Glossary · B
Basilica
A long hall divided by rows of columns or piers into a tall central nave and lower side aisles, usually with an apse at one end. In Rome it was the civic hall of the forum, used for business and the law courts; from the fourth century it became the standard form of the Christian church.
See also: Nave, Aisle, Apse, Clerestory
Rules that use the word
The forum basilica. Make a basilica between a third and a half as broad as it is long; make each aisle a third of the width of the central space, and the columns as high as the aisles are broad.
The Latin cross: nave, aisles, transept, apse. Lay out the church as an Early Christian basilica (a tall nave lit from above, lower aisles on either side, a sanctuary ending in an apse to the east) and cross it with a transept, so that the plan becomes a Latin cross with a tower over the crossing.
Piazzas and the buildings round them. Leave piazzas in several parts of the city for markets and assembly, the principal one in the middle; ring it with porticoes, and set round it the palace of the prince or the signoria, the treasury, the prisons and the basilica where justice is done, with the principal church close by.
Where it appears in the book
In the chapters Walls and Openings, Vaults, Columns in Company, The Classical World, Byzantium and the Early Church, Romanesque and Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque.
A feature of Ancient Roman, Early Christian, Byzantine architecture.
Nearby in the glossary
Barchessa · Bargeboard · Barrel vault · Base · Bastion · Batter · Bay · Bay window