Covers the syllabus of Module 1 for the students of Architecture 1st semester. Includes prehistoric civilizations (settlements).

1. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
Module 1
• Introduction
• Introduction to pre-historic civilization
• Introduction to river valley cultures

2. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
Pre-history and History
• The term "prehistory" was coined by French scholars, referring to the time before people
recorded history in writing.
• This is the longest period in the past of modern man (homo sapiens) that lasted about
400,000 years.
• History is the period of recorded events of man. History refers to the time after invention of
writing. The history of the world is the memory of the past experience of Homo sapiens
around the world, as that experience has been preserved, largely in written records.

3. Factors influencing Architecture
• Geography
• Geology
• Climate
• Religion
• Social and Political
•History
SEM 1 History Of Architecture I

4. Origin
• They required only the simplest kinds of buildings, though the purposes which they served
were the same as those of later times in civilized communities.
•A hut or house for shelter, a shrine of some sort for worship, a stockade for defence, a cairn or
mound over the grave of the chief or hero, were provided out of the simplest materials, and
these often of a perishable nature.
• There were mainly 3 types of primitive dwellings :
1) Caves – or rocks for those occupied in hunting or fishing
2) Huts – for agriculture
3) Tent – for those such as shepherds who led a pastoral and nomadic life
Huts
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5. Caves
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6. Tents
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7. Pre – historic Period
Paleolithic (20,00,000
BC)
• Hunters and gatherers
•Nomadic
•Simple tools and
weapons
•Use of fire
•Spoken language
•Burial of dead
•Belief in a spiritual
world
•Creation of cave
paintings
Neolithic (10,000 BC)
• work as farmers
•Live in permanent
villages
•Use domesticated plants
and animals
•Large villages
•Increased status for
males
•Warriors assert power
over others
•More personal
possessions
•New technologies
Early Civilization
(3,000 BC)
• priests and nobles
•Merchants and artisans
•Peasants
•Slaves
•Rise of cities
•Organized governments
•Job specification
•Growth of social disease
•System of writing
•Trade
•Complex religion
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8. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
The remains of the Stone Age can be classified into :
Monoliths or Menhirs :
• A prehistoric monument consisting of an upright megalith, usually standing alone but
sometimes aligned with others.
• their size can vary considerably, but their shape is generally uneven and squared, often
tapering towards the top.
• menhirs are widely distributed across Europe, Africa, and Asia but are most numerous in
Western Europe: particularly in Ireland, Great Britain and Brittany.
• they were constructed during different periods across pre –history as part of a larger
megalithic culture that flourished in Europe and beyond.
• the major function of Menhirs have variously been thought to have been used by Druids for
human sacrifice, used as territorial markers or elements of a complex ideological system, or
functioned as early calenders.

9. Menhir at Carnac, Brittany – 63 feet high, 14 feet in diameter and
weighing 260 tons
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10. Cairn : A heap of stones piled up as a monument, tombstone, or landmark.
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11. Tumulus : An artificial mound or earth or stone, esp. over an ancient grave.
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12. Dolmen : A prehistoric
monument consisting of two
or more large upright stones
supporting a horizontal stone
slab, found esp. in Britain and
France and
usually regarded as a tomb.
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13. Cromlech : A circular arrangement of megaliths
enclosing a dolmen or burial mound.
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14. Henge :
•There are three related types of Neolithic earthwork that are all sometimes loosely called
henges.
•The essential characteristic of all three types is that they feature a ring bank and ditch, but with
the ditch inside the bank rather than outside.
• Due to the poor defensive utility of an enclosure with an external bank and an internal ditch,
henges are not considered to have served a defensive purpose
SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
Henge

