Greek Domestic Architecture

Abstract

It is well to understand tactics too; for there is a wide difference between right and wrong disposition of the troops, just as stones, bricks, timber and tiles flung together anyhow are useless, whereas when the materials that neither rot nor decay, that is, the stones and tiles, are placed at the bottom and the top, and the bricks and timber are put together in the middle, as in building, the result is something of great value, a house, in fact. (Xenophon, Memorabilia 3.1.7; trans. Marchant 1938) this metaphorical observation by Xenophon's Socrates enumerates the primary ingredients for Greek house building, and also the rudimentary sequence of Greek domestic architecture, and construction in general. Stone, tile, brick, and timber comprise the principal materials. Not "flung together," but properly ordered, like the troops which are the actual matter of his concern, so that "… the materials that neither rot nor decay, that is, the stones and tiles, are placed at the bottom and the top, and the bricks and timber are put together in the middle." But this was not always so, in Greece or elsewhere. there are other options for building materials and house construction: the use of wattle and daub, wood or rammed earth (pisé), pit or thatch houses, to name just a few. But the Greeks opted for, and indeed developed, a form of construction which remained superior and standard for vernacular building into the pre-modern era and is still a viable option for traditional house forms today, particularly in the Mediterranean region. Greek construction preferences were shaped not only by the availability and suitability of building materials, but also by the form they would ultimately assume, namely, that of the courtyard house. Whether located as isolated structures in the countryside or crowded together side by side in an urban setting, the courtyard house came to dominate.