The culture of Ancient Rome is often understood as a product and continuation of the culture of Greece. Indeed, there is a lot in common, and there is every reason for the term "antiquity" to unite the antiquities of Greece and Rome. But it was Rome that was destined to go beyond the city-state and unite other cities and peoples of antiquity under its leadership.
During the period of the Republic, the history of Rome is almost continuous wars. At this time, the Romans created, first of all, what was necessary for life and defense - walls, bridges, roads and aqueducts.
The construction of the oldest wall is attributed to the semi-legendary Servius Thulius. The construction of the wall began in the 6th century BC. The dimensions of this barrier are impressive. Made of squares of tuff, it reached a length of 11 km, encircled the city along the perimeter and was 10 meters high and 4 meters wide.
The Romans became consummate bridge builders. Two of them have survived from the republican time - these are the Fabrice Bridge and the Cestius Bridge. The Romans learned many engineering and construction skills from their predecessors on the Apennine Peninsula - the Etruscans, including the construction of bridges. But the structures of Ancient Rome are more grandiose.
In addition to bridges, roads were of strategic importance. The first stone-paved road on the Apennine Peninsula was laid by the censor Appius Claudius. Construction began in 312 and this marked the beginning of an entire road network. They were paved with stone, with distance pillars flanked by pillars on either side. The roads of Rome cut swamps, hills and river streams. As of today, one can judge the high degree of skill of the builders. The well-rammed earth was poured with concrete, and stone slabs were placed on top. There was an elevation in the center of the road surface to allow water to flow down. In general, the structure reached a height of 90 cm, which is more than that of modern highways. Launched in the 4th century BC, Via Appia crossed half of modern Italy.
Ancient Greece gave the world a culture of high artistic merit. The civilization of Ancient Rome is the result of the activities of practitioners: politicians, military, administrators, merchants, in this regard, the creation of an extensive network of roads can hardly be overestimated. At the same time, the opinion about the coldness and artistic sterility of the art of Ancient Rome is completely unfounded.
There are many areas of art in which the ancient Romans were far more successful than the ancient Greeks. Despite the similarity of cultures, these peoples were characterized by completely different perceptions of the world. The Greeks saw the world through the haze of myth, for the Romans the mythological basis of art is not typical, they were inspired by reality. This defines the fundamental difference between the art of Ancient Greece and the art of Ancient Rome. For the Greeks, generalization was characteristic, for the Romans, decomposition into details and a detailed depiction of phenomena.
In ancient Roman art, sculptural relief was widespread, consistently and accurately telling about certain events. In ancient Rome, industriousness was considered one of the civic virtues, and therefore scenes of labor were reproduced on the tombstones with documentary accuracy.
The origin of the historical relief is an indisputable achievement of the culture of Ancient Rome. An interesting example of comparing the worldview of the ancient Greeks and the ancient Romans is the sculptural decoration of the altar of the censor Domitius Ahenobarbus. On three sides of the altar there is a relief depicting the wedding of Neptune and Amphitrite. It is assumed that this mythological composition was borrowed from the reliefs of the Greek sculptor Scopas. The fourth side of the altar shows a scene from Roman life. The sculptor describes in detail all the details of the ceremony, his images are reliable, and the event is true. The Roman historical relief reaches the peak of its development in the decoration of Trajan's column. This memorial and triumphal monument to the emperor of Rome is surrounded by a two-hundred-meter belt of relief. She coherently and scrupulously shows all the details of the military campaign of the Romans led by Trajan.
Another area discovered by Roman art is the sculptural portrait. It was in ancient Rome that such a realistic depiction of a particular person first appeared. The emergence of the Roman sculptural portrait was provoked by the peculiarities of the cult of the ancestors. The ancient Romans believed that deceased relatives become guardians of the family, so their images were kept in the house and used in various rituals. Something similar can be found in the Etruscan culture. This mysterious people put the ashes of the dead in special vases. The lids of these vessels had an anthropomorphic shape; over time, they began to be given portrait features. The art of Ancient Greece achieved extraordinary skill in depicting the beautiful human body. The Roman sculptural portrait combines Etruscan and Greek traditions, but its essence is unique. Only in ancient Roman portraiture did the civic significance and individual uniqueness of a particular person appear.
Foro romano - the Roman forum of the Republican era is also a unique phenomenon. There is no analogue in Ancient Greece. The cultural and religious center of the ancient Greek city is the Acropolis. It was located on a hill and was separated from the center of public life, the agora market. The Roman Forum during the period of the republic was a square that was the focus of both public and national life. Public buildings, shopping arcades, workshops and temples were located here.
Ancient Roman temples only at first glance do not differ from Greek ones. Upon closer examination, the originality of their architectural appearance is revealed. The Greeks preferred peripter - a temple surrounded by columns on all sides. The Romans favored the pseudo-peripter. In such a temple, the columns of the rear and side facades do not have a detour, but only protrude from the wall. You can enter the Greek temple from either side. The Romans erected their places of worship on a higher pedestal, and the steps were placed only on the side of the main facade. In these features of the Roman temple, the influence of Etruscan architecture is manifested.
The culture of Ancient Rome is often positioned as a compilation of Etruscan and Greek achievements. This position is wrong. The Romans learned a lot from the Etruscans, but rethought and improved all their achievements. This is not about superiority, but about a new round in the development of civilization. At the end of the Republican period, the Etruscans completely disappeared into the Romans. The parallels between the cultures of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome are undeniable, as are certain borrowings. But the difference in perception of the world makes each of these civilizations unique.
The Romans and Greeks understood the relationship between form and space in different ways. Greek structures - both temples and acropolis are open to the surrounding space. The Romans, on the other hand, preferred closed forms, for example, Roman temples, with an entrance from only one side. Roman city squares, forums of the Imperial time, are also closed. In ensemble terms, the architecture of Ancient Rome generally achieved more impressive successes than the architecture of Ancient Greece.
The creative thinking of the Romans was characterized by a developed constructive beginning. They were destined to open a new page in the history of world architecture. The Romans invented concrete. This allowed large spaces to be covered. The post-and-beam structural system invented by the Greeks was replaced by a new one - monolithic-shell. Broken rubble was poured between two brick walls and poured with concrete, then the structure was faced with marble or other material.
It was thanks to the appearance of concrete that an outstanding monument was built, equal to which there are few in the history of world architecture - the Flavian amphitheater or the Colosseum. Its facade is designed in the form of four arcades standing on top of each other with a total height of 57 meters. Alternating arches are separated from each other by semi-columns. This is the so-called Roman architectural cell, over time it gained popularity in the architecture of various countries. One example of a Roman architectural cell is the triumphal arch. In ancient Rome, they were erected by the people and the Senate in honor of the victors. Triumphal arches will also be widespread.
In ancient Rome, according to the customs of ancestors, not words, but deeds were recognized as valor. Therefore, the Romans did not theorize, but collected knowledge and used it in practice. And they had no equal in engineering and construction. Another unique monument of ancient Roman art is the Pantheon - the temple of all the gods. The beauty of this architectural structure is in the combination of clear volumes - a cylinder, a hemisphere and a parallelepiped. This is the only ancient temple not destroyed or rebuilt in the Middle Ages. The Pantheon combines technical prowess with a deep and complex interpretation of architectural space. In its interior, you can fit a ball of the same diameter as the rotunda. Such proportions give rise to a feeling of special harmony. The diameter of the dome is 43, 44 m, the builders of later eras could only approach its dimensions, but it was possible to surpass these dimensions only at the beginning of the twentieth century. For centuries, the Pantheon has remained an example of an outstanding, almost unique architectural solution.
