this video is going to analyze the church of santa castanza as an example of an early christian mausoleum so we have the term vocabulary term for mausoleum on the screen here a mausoleum is a monument or elaborate building used as a tomb now today this building is referred to as the church of santa castanza but originally it was a mausoleum built for constantina constantina is one of the daughters of constantine so um when she passed away this is her mausoleum that was built on the outskirts of rome at the time later she became a saint and so as a saint she was um became known as santa castanza saying to constantina that's santa castanza was the italian version and then this became a church but that happens like 900 years after this is built so way way later in time we are going to look at this structure as a mausoleum even though it's a modern-day name is a bit unconfusing because of that okay um looking at this structure here the exterior one of the characteristics i want to point out as an early christian characteristic is the plane exterior it's just a simple brick exterior this is very common in the early christian period think back to santa sabina our example of an early christian uh basilica church this structure here simple brick exterior so that is a pretty constant characteristic of the early christian period now this building is particularly notable because of its floor plan here we have the floor plan on the left here it is a central planned mausoleum central planned it is circular in design it is not rectangular and so you you walk around the interior like this it's not like a basilica floor plan but there is a simple entry north x here um in early christian architecture central plain buildings are first used as tombs so this is significant we will later we will get centrally planned churches but not yet this type of architectural form the central planned structure begins as a tomb and so our mausoleum here is a really good example of how these central plain structures first emerge in early christian architecture now there is roman precedent for this and so i think when we're talking about the early christian period we always need to think about where did they get their ideas from where did they get their precedent from we need to remember they're still living in a roman world there's a new religion but they're still romans and they're still within the roman empire so we have buildings like this we have the pantheon probably the most famous of central plain structures from ancient rome and you can see that there are some similarities between the two and particularly the use of a dome on the interior which we see in our mausoleum for constantina which we know that the pantheon is famous for so they're not identical but there are similarities and so it's it's safe to say that early christians are looking at roman architecture they know roman architecture they live in a roman world and they're just adapting what they know for the new needs of christianity okay so one thing to note with our new architectural form our central plan alter or not altar sorry our central plan mausoleum there's a new vocabulary term i need to introduce which is the ambulatory so an ambulatory is the um center space in a central plan church or other central plant structure so in this space it's instead of the isles you have the aisles in the basilica plan church where people can walk and move through the space here you have the ambulatory now we will see this term come up again and again so it's like all of the vocabulary related to this basilica plan church you will hear me use these terms over and over again for the rest of the semester okay so here's our exterior and again early christian so we have a simple exterior we do have some great arches that we can see on the exterior for the windows up here these windows are clear story windows too because they are above lower roofing elements right here and below the higher roofing elements up here now as we go into our space here's our interior so originally we would have had our tomb for constantina at the center now there is an altar we are standing in the ambulatory in this image we have pairs of double corinthian columns that go around in a circle that separate the ambulatory from the center space um as we move closer here we have our clear story windows up top of this image you can see that there's arches above the being supported by the columns now we can see the underlying brick structure here originally this whole space would have been covered with mosaic we can see some of that original mosaic in the saline space of the ambulatory so just look up at the top here you can see uh some mosaic in that shot here is another view and so all of the imagery you see here is either going to be christian imagery or geometric designs so we have a variety throughout this space and what is fairly interesting is this whole ceiling space for the ambulatory is a barrel fault it's a curving barrel vault that wraps all around the space so those rowing building techniques those are still here too so again we're still in a roman world we're just dealing with a new religion now you would have had mosaic on the ceiling and then um marble veneer on the walls here so marble veneer where i'm sort of drawing with the orange here what is different which is important for me to point out is the romans would have normally put mosaic on the floor the christian early christians are putting it on the ceiling they're using again a um roman ornamentation technique right something they're familiar with mosaics they're skilled artists who can make mosaics but they're adapting it they're not putting it on the floor that's the roman use of it they're putting it on the ceiling they're going to put it on walls it becomes decorative but it's not something that you walk on and that is most likely because of the imagery the romans you know are making pretty floors with mosaics early christians are making religious artwork you know you they're making images of uh important figures that you wouldn't want to walk on so that change in where mosaic is placed notes the change in sort of function and how one interacts and relates to the imagery of the mosaics okay so that is the church of santa castanza it is our example of a early christian mausoleum and mausoleums are important because it's where we see early christians first using central plan architectural designs