International Conference Architecture and Ideology CD Proceedings, p 331-340 September 28/29, 2012 – Belgrade - Serbia
Monica Gondim1
URBAN MOBILITY FROM MYTHOLOGY TO CONTEMPORARY TIMES
Abstract | This article deals with the representation of mobility in archeological remains, mythological narratives and architectural literature. The research suggests that this collection of human history shows the formation of the archetypes of mobility that, over time, shaped the cities according to their preference for movement or for permanence. Keywords | mobility, morphology, history, archaelogy, mythology, Bible
1. INTRODUCTION The city is recognized as a place of movement and rest. Streets and their respective modes of transportation represent fluidity while city-blocks and their buildings embody permanence. In fact, streets reveal another duality, between the slowness of pedestrians and the quickness of vehicles, with sidewalks forming the transition between the rapid movement of the roadway and the fixity of the buildings. This article’s objective is to reflect upon the interaction of these two movements which, over time, led to the transformation in street design and city configuration. This study begins by noting that, throughout history, cities have sometimes preferred permanence and sometimes movement. Later, the study reviews an argument made by some authors that the intensification of transportation systems, acceleration, and the fascination with speed are typical characteristics of industrial society. Furthermore, this article presents 1
Professor of Urban Design, Brasília University,
[email protected], www.monicagondim.com.br
archaeological remains of ancient civilizations and religious narratives of the Greeks and the Israelites that demonstrated the power and significance of vehicles. The article then concludes by forming the hypothesis that past experiences have contributed to the formation of archetypes of mobility that, over time, shaped city models according to their preference for speed or slowness.
2. MOBILITY IN THE HISTORY OF URBANISM The representation of the city as a place of rest and motion is made by authors from different fields of knowledge which include Ildefonso Cerdá [1a], Lewis Mumford [2] and Milton Santos [3]. Throughout history, however, one realizes that the city sometimes favors the fixed areas of architectural complexes, and sometimes the movements that integrate them. Thus, in midnineteenth century, Baron Haussmann cut the fabric of Paris to sew a network of wide avenues to promote the crossing of the city in more direct, short and quick routes. Later, Camillo Sitte [4] criticized roadways that favored movement over apreciation of the architectural landscape. Four decades later, Le Corbusier [5] dared to propose the demolition of the center of Paris to promote mobility, believing that speed represented progress in modern society. In fact, the alternation between acceleration and deceleration seems to happen in cycles throughout the discourse of history. The image of Athens, as the city of meeting in the ágora, is followed by the representation of Rome with its roads and chariots. The maze of narrow lanes of the Middle Ages, which impedes the expansion of the movement, is faced with the ideal of the straight routes of the Renaissance, and the heyday of the street in the Baroque period. In contrast to the speed of modern times, the ideal city of the 21st century invests in pedestrians and bicycles. The duality is always present, although it is more apparent in planned cities where there is a great contrast between streets designed for speed and for slowness. This contrast is evident in cities from different ages and cultures, including the ancient city Mohenjo-Daro, built around 2600 BCE, in Pakistan, with its wide avenues, while access to housing was provided by narrow alleys that hindered fluidity and speed. Even in a labyrinthine layout, such as the residential area of Ur, from the Babylonian era, it's possible to identify a hierarchy of roads influencing different travel times, which is also evident in Gournia, a Minoan city in Crete.
