Module 4: Global Architectural Traditions Review

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering urban forms, landscape integration, rock-cut methods, and architectural terminology across Pre-Contact America, Gupta India, Southeast Asia, the Islamic world, and Africa from Module 4.

Chinampas

Specialized artificial 'floating' agricultural and garden plots engineered on shallow lake beds in the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan.

Zoomorphic Urban Plan

A city layout designed to represent an animal's form, exemplified by the Inca capital of Cuzco, which was laid out in the shape of a puma.

Barays

Massive artificial water reservoirs that served hydraulic, agricultural, and symbolic roles, defining the urban planning of Angkor in Cambodia.

Hypostyle Mosque

An early mosque form—exemplified by the Great Mosque of Cordoba—characterized by a large, column-supported hall that was democratic in layout and infinitely expandable.

Inca Polygonal Masonry

A construction method using massive, multi-faceted stones dressed and fitted tightly together without mortar, providing exceptional durability and earthquake resistance.

Art of Subtraction

A rock-cut architectural process in Gupta India where temples, shrines, and monasteries were excavated and carved out of solid natural cliffs rather than assembled from quarried stone.

Chaitya

A Buddhist rock-cut assembly hall or sanctuary carved from living rock, typically housing a stupa at the apse end for devotion.

Vihara

A rock-cut Buddhist monastery hall containing central communal gathering space and surrounding monastic residential cells.

Kailasa Temple at Ellora

A monolithic Hindu temple complex excavated top-down from a single cliff face, replicating a freestanding multi-story temple and marking the peak of Indian rock-cut architecture.

Mount Meru

The sacred multi-peaked mountain of Hindu and Buddhist cosmology, symbolized architecturally by the towering central mass of monuments like Angkor Wat and Borobudur.

Living Architecture

An African earthen building tradition where community participation—such as regular or annual group re-plastering—is vital to maintaining and renewing the building's physical form.

Great Mosque of Djenne

A monumental earthen mosque in Mali constructed from banco (mud-brick) and projecting timber poles, representing West Africa's distinctive mud-brick architectural tradition.

Double-Tiered Arch

A distinctive two-level arch system invented at the Great Mosque of Cordoba that combined Roman voussoirs with horseshoe arches to increase ceiling height.

Earthworks

Massive geometric or effigy mounds and raised embankments built for ceremonial and civic purposes by pre-contact cultures in the eastern United States.

Pueblos

Multistoried, communal stone or adobe settlements and great houses constructed by indigenous populations in the American Southwest.

Kiva

A circular or rectangular subterranean or semi-subterranean chamber used by Puebloan cultures for spiritual rituals and community assemblies.

Mandala

A geometric cosmological diagram representing the universe, used as the underlying sacred planning grid for religious architecture across India and Southeast Asia.

Garbhagriha

The dark, compact inner sanctum ('womb-chamber') of a Hindu temple where the primary cult image or deity is enshrined.

Shikhara

The tall, parabolic spire or tower rising over the garbhagriha in North Indian Hindu temple architecture, representing a cosmic mountain peak.

Gopura

A towering, ornately sculpted gateway pavilion giving entry into the sacred enclosures of South Indian Hindu temple complexes.

Prakaram

The walled outer ambulatory pathway or concentric enclosure corridor surrounding the inner sanctum of a South Indian temple.

Kunda

A stepped sacred reservoir or ceremonial water tank integrated into Indian temple complexes for ritual bathing and ablutions.

Qibla Wall

The interior wall in a mosque oriented perpendicularly toward Mecca, indicating the proper direction of prayer.

Mihrab

A decorative, semicircular niche set into the qibla wall of a mosque indicating the direction of prayer toward Mecca.

Minbar

The stepped wooden or stone pulpit located to the right of the mihrab where the imam stands to deliver the sermon.

Sahn

The open courtyard of a traditional mosque, usually enclosed by arcades and equipped with an ablution pool.

Minaret

A tall, slender tower connected to or beside a mosque used by a muezzin to call the faithful to prayer.

Muqarnas

Decorative cellular, stalactite-like or honeycomb corbelled vaulting commonly used in Islamic squinches, domes, and soffits.

Ablaq

An architectural masonry decoration technique characterized by alternating horizontal rows of light and dark stone or marble.

Haram

The covered, sacred sanctuary or primary hypostyle prayer hall within a mosque.

Iwan

A rectangular, vaulted hall or monumental portal walled on three sides with the fourth side completely open to a central courtyard.

Banco

A mud-brick or puddled mud material reinforced with organic elements like straw and dung, used as the main building medium in West African architecture.

Toguna

A low-ceilinged, open-sided community shelter built with wooden or stone pillars and a heavy thatched millet roof, used by Dogon male elders for deliberation.