George R.H. Wright, Ancient Building Technology.

George R.H. Wright, Ancient Building Technology, Vol. 2: Materials. 2 vols. Technology and Change in History 7 (Leiden: Brill, 2005): ISBN 9004140077. 488 pp., 309 fig. Hardcover, 217 [euro].

Educated in history, law and architecture, George R.H. Wright has created in Ancient Building Technology, Volume 2: Materials a book of impressive value through his scientific synthesis of recently acquired knowledge of the building materials and techniques used in Prehistory and Antiquity. A well known academic at the University of Munich, he has brought to bear in this work a life-time spent recording and restoring monuments in the Mediterranean, the Middle East, East Africa and Southern India. His numerous publications cover fields related to the History of Architecture and the History of Religion, as well technical accounts of restoration projects. (1) Wright's inclusion of the archeological excavations done in the past few years in his survey allows us to better understand the development of various building materials and construction techniques. This, also, allows us to examine the developing human abilities to obtain and apply various materials in building structures and to reconstruct early building technologies. The survey given by G. R.H. Wright helps us to understand these processes of human development.

The second volume of Wright's two volume work explains the methods used to set together the fabric of prehistoric and ancient buildings, including both manual and mechanical operations. It specifies the materials, tools and equipment used in ancient construction practices. Though Wright limits his examination of the product and process of building to the architectural, he also includes novel technologies employed in other areas, such as civil engineering.

According to the author the term "ancient" means of or relating to a span of time that stretches from the beginning or origin of human culture to the end of Late Antiquity (i.e. about 600 A.D.) as manifested geographically in the Old World of Europe and the Middle East. (Wright does not include sub-Saharan Africa, the Indian Sub-continent, the Far East or the New World in his survey.) Although the book was originally intended to focus upon Ancient Building Science and Technology, it was not intended to relate the subject to the modern science or theory of building. Consequently, the term "technology" is applied here to the system of techniques used in the process of ancient building construction. The writer distances himself from dealing with the principles governing building construction. He does this for two reasons: First, the comparison of the principles of ancient building technology to the modern is very difficult because the basis of such comparisons must be either taken from ancient sources or derived from the analysis of the remains of ancient buildings. Both sources are quite problematic. Second, the author disclaims the capacity to deal approprietly with such scientific issues. Such comparisons between the ancient science of building and the modern are best left to specialists.

That said, Wright organizes his presentation of materials according to a paradigm composed of the elements of nature, manufacture and use, which enables comparison between different modes of application of the same material, as well as between different materials and between various building traditions. As the author says, it is the fabrica of Vitruvius, not his ratio that concerns him. His intention is not to create theory of any kind but rather to provide helpful information and create at most a practical tool for use in archaeological excavations.

Ancient Building Technology, Volume 2: Materials is itself published in two volumes, the first containing 295 pages of text including contents, list of illustrations and index, the second 309 illustrations. The content is organized in nine chapters. The first chapter is devoted to a general historical survey of the use of materials that discusses man's capacity for combined observation and experiment, the nature of building materials, and the qualities of materials based upon the properties of matter. The writer argues with the well known view that the evolution of mankind was stimulated first by tool-making and second by building activity. He stresses the importance of both factors, arguing that it is perhaps the second that has made the greater contribution to man's cultural development: "If man has made himself, he has done this in a significant measure by building." (p. xxxii)

The following chapters are ordered according to type of primary structural material, starting with those natural materials that dominated building construction in the ancient world, i.e. wood, stone, earth/clay, moving to the basic processed materials of lime and gypsum, and then to the more refined materials of concrete, bitumen, metals, and glass. Such organization may be very useful in archeological practice. However as an architect and a scholar with an expertise in ontogenesis of architecture, (2) I have to express my regret. This type of order decreases an opportunity to explain the development of different types of structures. Instead of the exciting story of the evolution of building, we merely receive a list of building techniques. Prehistory--the period of first human settlements--was that time when the process of building was really formative. Completely new forms of structures not existing in Nature were generated. The development of more advanced forms was based on the experience gained through trial and error while working with simple materials, and it relied on the transition from one material to another. This message is missing in the given survey.

One might also criticize Wright for the selection of illustrations. They provide a great amount of information on the technology of developing materials, but do not explain sufficiently the techniques of structuring and covering buildings, i.e. on constructing dome and vault, for instance. The content of the book is mostly based on classical manuals, such as the work of Clarke and Engelbach, Nauman, Martin, Orlandos, Arnold, Lugli and Adam. There is additional information from more recent sources, such as Shaw, Moorey, and Aurenche, but important works such as R. Besenval's Technologie de la Voute dans L'Orient Ancien (Paris, 1984) are missing. Wright might have enriched the content of his work through the inclusion of material from additional recent archaeological reports and reconstructions.

Despite these critical remarks, the amount of information provided by Materials is significant. It should be strongly recomended to academic libraries and to students and scholars of the art and archaeology of the Ancient World.

Endnotes

(1) Important publications: "Ancient Building in Cyprus" (Handbuch der Orientalistik. Siebente Abteilung, Kunst und Archaologie) "Ancient Building Technology: Historical Background" (Technology and Change in History) "Ancient Building in South Syria and Palestine" (Der Alte Vordere Orient, 2. Abschnitt, Die Denkmaler, B, Vorderasien, Lfg. 3).

(2) Ontogenesis of architecture is a branch of study introduced in a book Tobolczyk, M.," Narodziny Architektury. Wstep do Ontogenezy Architektury (Eng. "The Birth of Architecture") (Warsaw: PWN, 2000).

Marta Tobolczyk

Eastern Mediterranean University