15. There are three types of henges :
1. Henge - The word henge refers to a particular type of earthwork of the Neolithic period,
typically consisting of a roughly circular or oval-shaped bank with an internal ditch
surrounding a central flat area of more than 20 m in diameter.
There is typically little if any evidence of occupation in a henge, although they may contain
ritual structures such as stone circles, timber circles and coves.
2. Hengiform monument (5 ≤ diameter ≤ 20 m). Like an ordinary henge except the central flat
area is between 5 and 20 m in diameter, they comprise a modest earthwork with a fairly
wide outer bank. Mini henge or Dorchester henge are sometimes used as synonyms for
hengiform monument.
3. Henge enclosure (> 300 m). A Neolithic ring earthwork with the ditch inside the bank, with
the central flat area having abundant evidence of occupation and usually being more than
300 m in diameter. Some true henges are as large as towns, but lack evidence of domestic
occupation. Super henge is sometimes used as a synonym for a henge enclosure.
However, sometimes Super henge is used to indicate size alone rather than use,
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16. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
STONEHENGE I : c.3000 BC
• About 91 m across
• Ditch and bank: work began c.2800 BC
• Probably a place of Neolithic astronomical observations, worship, and burials for
about 7
centuries.
• Unknown purposes
• Re-used for burials of cremated human bones (c.2200 BC)

17. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
STONEHENGE II
• Introduction of a new axis, a more east than previous one.
• Addition of the Avenue (510 m).
• Addition of the Bluestones
• 1.8 m apart
• Came from Preseli Mountains, 135 miles from Stonehenge

18. SEM 1 History Of Architecture ISTONEHENGE III-a
• 2000 BC
• Composed of 30 upright stones in uniform height capped by a horizontal ring of stone
lintels.

19. SEM 1 History Of Architecture ISTONEHENGE III-b
• Y & Z Holes
o 59 holes in all
o 59 days in 2 lunar months
• Bluestone Horseshoe
o 19 bluestones
o 19 cycles of the moon, crucial for the prediction of eclipses

20. SEM 1 History Of Architecture ISTONEHENGE III-C • Some bluestones in III-B
were re-used in III-C, some were shaped, and
some were jointed together.

21. Stonehenge:
• Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument in Wiltshire, England.
•Archaeologists believe it was constructed from 3000 BC to 2000 BC.
• Begun as a sinple earthwork enclosure, it was built in several stages, with the unique lintelled
stone circle being erected in the late Neolithic period around 2500 BC.
•Stonehenge remained important into the early Bronze Age, when many burial mounds were
built nearby.
•Two types of stone are used at Stonehenge – the larger sarsens and the smaller “bluestone”.
•The sarsens were erected in 2 concentric arrangements – an inner horseshoe and an outer
circle – and the bluestones were set up between them in a double arc.
•Probably at the same time the stone were being set up in the centre of the monument, the
sarsens close to the entrance were raised, together with the four station stones on the
periphery.
•About 200 or 300 years later the central bluestones were re-arranged to form a circle and
inner oval.
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22. •The earthwork Avenue was also built at this time, connecting Stonehenge with the river Avon.
•One of the last pre-historic activities at Stonehenge was the digging Around the stone setting
of the two rings of concentric pits, the so-called Y and Z holes. They may have been intended
for the re-arrangement of the stones that was never completed.
•Immediately outside the north-east entrance is the Heel stone, a huge unshaped sarsen
boulder. It may have been an early stone at the site, raised upright from its original position
nearby.
•Also near the north-east entrance is the slaughter stone, a fallen sarsen that once stoon
upright with one or two other stone in the entrance.
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23. Alignments at Stonehenge:
• The main axis of the stone is aligned upon the solstitial axis.
• At midsummer, the sun rises over the horizon to the north-east, close to the Heel Stone.
• At midwinter, the sun sets in the south-west, in the gap between the two tallest trilithons, one of
which has now fallen.
•These times in the seasonal cycle were obviously important to the pre historic people who built
and used Stonehenge.
•The posts measured 4.1 mts high, 2.1 mts wide and 1.1 mts thick
•They were surmounted by 6 to 7 ton lintels that formed a continuous circle around the top.
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24. Heel Stone
(Sunrise
summer)
Chalk Banks
Bluestones
Sunset -
winter
Station Stone
Sunrise -
winter
Sunset -
winter
Smaller
Sarsens
Y & Z
Holes
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25. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I

