Architecture to Remember

• Cave Paintings at Lascaux

• Southwestern France

• Paleolithic peoples (hunter-gatherer)

• ca. 15,000–13,000 BCE

• Likely ritual or symbolic — theories include hunting magic, shamanistic practices, or storytelling for community memory

• Mineral pigments on limestone

• Among the most famous Paleolithic art sites; demonstrates symbolic thought, creativity, and spiritual life of early humans — art as a key part of human culture long before permanent architecture

• Gobleki Tepe reconstruction drawing

• Mesolithic people

• Southeastern Turkey

• ca. 9,500–8,000 BCE

• Ritual/religious sanctuary (world’s first known temple)

• Carved limestone megaliths in circular enclosures

• Oldest monumental ritual site; shows organized religion and complex society developed before farming.

• Gobleki Tepe site

• Lepenski Vir house reconstruction

• Mesolithic/Neolithic transitional society

• Serbia

• ca. 6,300–5,500 BCE

• Settlement with trapezoidal houses, ritual spaces

• Stone foundations, timber superstructures, clay floors, decorated sculptures

• Early permanent riverside settlement; shows organized community life and religious practices tied to fishing.

Lepensky Vir site reconstruction drawing

Lepensky Vir site

• Jericho reconstruction drawing

• Neolithic peoples

• West Bank (Palestine)

• ca. 8,000 BCE

• Defensive settlement; tower and walls protected community

• Mudbrick walls on stone foundations

• One of the earliest fortified cities; evidence of large-scale communal labor and urban organization

Jericho tower section

Jericho walls

• Catalhöyük exterior render

• Neolithic peoples

• Anatolia, Turkey

• ca. 7,400–6,200 BCE

• Domestic settlement, ritual integrated into homes

• Mudbrick houses, plastered and painted interiors

• Largest Neolithic town; no streets, houses packed together; evidence of early urban life, social equality, and symbolic art

Catalhouyuk house design diagram

Catalhouyuk houses in plan

Catalhouyuk interior

• Khirokitia houses reconstruction

• Neolithic peoples

• Cyprus

• ca. 6,000–4,000 BCE

• Settlement with circular houses and narrow streets

• Limestone rubble masonry

• Shows early urban planning with streets and organized community living

Khirokitia site plan

Khirokitia street rendering

• Typical Longhouse - Central and Northern Europe

• Neolithic peoples of Central/Northern Europe

• Central & Northern Europe (Germany, etc.)

• ca. 5,000 BCE

• Domestic structures for families, farming communities

• Timber posts, wattle and daub walls, thatched roofs

• Evidence of agricultural villages; early large-scale domestic architecture

• Skara Brae aerial

• Neolithic peoples

• Orkney Islands, Scotland

• ca. 3,100–2,500 BCE

• Domestic settlement

• Stone houses connected by covered passageways

• Exceptionally well-preserved stone village; shows advanced planning, drainage, and furniture — early complex domestic life

Skara Brae interior

Skare Brae site plan