Early Bronze Age Greek Architecture
One important Early Bronze Age site is the town of Lerna. Lerna has a lot of small stone houses, and one house that is larger than the others. This is called the House of the Tiles, because instead of having a thatched roof this house had clay tiles on the roof. Like the houses from the last part of the Stone Age, this house is a megaron house.
Megaron
Lerna also had a big stone wall around it. The wall did not go around all the people's houses, only the richest ones in the center of the town, at the top of the hill. But if there was a war, the poor people from outside could come inside the wall. Only their houses would be destroyed by the invaders.
Other towns from this period also have one big house and a stone wall. One example is Tiryns, near Lerna, where the big house is called the Rundbau, or Round House (in German), because it is round.
The site of Myrtos in Crete (only the foundations remain;
this is a drawing of what it looks like looking down)
On the island of Crete, things were developing a little differently at this time. Instead of many separate houses, the Cretans tended to build houses all crammed up against each other, sharing party walls. Or some people see this as one big house, with a lot of doors. Either way it probably means that the Cretans lived more together with their neighbors than the mainland Greeks did.
The site of Vasiliki in Crete - again,
only the foundations of the walls are still there,
but you can see the outlines of some of the rooms.
To find out more about Early Bronze Age Greek architecture, check out these books on Amazon.com or in your library:
Greece in the Bronze Age, by Emily Vermeule (1972). Now rather out of date, but there's no newer book that pulls it all together.
Minoan and Mycenaean Art, by Reynold Higgins (2nd revised edition 1997) The standard book for college students.
Aegean Art and Architecture (Oxford History of Art), by Donald Preziosi, Louise A. Hitchcock (2000)
Early Bronze
Age Greek History
Early Bronze Age Greek Pottery
Early Bronze Age Greek Sculpture
Late Bronze Age architecture
Main Greek architecture page
Main Ancient Greece page
Main architecture page
This page was reviewed for accuracy by Ioannis Georganas in March 2005.
