near East;
probably a product of its desert environment
livable environments in houses
as a thermal storage
fluctuations of temperature
• Two technologies appear to have been
passive cooling and water supply.
• The evolution of courtyard in Mesopotamia was
and the need for climate modification.
• Courtyards were used for cooling to create
• The thick walls of houses may also have served
• They help to mitigate against the wide

Technology
• People of the ancient Near East also mastered
the earth of water supply
• Channels were used to move water and supply
it to agricultural fields and houses.
• Ancient Babylon was said to have an aqueduct
that supplied water to the city.
• The hanging garden in Nebuchadnezzar’s
palace would also be impossible without a
means of transporting water from the ground to
the garden

Principles of Arch. Organization
Principles
• Three principles appear to predominant in
the organization of architectural form and
space
– Courtyard organization
– Lifting of buildings on artificial mountains
– Organic organization of city fabric

Forces Shaping Arch. Organ.
Forces
• Three forces account for the prevailing
architectural organizing principles
observed
• Geography,
• Symbolism and meaning to the people
• Social factors
• Combination of the factors account for the
architectural forms that are witnessed in
all the cultures of the ANE

Forces Shaping Arch.
Geography
Organ.
and built form
and constrained the development of
conditions which lead to the evolution of the
of courtyard fixed the form of buildings as a
of one story multi-courtyard form
• A strong factor in shaping spatial organization
• Limited the availability of construction
material construction technology
• Desert environment also meant t hash climatic
courtyard form of building
• Prevalence of mud bricks coupled with the use
regional solution.
• Most buildings- whether house or palace, were

Symbolism and Meaning
symbolisms and meaning
sky and to god
Ziggurat to communicating with the chief priest
holy experience.
motivation for the construction of larger and
• Organizing principles may also be a factor of
• The role of symbolism is evident in the Ziggurat
• Sumerians think of ziggurat as a ladder to the
• They believed that God came down to the
• Climbing the ziggurat is also associated with a
• Symbolic meaning of ziggurat provides more
impressive mountains

Symbolism and Meaning
and power of the king
in the symbolic importance
center of authority.
of the temple
authority and power of the emperor of the
commandeer resources from as far as Egypt and
• Palaces also symbolize power and authority
• In Assyria, architecture expressed the authority
• The palace at Khorsabad also shows the
decline
compared to the palace of the king, which is the
• At Parsepolis, the palace also expresses the
Persian empire
• This power is evident in the ability to

Social Concerns
• Social concerns contributed to the evolution
of
design principles
• There was need for defense due to warfare
• Led to construction of wall fortifications for cities
• Also to ziggurat as a place of refuge from attack
• Concerns for privacy
• Courtyard house may have evolved because
of privacy needs *for educational purposes only*

02 ARCHITECTURE OF ANE

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