Alternatives

The New Rome:

Change comes to the Roman Empire. Constantine becomes the Emperor of Rome after Diocletian abdicates the throne. Emperor Constantine relocates the entire Imperil City of Rome to a New Roman Empire call Constantinople. Under the influence of his Mother Helena,a devote Catholic, Constantine accepts the Christian religion founded by Jesus of Nazareth. A new religion sect among the Jews of Palestine took affect like wild fire across Rome, Greece, Asia Minor, North Africa, Egypt and then Europe. In just a century this religion was spread from twelve disciples to thousands and tens of thousands across the then know world. Do to the belief in Jesus the Christ( Son of God). Christianity comes to the Roman Empire. Even the year changed due to this Prophet, Man Son of God, to the Year of Our Lord. (Anno Domini). Roth 277.

Churches under the direction of Constantine began to develop all over the new Roman Empire. It is believed that due to Constantine's faith in Christ he was able to defeat the Persians who came to conquer the New Rome. Under the influence of his mother Helena, Constantine builds a Holy Roman Empire and the first Cathedral of Rome the Basilica of St. Peter. This church the largest of it's kind was built over the burial site of St. Peter the head of the new church of Christ. Before Jesus was crucified he commission Peter as the head of his church. "Upon this rock you shall build my church....and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." verse from the Christian bible verse. This Basilica stands even today in the 21st Century.

Constantine took an active role in Church doctrine and policy. He became the new Vicar of Christ the Enternal King. Pagan religions were abolished or at least not to be publicly worshiped. Christianity becomes dominate. At first the early christians were persecuted for their faith and they had to hid to worship this all changed under Constantine. There was a council at Nicaea which resulted in the Nicene Creed a decree in which all Christians were to follow and even exist to this day. Later when the church becomes so powerful the christian church begins to persecute heretics or non believers.

The Basilica of Saint Peter of Rome is one of the largest basilicas in Rome. It is now called Vatican City. It is 90.7 meters long and 21 meters wide. This basilica forms a T resembling the cross on which St. Peter was crucified. The architect Zenobius is credited with this construction. Other churches are built through the New Rome now known as Constantinople.

The Visigoths coming from upper Europe, Hungary and Germany began to conquer the western half on the Roman Empire. The city of Rome is deviated in 410. The Visigoths moved out of Italy and settled in what is now France and Spain. The Ostrogoths from Russia settle in the Eastern part of Rome and this area becomes known as France. The Burgandians in the south establish an area called Britain. The Anglos and the Saxons from Denmark over run now Britain but the borders of Constantinople are protected from all of this movement and change.

Constantine builds a Mausoleum to his daughter Constantina. Due to all the vandalism in Europe, Monasteries began to be developed to preserve learning and writings. Monasticism is developed to protect and nurture classical literature and a new institution arises called Monastic copists. Groups of Monks began to organize into "orders "in southern Egypt.

Basil the Great establishes Monasteries in the East and Martin of Toures does the same in France. In the 6th century under Benedict of Nursia the Rule of Monasteries was established and monasteries began to crop up all over Europe.

The Emperor Justinian comes to power in 527. Under Justinian rule two major developments happened the codification of Roman law and the Church building. This code was an attempt to get rid of corruption in the government. The common people began to revolt against this rule and burned the city of Rome and a beautiful cathedral of Hagia Sophia.

The Hagia Sophia was a grand Byzantine Church one that Justinian was determined to rebuild. This church was built with the remains of Ancient Greek and roman pagan temples. This signified the use of re usable materials. This church was finished in 527 AD.

Justinian employs two experts in the theory of physics and statics to rebuild the church of Haga Sophia. Hagia Sophia was an achievement never before done not as large as the Pantheon but just as grand if not more. The dome of the Hagia Sophia elevated 120 ft in the air a cube surmounted by a dome. This was supposed to represent the Universe. It collapse again in 558 twenty years after completion. Constantinople is captured by the Ottoman Turks and the Hagia Sophia falls into Turkish hands and becomes an Mosque.

There is a shift in the Byzantine church, Eastern and Western Byzantine churches separate. The Pope of Rome is no longer Pope to Eastern Byzantine Churches . The Orthodox churches of the east expanded to Serbia. Bulgaria, and Russia.

The Middle Ages becomes The Age of Enlightenment :

The Dark ages come and end with the rise of Charlemagne the Frankish Empire. A stable feudal system emerges. The Crusades against the Muslins were : Charlemagne reestablishes Centers of learning in the Frankish Kingdom. Monasteries began to flourish all over the west. They became liberies for ancient scared and pagan text.

The revival of Roman Architecture results in the construction of an Octagonal Chapel on the Byzantine church of San Villae in Ravanna. This was designed by Odo of Metz built of cut stone and central vertical space covered with a stone vault. Domestic construction began wood framed homes Manor homes.

Charlemage of France becomes the next emperor. He is against Iconlastics in the churches and has them removed and replace with crosses and foliage. He believes that too much attention is put on decorating the churches, that this might have something to do with the problems in the Byzantine church. One of the oldest drawings to survive the Middle Ages was the Plan by Abbot Haito of the monastery of Saint Gall. Monasteries were used as hotels for travelers.

