In the ancient Hellenic world, beehive corbelled domes reached a notable level of technical evolution very early on and created not only brilliant monumental forms, such as the Late Minoan tombs in Crete and the famous Thesaurus of the Mycenaean kings in Peloponnesus, but also simple adobe or stone habitats widely spread over the historical Hellenic world from Macedonia to Cyprus. This tradition survived in the following centuries with no significant innovations from then on, though the relation to the ancient forms is not always clear. In the case of dry-stone corbelled buildings, in particular, the precise date of construction is usually uncertain, since, though their age understandably cannot exceed two or three centuries, they maintain the unchanged primordial forms. Here we are focusing on corbelled dome constructions of Greek vernacular architecture during the last millennium, with a concise reference to some earlier examples of the AD era or before, still in use at that time. Geography, natural environment, socio-economic context Corbelled dome habitats of southern Greece are strongly related to dry and arid climatic conditions unfavorable to wood production; they can be found mostly in small, rocky islands and in barren, windy landscapes, often at high altitudes where the sole construction material remains stone. Stone is usually abundant in such harsh grounds anyway, in different types of rock, limestone, schist, etc. (Fig. 3). Vernacular corbelled dome constructions are scattered around the south of Greece in regions close to the sea; functionally similar forms in the north of the country are the paraboloid straw huts of nomad pastoral clans like the Sarakatsani. These huts are considered to be prototypes of the primitive stone and adobe built beehive dome forms. In modern times corbelled dome buildings can be found in Dodecanese, on the
Hellenic Society, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece
Fig. 1: Diffusion of corbelled building culture
Mani peninsula, on some of the Ionian Islands and, mostly, in Crete. Their geographical distribution is therefore localized along an Ionian IslandsCrete-Dodecanese line, as part of a tradition diffused from the western Fig. 2: Corbelling dome architectures in Greece in the AD era
THRACE
MACEDONIA
EPIRUS Ioannina Corfu Igoumeni 12 Lefkada
Larissa THESSALY Volos 0 CENTRAL GREECE
AEGEN ISLANDS
EUBOBEA
IONIAN ISLANDS
2
Patras 1 11 Zakynthos PELOPONNESE
Athens
CYCLADES
10
3
Aeropoli DODECANESE 8
9 9
Heraclion 8 7 CRETE
4
5
6 Karpathos
97
Earthen Domes and Habitats
Corbelled dome architecture in Greece
Maria Arakadaki