26. Types of Burials and Graves by Pre-historic People:
• Tumuli or Burial Mounds – were prototypes of the pyramids of Egypt and the beehive
huts found in Wales, Cornwall, Ireland and elsewhere.
•A Tumulus is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. They are
also known as barrows, burial mounds, or Kurgans and can be found throughout much
in the world.
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27. • Lake Dwellings – as discovered in the lakes of Switzerland, Italy and Ireland consisted of
wooden huts supported on piles, and were so placed for protection against hostile attacks of all
kinds.
•They range in the dates between early Neolithic through Iron Age villages.
•People who lived in the lake dwelling settlements practised animal husbandry and farming, as
well as relied on fishing and hunting.
•Oval Hut, Nice – the oldest recognized buildings in the world are 12 4,00,000 year old huts
found in Nice, France in 1960.
•Evidence at Terra Amata indicates that early humans living there occupy oval huts that are 15 m
by 6 mts.
•This is the first evidence of housing construction.
•A small hearth was found in the centre of each successive hut.
•The habitations dates to 3,80,000 BC, and included vestiges which suggested that the
inhabitants lived in huts on the beach. In the centre of each hut was a fireplace, with ashes
showing that the inhabitants had domesticated fire.
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28. • the inhabitants built the huts of animal skins supported by poles, with a hole in the center for the
smoke to escape.
•20 to 40 people could gather in such a shelter.
•These people, apparently Neanderthals, were hunters and the site contains remains of the bones
of a variety of animals, including elephant, rhinoceros, red deer, ibex and giant ox.
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29. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
Lake Dwelling

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Oval Hut

31. • Passage Graves– are amongst the oldest tombs.
• A passage grave or a passage tomb consists of a narrow passage made of large
stones and one or multiple burial chambers covered in earth or stone.
• the building of passage tombs was normally carried out with megaliths and smaller
stones, they usually date from the Neolithic age.
•Those with more than one chamber may have sub-chambers leading off from the
main burial chamber.
•One common layout, the cruciform passage grave is cross-shaped.
•Sometimes passage graves are covered with cairn, especially those dating from later
times.
•Not all passage graves have been found to contain evidence of human remains.
•They have corbelled roofs rather than simple slab.
•The passage itself, in a muber of notable instances, is aligned in such a way that the
sun shines into the passage at a significant point in the year, for example at sunrisr on
the winter solstice or at sunset on the equinox.
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32. •Passage graves are distribute extensively in lands along the Atlantic seaboard of
Europe.
•They are found in Ireland, Britain, Scandinavia, Northern Germany and the Drenthe
area of the Netherlands. They are also found in Iberia, some parts of the
Mediterranean and along the northern coast of Africa.
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33. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
Passage Grave