The Architect of Islam: Byzantine Empire lasted 900 years after Justinian's reign . A new religion is preached by a prophet Muhammad, in Mecca. This religion spread across Arabia, Persia, Syria,Palestine, Egypt, North Africa and Algeria in the west. Then to Pakistan and Hindu Kush in the east. Christians were allowed to practice their religion as long as they paid taxes. Islamic Architect brought mosaics and vibrate colors to their buildings. The domes of the mosque were spherical, smooth, with colorful glazed tiles.

High Middle Ages: The Romanesque churches had round arches, massive vaulted naves and very little light. Gothic Architecture is invented in 1141 for Suger, abbot of the monetary of Saint -Denis a small town next to Paris. He and his team integrated a number of improvements in late Romanesque church architecture by including pointed arches and rib vaulting. Gothic architecture was physical, assertive, had a positive disposition on the here and now. While Romanesque period focused only on the here after.

This period a joy in human existence coincided with the adoration of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God. She exemplified womanhood and raised respect for woman and motherhood.

In 1066 Normandy conquers England which develops into the 100 Years War from 1337 to 1457. This marked the end of the Middle Ages. A new economy develops from the end of the crusades or because of it, one is the growth of cities and trade. Agriculture and woolen cloth was a very important industry in England, Flanders and Italy. A new class of people derives from this the French called Bourgeois, (city dwellers). This new class of merchants, bankers began to rival the nobility and clergy. They began to be able to build homes of their own and not just keep funding the development of churches.

The Middle Ages end after the Black plague and a great famine kills over 2/5th of Europe's population.

Renaissance Architecture: During the renaissance period there was a return to the classical orders. This period was characterized by harmony, clarity and strength. A revival of linking the old standards with the new. An interest in antiquity, literature, philosophy and mathematics. Urban planning became important. Filippo Brunelleschi brought back the Greek and Roman style of building architect. He developed a basilica design with the plan in which squares of the crossing was the module repeated to make a Latin cross. Basilicas were based on Corinthian style arcades. Merchants families began to build homes for the urban life.

The city of Florence created a new form of domestic architecture. Shops were on the first level and living quarters were upstairs. Brick was widely used in these structures. St Peter's Basilica in Rome is rebuilt. The designer Donato Bramante using the old corthinian orders reinterpreted the circular temple for , constructing a peristyle around the central sanctuary. A hemispherical dome covers the interior as in the Pantheon. Andrea Palladio brings back the classical elements of the column, entablature, pediment and the arch.

Doric order columns dedicated to St. Peter and also included emblems of the papacy on the metopes of the frieze. Some of the other architectural builds of this time were: Palazzo Farneses, Rome, Library of Venice, Venetian Palaces, Palazzo Cihiericati, Vicenza. By the 16th Century Rome had become the center of power and princes of the church. These are the works of Andrea Palladio.

Baroque and Rococo Architecture come into being in the 17th and 18th CE.

Baroque church in Roman was created by Ignatius Loyola. The church of Gesu Rome. Loyola founded the order of the Jesuits ( Society of Jesus). Symbolic and well as illusionist schemes were used to play on the emotions as well as the intellect of the parishioners. A new style of architecture was used based on repetitions and distortion of the classical Renaissance motifs. Broken pediments, giant orders, and convex and concave walls were used by baroque architects. Bernini, and Gorromini were commissioned to remodel older palaces. They used open loggias, grand staircases and emphasis on entrances. Painters and sculptors adorned the architecture with great fresco cycles.

In France King Louis XIV has the Chateau de Versailles rebuilt. The palace and gardens of Versailles was developed in different phases from the 17th to 18th century. Major sculptors and painters of the day were employed to make this undertaking a "Monarch Triumphant" Urban Villa's are created, the development of Hotels where the interior was based on the decorative style of Versailles.

In the 17th century London is nearly burned down in the Great Fire of London 1666. Acts were passed to rebuild the city. Christopher Wren was the architect to redesign the city. He used inventive barogue soluctions involving distortions and adaptations. Among his work was Trinity College Library, Cambridge, England, St. Jame's Piccadilly, and St. Paul's Cathedral.

Rococo Style was a decorative movement that developed in the early 18th century. In the hotels of Parisian nobility the style came from the rich decorations and ornamentations of Versailles. Designers of this style based their architecture on more intimate scale and comfort. Rooms were arranged by decorating them with light, colorful and playful schemes in panels and door frames that disappeared in the walls. Walls merged with the ceilings. A few Rococo style churches were St Paul and St. Louis in Paris. Germany used this style more than France.

In England in the early 18th century a movement to "national taste" came into the arena. This was about the reforms that Inigo Jones and Palladio used to get away from the extravagant "deformities" of baroque architecture. Inigo Jones changed English architectural ideas with the theories that Palladio wrote in his "Four Books of Architecture" . This was a revival of the classical thought. The appeal of Palladio's treatise was a proportional system of orders, based on careful study of the ruins of antiquity. Palladio used the work of Vitruvius to establish his "Four Books of Architecture".

Some of Inigo Jones works are the Queens House, Greenwich, England, and the Banqueting House at Whitehall.

In the United States in the mid 18th century Thomas Jerrerson uses Palladian's treatises to create his home in Monticello, Virginia. This was a two story house with a portico detailed from Palladio's designs of the Doric and Ionic orders. Later Jefferson remodels the house with French republic details.