Description

In this fully illustrated study, Rune Frederiksen assembles all archaeological and written sources for city walls in the ancient Greek world, and argues that widespread fortification of settlements and towns, usually considered to date from the Classical period, in fact took place much earlier. Frederiksen discusses the types of fortified settlement and the topography of urban fortification, and also the preservation of structures from early settlements. He also presents an architectural history of Greek fortification walls before the Classical period, and makes the intriguing observation that early monumental architecture developed just as much in fortifications as it did in early temples. This underlines the importance of the secular sphere for the development of early communities across the Greek world.

Features

• Offers a new view of the incentives behind early monumental architecture
• Challenges received opinion on the development of communities across the Archaic Greek world
• Includes a complete catalogue of early Iron Age and Archaic city walls, with more than 100 plans, together with a full list of walls mentioned in written sources, with quotations and translations
  

Product Details

272 pages; 114 illus.; 10.9 x 8.6; ISBN13: 978-0-19-957812-2ISBN10: 0-19-957812-5

About the Author(s)