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5.2.2 Spatial criteria

In addition to the primary distinction of the provision of a cooking facility in association with the counter, I have used the structural layout of each of the establishments as a basis from which to construct the typology of food and drink outlets. However, I have considered this layout of each building as a variant rather than as a primary criterion because of the diachronic nature of relationships between architectural form and function: the structural and spatial arrangements of food and drink outlets often represent earlier architectural layouts of distinctly different sets of properties and activities. The more familiar architectural typologies of, for example, houses, villas, and temples of the Mediterranean world begin from the, often correct, presumption that such buildings were originally constructed as such, but with various and later reconfigurations (on villas: see Smith 1997, 13-20; on houses: see Wallace-Hadrill 1994, 65-90; on Roman temples: see Gros 1976; 1996). In their final phase of bar activity many properties often utilised spatial arrangements of earlier shops, work-shops and houses. Moreover, these spatial arrangements are sometimes too similar to suggest a difference in activity: that is, properties with two rooms did not necessarily have a different function from properties with three rooms because of this simple distinction alone. Nevertheless, there must have been differences in the way a small one-room property operated when compared to a large complex with many rooms.


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