byzantine architecture

Byzantine architecture / Eastern Roman Empire

Byzantine Architecture

When he Roman Empire fell in 476 AD the Center Age began. Nevertheless, earlier than its fall, the empire was divided into the Jap and Western Roman Empires. In 476, the “Western Roman Empire” fell, whereas the Eastern Roman Empire, whose capital turned Constantinople, preserved Roman tradition (and architecture) and have become the Byzantine Empire.

The non secular buildings and their designs are the primary achievements of the Byzantine Empire. One other vital development was the event of bacilicas. Bacilicas had been early Christian or medieval church buildings. This style was frequent in Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox church buildings.

Byzantine and Islamic architecture share a standard pattern: that’s, the usage of the dome. One instance is the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, which was Islamic architecture, however illustrates the affect Byzantine bestowed because the dome style handed on to the Muslims. They usually used “Persian’ dome. We modernly confer with this because the Onion Dome. Probably the most celebrated instance is the Taj Mahal (A.D. 1630) at Agra, India. Byzantine’s development in growing the dome created a brand new style in world architecture, for no different civilization had designed buildings, particularly non secular buildings, as did the Byzantines.

Structural evolution

As early because the building of Constantine’s church buildings in Palestine there have been two chief varieties of plan in use: the basilican, or axial, sort, represented by the basilica on the Holy Sepulchre, and the round, or central, type, represented by the nice octagonal church as soon as at Antioch. These of the latter type we should suppose had been practically at all times vaulted, for a central dome would appear to furnish their very raison d’etre. The central house was generally surrounded by a really thick wall, wherein deep recesses, to the inside, had been shaped, as on the noble church of St George, Salonica (fifth century), or by a vaulted aisle, as at Sta Costanza, Rome (4th century); or annexes had been thrown out from the central house in such a means as to type a cross, wherein these additions helped to counterpoise the central vault, as on the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia, Ravenna (fifth century). Probably the most well-known church of this kind was that of the Holy Apostles, Constantinople. Vaults seem to have been early utilized to the basilican type of plan; as an illustration, at Hagia Irene, Constantinople (sixth century), the lengthy physique of the church is roofed by two domes.

Hagia Sophia

The Golden Age of Byzantine Architecture was below the rule of Justian in 527-565. It was throughout this era that probably the most well-known examples of all Byzantine Architecture was constructed, together with the Hagia Sophia. The Hagia Sophia was rebuilt from 532 to 537 after the earlier church was destroyed by riots and fires. This church has some distinctive options which turned the patterns for Byzantine Architecture for years after.

The style of the Hagia Sophia or Church of Divine Knowledge, was to have a big dome in the midst of the structure. The dome has a novel type in that it relaxation on four large pillars that are organized in a sq..