Architecture arose as a result of people’s desire for more secure living arrangements.
Huntsmen and foragers used to live in both natural and man-made shelters in the days before the advent of modern civilization.
Buildings and defences in Jericho were constructed using simple, regular plans. There was a new building type in southern Mesopotamia at the beginning of the fourth millennium: a temple that was separate from homes in location and shape.
There is a small shrine in Eridu that dates back to this era that was found beneath a number of other religious structures. There is an internal niche in one wall and an offering table that were important parts of temples in Sumerian and many other cultures that came after them already present in the structure.
- Entrance to Temple Malta
The only material available for construction was mud-brick. A long time after Malta’s temples and the megalithic tomb chambers on Europe’s Atlantic coast, stones were not used here or in Egypt.
The temples on Malta and Gozo were constructed prior to 3000 BC. The temples had fallen into disrepair by the year 2000 BC. They are the earliest examples of stone-built structures that we are aware of. Large blocks are not joined together with mortar in at least 16 of them.
There are about 12 feet (3.5 metres) of limestone slabs on Ggantija’s facade. All of the rest of the facade’s smaller, rougher stones support the larger, smoother ones. The most important design element on the inside is a trefoil or three-leafed plan.
Some of the rooms have rounded corners, while others have a wood rafter roof. Most of the stonework has been cleaned and polished (i.e. smoothed to a uniform surface). The stonework has been given a mottled appearance by the addition of small hammered pits. Tarxien, the most elaborate temple, also features spiral vine-scroll motifs.
All over the Mediterranean Sea, these spiral vine-scroll motifs can be spotted. Also discovered was a small fragment of a statue depicting a woman sitting down. Only a few well-done stone and clay statues of obese women have survived throughout history.