Akkadian: ca. 2000 BC

Babylonian: ca. 1700 BC

Assyrian: ca. 700 BC

Late Babylonian: ca. 600 BC

Persian: ca. 500 BC

Mud bricks: An innovation in Mesopotamia that allowed for better shelters. They didn't have stone so they had to make mud bricks

Cylinder seal: a cylindrical piece of stone about an inch or so in height, decorated with an incised design, so that a raised pattern was left when the seal was rolled over soft clay. It is a small pierced object, like a long round bead, carved in reverse and hung on strings of fiber or leather. It was used to imprint one's signature for official accounting, governmental, theological pronouncements, an dcorrespondence. People used and held them in particularly intimate ways such as strung on a necklace or bracelet. They can be made of all kinds of stones. The iconography of the seals reflected back on the owner of the seal revealing their social and rank and even sometimes their name.

Heraldic pose: A pose where two figures are mirror images of one another, sometimes flanking in a central object, as in the relieving triangle above the Lioness Gate at Mycenae.

Registers: one of a series of superimposed bands or friezes in a pictorial narrative, or the particular levels on which motifs are placed.

Composite view: a way of representing a figure so that part of it is seen in profile and part of it is seen frontally

Hieratic scale/Hierarchical scale: An artistic technique in which the importance of figures is indicated by size, so that the most important figure is depicted as the largest.

Ziggurat: a built raised platform with four sloping sides—like a chopped-off pyramid. It was made of mud-bricks as stones were rare is Mesopotamia. They were the visual focal and symbolic point of the city. Seeing the ziggurat towering above the city, one made a visual connection to the god or goddess honored there, but also recognized that deity's political authority. Temples were built on top of them.

Stele: A carved stone slab sometimes used to mark graves or to commemorate historical events.

Lamassu: Assyrian guardian in the form of a man-headed winged bull

Orthostat: An upright stone or slab forming part of a structure or set in the ground.

Column: A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column is a compression member.

Capital: capital, in architecture, crowning member of a column, pier, anta, pilaster, or other columnar form, providing a structural support for the horizontal member (entablature) or arch above.

Minoan Art: c.1500 BC: Very distinct in their figures, very skinny legs, men were generally dark skinned while females were light skinned.

Mycenaean Art: c.1500 BC

Megaron: The central hall of the large Mycenean. It is mycenanen. 

Rhyton: a drinking vessel

Cyclopean Masonry: type of megalithic architecture that involves the use of large stones. They thought only cyclops could build these reasons why it is called this. It was common in Mycenean.

Casemate: vaulted chamber in a fortress. The Mycenean were a warrior people and this is where they kept their weapons.

Corbel arch: successive course of stones that project inward as they rise to close the gap at the top:

Corbel vault: corbeled covering like vault

Krater: a jar with a large round body and wide mouth; often used for mixing wine and water

Volute Krater: specific type of kraters with colutes ont he side

Kylix: a shallow bowl cup

Parts of a temple:
capital:
column:
drum:
fluting:
entasis: the bulging of a column and narrowing towards the top that way when you are looking straight at it so it looks straight.
triglyphs/metopes:
Frieze:
pediments:

Contrapposto: weight of body is distributed on one foot, counterbalances the body

Lost-Wax Bronze Casting: process by which a duplicate metal sculpture is cast from an original

Agora: public space used for the community (markets, assemblies)

Acropolis: a fortified part of a greek city, usually built on a hill

Orientalizing (c. 600 BC): It was influenced by the near east and egypt

Archaic (c. 500 BC): there is a special smile and there are almond shaped eyes

Classical (c. 400 BC): starting to get more dramatic and really cares about the perfect body.

Hellenistic (c. 300 BC): all about drama and emotion

Cinerary urn: a vessel used to preserve the ashes of the cremated dead. Can also use a sarcophagus, a urn.

Sarcophagus: "flesh-eater" a coffin for inhumation burials

Filigree: ornamental work of especially fine wire of gold, silver or copper applied chiefly to gold and silver surfaces formed into delicate tracery

Granulation: small globules of gold are soldered to a metal sheet to create decorative patterns, or massed to form a matte surgace

Relief carving: a piece of sculpture that has lots of dimension to it

Terra cotta: earthen clay that has been fired in a kiln

Orator pose: standing in contrapposto pose, lifting the right arm and raising your index finger.

