AP Art History: Ancient Mediterranean Art 

White Temple and Ziggurat:

• Temple is a box like structure on top of the larger platform
• About 65 feet tall - 5/6 story building
• Uruk was probably the world’s first city still inhabited today
  • 5000+ years after it was established
• ==Most important building in the city==
• ==Temple for sky god Anu==
• Common belief in ancient cultures that gods lived in the sky
• Took 1500 workers 5 years, working 10 hours a day
• Temple seen as “residence” of Anu
• Not many regular people allowed in the temple, but they could leave a votive offering (gift to god/goddess)
• Places for display of objects, probably the most valuable votive offering
• None of the entrances of the temple face the ramp going to the top of the ziggurat
• ==Ziggurat: A rectangular, tiered temple platform, usually made of mud brick==
• Location is flat: ziggurat and temple seen from far distances, tall building
• Mud brick was easy to produce and use but deteriorated

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Statues of Votive Figures

• 1-3 feet tall
• A typical hairstyle, beard, and clothing of a Sumerain Man
• Not a portrait, but a symbol of a person
• Found buried in the floor of a temple, a group of 12 primarily male figures
• ==Religious function==
• Not naturalistic: not realistic or accurate to a real person
• ==Votive Figure: Placed in a temple to stand and pray at all times in the place of the person who left it there==
• ==Votive: An offering to a god or goddess, oftentimes a human figure but sometimes just a precious gift==

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Standard of Ur from the Royal Tombs at Ur

• Function unknown → could be commemorating a successful battle and celebrating afterward

• Imported materials

  • Red Limestone (India)
  • Lapiz Lazuli (Afghanistan)

• Found in a very rich, possibly royal, tomb in the major Sumerian city of Ur

• Demonstration of trade routes across vast distances, even at the early moment of human civilization

• Connection between the two sides → peace and war side

  • Peace side could be celebrated after event portrayed in the war wide

• Features registers

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The Stele of Hammurabi

• Relief sculpture at the top of the stele shows Shamash (sun god) speaking with King Hammurabi

• Twisted perspective and hierarchy of scale

• Throne that the god is sitting on is in the shape of a temple - representing his power and size

• Passing over the rod represents giving power

• Function: Commemorative and records a law code given by one of the first kings of Babylon

  • Political and semi-religious function

• 1 of at least 50 Stelai with the law code on it → this is the best preserved

• Found in Iran, far from Babylon, probably taken as war loot long after Hammurabi’s death

• Most of the Stelai is a list of 282 laws set by Hammurabi “in order to keep the strong from oppressing the weak.”

• Not the first law code ever, but the earliest that is completely preserved

• The introduction names many Babylonian gods, giving Hammurabi the authority to rule over Mesopotamia

• Political propaganda? Meant to make Hammurabi favorable to his religious subjects and to show the power he was handed by the god

  

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Lamassu from the Citadel of Sargon II

• Combination of relief and sculpture in the round

• Originally painted for more impressive effect

• Bull symbolizes strength, power, aggression

• Eagle represented flight

• Man represents wisdom and intelligence

• Function: Decorative, monumental,

• Stood outside gateways to the palace of an Assyrian King

  

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Apanada Palace

• Stairways decorated by register or relief sculptures depicting representatives of the 23 nations of the Persian empire

• Functon: Residential + Treasury + Administrative + Ecomomic Center + Religious areas

• Ceremonial Palace

• King of the Persian empire hosted guests and tributes

• Relief sculptures reinforce the power of the king and the span of the empire

• Persian kings used art and architecture to reinforce their power over the diverse population and send messages to the people they ruled over.

• Persian Empire was eventually conquered by Alexander the Great

• Audience hall to receive visitors

• Hypostyle Hall: A space where the roof is supported by pillars of columns

  • Allows for roofing of large, open areas.
  • Creates a “forest of columns” appeareac\nce
  • Originally 72 columns, now only 14
  • Roof → 24 meters/78 feet tall

• Capital: The topmost part of a column or pillar where the verticle support meets the roof

  

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