Towards Understanding Doric Design: The Stylobate and Intercolumniations

Abstract

Most of the efforts of students of Greek architecture have been devoted to two questions: what the buildings were like and when they were built, rather than to the manner of their design. This emphasis has obviously been justified, for those are the primary questions which must be reasonably well answered before the ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ can be approached. But our understanding of these primary questions has reached a stage where attention to the secondary questions is justified, not only because of their intrinsic interest, but also because a detailed study of proportion has become an established tool of stylistic dating. Some understanding of, or at least some hypothesis about, the way such proportions were envisaged and put into practice by ancient architects is necessary, in order to find out what proportions should most usefully be considered, and at what point small changes in them may represent a significant stylistic change.