Minoan

Ancient Near East/Greek Orientalizing Period

Greek Archaic

Greek Classical

Roman

engaged columns: a column embedded in a wall and partly projecting form the surface of the wall.

forum: a site located at the center of the city and the location of important religious, political, and social activities.

basilica: an oblong building ending in semicircular apse used in ancient Rome especially for a court of justice and place of public assembly

barrel vault: a continuous arched shape that may appx, a semi-cylinder in form, resembling the roof of a tunnel, or may be pointed at its apex.

groin vault: an intersection of two-barrel vaults (especially at a perpendicular angle, it allowed for much more light and and open space within the buildings

arcade: a succession of continguous arches with each arch supported by a colonnade of columns

oculus

coffers

aqueduct: an artifical channel for conveying water, typically in the form of a bridge accross a gap of some sort

encaustic: using pigments mixed with hot wax that are burned in as in inlay

domus: a dwelling of ancient roman times (private family residence)

atrium: a courtyard surrounding a impluvium

impluvium: a cistern or tank in the atrium or peristyle of a house of ancient Rome to receive the rainwater falling through the compluvium

peristyle: a row of columns surrounding a space within a building

fresco painting: method of painting water-based pigments on freshly applied plaster, usually on wall surfaces

tetrarchs: one of four joint rulers of ancient rome

Empire Period: c. 100 AD

Late Empire: c. 300 AD

Ichthus symbol: Two intersecing archs (Jesus Christ son of God Savior)

Orant position: figures with arms raised in prayer

Clerestory: high section of wall that contains windows above eye level. Its purpose is to admit light, fresh air, or both

Martyrium: building/chamber used by early Christians as a burial place

Tesserae: small block of stone, tile, glass, etc used for constructing mosaics.

Nimbus: cloud or halo surrounding a supernatural being or saint

Nave: central part of a church building

Aisle: parallels the major sections of the chapel (nave, choir etc.)

Gallery: the second story, be on the Clerestory.

Narthex: enclosed porch or meeting area

Apse: a semicircular or polygonal termination to the choir, chancel, or aisle of a building

Icon: sacred images reprsenting Christ, saints, and the virgin, includes images of Christ's crucifixion

Iconoclast, Iconophile: the banning or destruction of religious images

Psalter: a copy of hte book of psalms

Pantocrator: Greek= all mighty or all pwoerful, image of Christ as the ruler of the universe

Early Byzantine Art: c. 500 A.D.

Middle Byzantine Art: c. 900-1200 A.D.

Late Byzantine Art: c. 1300 A.D.

Qibla Wall: wall in the moque that faces Mecca

Kufic Script: used by early muslims to record the Quaran.

Minaret: tower from which the faithful are called to prayer five times each day by a crier

Horseshoe arches: curved arch often used in spanish medeival architechture - embleatic arch of Islamic architecture

Voussoirs: wedge shaped stone used to build an arch

Iwan: rectangular hall or space, usually vaulted, walled on three sides with one end entirely open.

Ribbed groin vaults: the panel in the bays of the vaults underside are separated from each other by ribs which conceals the goins (intersections of the panels)

Flying buttresses: a buttress slanting from a separate pier, typically forming an arch with the wall it supports

Nave

Transept

Crossing

Aisles

Ambulatory

Nave arcade: an arcade marking the separation between a nave an dside asiles

Gallery: an upper story over the aisle which opens onto the nave or choir

Triforium: a gallery or arcade above the arches of the nave, choir and transpets of a church

Clerestory: the upper part of the nave, choir and transpets 

Compound piers: feature of a nave arcade designed for the support of arches and to bring arch and pier into harmey

Westwork

Jamb statues: a figure carved on the jambs of a doorway or window

Cult of Mary: consists of devotees who center their devotion on Mary, instead of Jesus or God.

Gothic “sway”: a variation on the contrapposto pose which places the weight of the body on the forward stationary leg, creating an elegant pose, often seen in Madonna figures.

Stained glass: colored glass used to form decorative or pictorial designs

Tracery windows: where windows are divided into sections of various proprotions by stone bars or ribs of molding

Rayonnant or Court Style: focused more on decoration (pinnacles, moldings, window tracery). Focused on the dissolution of walls in favor of huge areas of windows.

Flamboyant Style: It evolved otu of teh Rayonnant style's increasing emphasis on decoartion. Its most conspicuous feature is the dominance in teh stone window tracery of a flamelike S-shaped curve.

Fan Vaulting (England): a form of vault where the ribs are all of the same curve and spaced equidstantly in manner resembling a fan.

Apron Scene: the area of the stage in front of the proscenium arch

Painted Altarpieces: works of art that decorate the spavce above and behind the alter in a Christin church. 

Tempera: painting with pigments bound in water soluble emulsion, such as water and egg yok or an oil in water (oil and w awhole egg)

Fresco: a painting done rapidly in watercolor on wet plaster on  a wall or celing, so that colors penetrate the plaster and vecome fixed as it dries

Pulpit: raised platform in church where preacher delievers a sermon. 

Annunciation: the announcement of the incarnation by the angel Gabriel to mary

Dyptch: a painting, especially an alterpiece, on two hinged wooden panels which may be closed like a book.

Triptych: a picture or relief carving on three panels, typical hingered together side by side and used as an alterpiece.

Polyptych: a paitning, typically an alterpiece, consisting of more than three leaves or panels joined together by hinges or folds.

Donors/Patrons: someone who gives financial or toher suport to a person, cause, commision etc.

Grisaille: a method of painting in gray monochrome, typically to imitate scupture