Environmental design in domestic ancient Greek architecture

The objective of this paper is to show that the subtle climatic differences should lead to different environmental strategies in building construction. Domestic architecture is investigated since housing is the most energy demanding building type. The study aims to demonstrate that the architectural subtleties developed between different house types have direct relevance to the different environmental parameters involved. It investigates two case study houses, one in the ancient city of Olynthus in northern Greece and one in the ancient city of Priene in southern Greece. The methodology is based on bibliographical comparative analysis between the two case study areas and observation. The study showed that at a historical time when housing was designed with consideration to the environment, two, different in many ways, housing types sensitive to their local climate were developed. The paper argues for the first time that the latter is the outcome of climatic differentiation.