34. • Gallery Graves–
•A gallery grave is a form of megalithic tomb built primarily during the Neolithic Age in Europe in
which the main gallery of the tomb is entered without first passing through
an antechamber or hallway.
•There are four major types of gallery grave - complex,transepted, segmented, and wedge-
shaped.
•The structure resembles a megalithic corridor under an elongated mound, though sometimes
they are cut in the rock.
•Two parallel walls of stone slabs were erected to form a corridor and covered with a line of
capstones. The rectangular tomb was covered with a barrow or a cairn.
•Most were built during the 4th millenium BC, though some were still being built in the Bronze Age.
•Some of the graves in Britain also has side chambers.
•Segmented graves with concave forecourts are found in Ulster and South-western Scotland.
•In the Paris Basin the gallery graves have small round entrances and are lined with large stone
slabs.
The tombs are often associated with deities, whose representations are depicted on the rock
walls.
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35. Gallery Grave
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36. • they are distribued across Europe and they are usually subdivided by period, region and also
into more genric types of long barrows, chambered round barrows, etc
•In 2000 BC, new generation of tombs called Coves appeared.
•They consisted of 3 upright slabs set in configuration of a U facing east, open to the sky and
often surrounded by circular embankments and stone circles.
The difference between a complex gallery grave and a passage grave (which also
has smaller burial chambers opening off the main passage) is two-fold. First, the
gallery grave gallery will be as high and wide as the side burial chambers, while in a
passage grave the passage is not as high or wide as the burial chambers. Second,
gallery graves are usually topped by a V-shaped tumulus, while passage graves are
almost always covered by a round tumulus.
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37. Cove – Three standing stones, two on the sides and one at the back.
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38. Trilithon – A structure consisting of
two upright stones supporting a
horizontal lintel
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39. • Stone Cicles –
• At one time, there might have been more than 4000 of them.
•Two-thirds of which were erected in the major building phase between 3000 and 1300 BC.
•The earliest stone circles ranged in size from 18 to 30 mts in diameter, with the stones standing
shoulder to shoulder.
•For most part they were near a village or clan compound and were built with local stones.
•They could be round or oval, they could have concentric embankments of stone circles, and
many had approach avenus.
•Some were associated with burials, others with cremation.
•At Loanhead of Daviot, stones were not upright but flat on the ground and in the center were the
remnants of a fire pit with cremated human bones.
•Many had a central stone.
•Though debatable, they were meant to follow the movements of the moon and the stars as would
have been typical for agrarian based communities.
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40. SEM 1 History Of Architecture I
Stone Circle

41. • Catal Huyuk -
•One of the world’s first permanent settlements.
•Populated 7500 – 5700 BC and flourished in 7000 BC
•Located in central Anatolia what is now Turkey
•Populated of about 8000 people.
•1000 dwellings crammed together like a honeycomb
•No streets – people climbed out through ladders in their ceilings.
•Supported by agriculture and animal domestication – barley, peas, wheat – cattle, sheep.
•Famous because it is so well preserved. It lay in the centre of the metal trade
•The city was located next to a river that fed into a nearby lake.
•Consisted of rectangular flat roofed houses packed together into single architectural mass with
no streets or passageways.
•Walls made of mud bricks reinforced by massive oak posts.
•Light entered through small windows high in the walls.
•If a family died out, the house was abondoned for a period of time and then eventually reclaimed.
•Untill the house was reclaimed, it was used to throw garbage.
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45. •Typical residence consisted one large room connected with smaller storage rooms.
•The main room was equiped with benches, ovens and bins.
•Average size of a room – 5m X 6m
•Walls were plastered and many were decorated with spectacular hunting scenes, textile patterns
or landscapes.
•Raised benches on all three sides for sleeping and other activities.
•Horns of animals especially cattle were mounted on walls.
•Each house had its own shrine consisting of a wall decorated with bulls or horns.
•In some cases pair of horns were set in clay at the edge of platforms.
•The dead of the family were buried in this room and their bones incorporated in to the shrine.
•Principal deity – mother goddess
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46. Factors affecting River valley Cultures :
• Approximately 5000 years ago the first complex, politically centralized civilizations began to
crystallize independently along a number of river valleys throughout the southern half of Asia and
northern Africa .
•These civilizations constitute the next step in the organization and centralization of human
economic, political, religious, and social institutions and practices.
• Rivers supplied a continuous if not always dependable flow and supply of water for farming and
human consumption.
• These rivers along with climate, vegetation, geography, and topography shaped the
development of the early river valley civilizations.
•However, while people of these civilizations were dependent on the rivers, the rivers also inspired
new technological, economic, institutional, and organizational innovations and developments.
•Between 3000 and 2000 B.C.E. such river valley civilizations formed independently of each other
along the Indus, the Nile, the Tigris and Euphrates, and the Yellow Rivers. These civilizations
shared certain characteristics that distinguished them from the collections of Neolithic
communities that preceded them.