Helmut Berve & Gottfreid Gruben. 508 pages. Weighs 3.6 kilo.
This book suffered water damage and as a result, not all the black and white photos are visible – many are stuck together (look closely at the photo). However, many photos are still visible, and what is more essential is the text with diagrams which are all still in excellent condition.
€20.
Considered the essential book for the history and understanding of temple structures.
The aim of this book is twofold. Not only does it set out to show the monuments which still stand within the large territory covered by ancient Hellas as expressions of a living art, but it also intends to reveal the actual purpose of these buildings and to reconstruct in our mind’s eye what today are only ruins.
One is only able to grasp their essential meaning if one has first come to an understanding, through the study of Greek culture and religion, of the beliefs which were the reason for their having been built; of the ceremonies which took place in them and of the mythology which had permeated them since ancient times and justified their existence. To reveal all this for us once more is the aim of the first part of this book.
The further task of this book is to present the architecture itself in its formal and historical aspects. It sets out to reconstruct the buildings as they were –magnificent, self-contained creations, independent of their whole environment, the manifestations of the highest art of building which, from before the earliest period of Hellenic life, were already clearly and prophetically conceived, during the centuries in which the flowering of Hellenic culture found its fullest expression.
As well as giving a picture of each building in its entirety and final form, this book shows the development of Greek architecture as a whole, gives the history of each individual temple and shrine, and discusses the forms of mythology and religion of their time.
