The word temple indicates a building consecrated to the cult of a deity, created like it were a persisting or temporary residence. The term templum derives from a root indicating the action of “cutting”, that is to say to delimit a place to use for religion. Templum was also the space that the Augur (a priest) circumscribed in the sky to observe the omens. In the Roman period, all the sacred places so created were called with the word templum while the other were called aedes sacrae.
The Roman temple is similar to the Greek one, but it has a wider structure and a podium (a great base) with stairs in the front, most of time with columns only in front whereas the Greek were entirely surrounded. The columns sourronding the inner cell are generally simple half-columns laid to the side walls, while on the main facade, according to the diagram of the etruscan temple, there is a deep courtyard over a podium. In imperial age the temple is a lot larger and it is enriched of niches and apses, with semicircular spaces in the walls for statues (or realized to give more complex the plant of a building). The roof is not anymore formed by two layers, but also with vaults or domes. In the Roman architecture a very special plant is the round temple, formed from a inner cell surrounded by concentric columns. The orders, that is to say the complex of the decoration of the columns and of the capitals, had been a characteristic element of the monumental Roman architecture. They imported the Doric, Corithian and Ionic orders from the Greek art, then they widely adopted the Tuscanic order, a simplification of the Doric created from the Etruscans.
A characteristic of the Roman architecture is the abandon of the static function of the orders, whereas Greeks meant them only as a support of their constructions. In Rome due to the large development of the coementitium technique the order of the columns and of the substractions was only considered in decorative function. So the Roman preferred amongst the others the Corinthian order (also with many variations), that with its flowerish capital and the rich frieze was better adaptable to the triumphant buildings of the empire. The Corinthian capital was changed, since have to be more magnificent: the leaves of acantus were inflated in a floral structure much more glaring.
from Liceo Cavour of Rome website
The list of temples was made with Enrico Rizzi (Bolzano)’s help, to him my deep thanks
Specialized sites on roman temples:
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