Khalil, Kadhim Fathel
(2013)
Architectural Typology Of
Mesopotamian Civilization From
Ancient Cultural Myth.
PhD thesis, Universiti Sains Malaysia.
Abstract
Some facts can be easily inferred subjectively but difficult to prove objectively, thus causing
the philosophers who came before Socrates to deviate from logic in interpreting the nature of the
physical world around them. The dialectic between subjectivity and objectivity is the force that
motivated us to restore the symbolic dimensions of Mesopotamian cultural and architectural products.
The most important theoretical presentations of architecture are those that deal with the metaphysical
and physical environments, which together form the contemporary cultural identity. The most
important dialectics in contemporary architectural society in Mesopotamia–Iraq are related to the
importance of formulating the basis of cultural identity by highlighting the importance of studies that
focus on the Mesopotamian cultural environment.
No civilization is older than Mesopotamia, and the cultural and architectural products of this
society have extended spatially and temporally but are incapable of speaking for themselves, which
lends difficulty to understanding the interpretations of the mental expressions that stand behind the
material expressions. As a result, a kind of ambiguity exists about the nature of knowledge relative to
its origin in terms of the reflection of mental expressions on architectural expressions.
This study sets off from a consideration of cultural and architectural products as part of the
philosophical perspective. Therefore, the intellectual exploration of the architectural prototype appears
to be the abstract level that is connected to mental expressions on one hand and architectural
expressions on the other. The inquiry is phenomenologically unknown; thus, a methodological inquiry
was applied by based on the path of formation comprising the spirit of the age and the path of
abstraction comprising the cultural species.
Thus, this study first adopted the structural analysis method considering the nature of the
Mesopotamian cultural core to identify the structure of its mental expressions. Such expressions are
represented by myth of creation in Mesopotamia, which is based on the structure of origin, evaluation,
and organization. Second, this study adopted the geometrical analysis method to determine the
structure of the architectural expressions, which are represented by symbolic architecture, temples,
and palaces in Mesopotamia based on the structure of the whole–part, public–private, and mass–void.
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