Fig. 01: Mohenjo-Daro, 2200 BCE [6]
Fig 02 Ur, 2400-2300 BCE [7]
Fig.03: Gournia, 1500 BCE [8]
3. MOBILITY IN ARCHEOLOGY For Ildefonso Cerdá [1b], the appearance of the engine in the nineteenth century brought a transformation to the cities that started to require more freedom for movements. Approximately 150 years later, Bauman [9a] reaffirms that the beginning of modernity is marked by the advent
of machinery, locomotives, steamboats and manufacturing processes of production. For the author, this is the moment when fast vehicles overcomes the human force and animal power, and transforms the perception of space and time with impacts on social relations. He then states that, until the advent of the steam engine and combustion, the difference between the travel speed of a king and a servant was not enough to represent a large dissimilarity between them. He adds that acceleration represents a strategic advantage for victory in battle and for the conquest of territories. For all these reasons, the car caused great fascination due to its ability to empower its users. However, the power of the vehicle does not come with the engine. It is inherent to the vehicle as indicated by the archaeological collections of the oldest human settlements. According to Stuart Piggott [10a], even before the wheel, the ox-drawn sleigh was distinguished as an object of prestige, both in Mesopotamia and in places along the Danube and the Volga. Archaeologists have not yet determined exactly where wheeled vehicles first appeared. A miniature vehicle was found in the province of Mardin, in Turkey, at the end of 2011, which could be the oldest ever discovered, dating back to approximately 5500 BCE [11]. However, Anthony David [12] argues that it would be difficult to have appeared before the fourth millennium BCE, due to technical development that was required. In support of this argument, he points out that the remains of the oldest well-dated wheeled vehicles are from between 3500 3000 BCE. Among these examples are: the pictograms printed on clay tablets found in the temple of Eanna in Uruk, in Mesopotamia; the drawings on the clay pot from the village Bronocice, in Poland; a clay model from the culture Baden of Budakalász, Hungary; and several burial cars from archaeological sites in Russia and Ukraine. According to the archaeologist, traces of cargo vehicles and hearses from the same period are spread from Germany to the steppes of Russia, with examples of wheels and car pieces in Switzerland, Holland and Denmark. This scattering can be explained by the widespread increase in the use of transportation with wheels, starting from the end of the fourth millennium BCE, in different regions of the world, not restricted to large cities. Archeology shows that the burial of individuals with their cars and animals used for transport was common in Europe, Mesopotamia and in China. According to Piggott [10b] “A vehicle buried with the dead can only be interpreted in terms of status and prestige, shared by the vehicle and its deceased owner”. But toy cars and ritual miniatures are the objects that demonstrate the fascination with vehicles that existed since the earliest villages and continued during the following millennia in different regions of the world. There are specimens from the fourth and third millennia BCE found in Hungary, Russia, Bulgaria and Syria, and in cities such as Ur, Uruk, Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro.
Fig. 04: Sumer chariot model 3000 BCE Ashmolean Museum [13]
Fig.05: Syria chariot model 3000-2000 BCE Ashmolean Museum [14]
Fig 06: Harappan car 3000-2500 BCE Brooklyn Museum [15]
In ancient times, vehicles were also used as an expression of the power of monarchs. The kings were commonly represented on carts pulled by donkeys or onagers up until the arrival of the horse in Western history, in the second millennium BCE. The horse then takes on a prominent position of empowering the speed, the expansion of territories and the attacking strength during conflicts. By conferring this power, the Hyksos, in horse-drawn chariots, dominated the Egyptians, in the eighteenth century BCE; the Kassites conquered the first Babylonian empire; and the Hittites, with their feared vehicles of war, constituted one of the great powers of the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries BCE. Strength and glory are represented by horses and chariots engraved on many wall panels of the Assyrian and Babylonian kings, and by the equestrian statues of Roman monarchs.
4. MOBILITY IN MYTHOLOGY Walking and rapid transit are also covered in the Biblical narratives and Greek mythology, that were crucial in the formation of Western thought. In particular, Genesis and Exodus from the Old Testament [16], by the Israelites; and Homer's Iliad and the Odyssey [17,18]. These works stand out for telling stories of two voyages occurring at nearly the same time during the second millennium BCE. The exodus led by Moses is calculated to have occurred between 1290 and 1200 BCE [19, 20] and the Achaeans attack on Troy is estimated to have happened between 1350 and 1200 BCE [21]. The parallel between the two religious cultures highlights their differences in mobility. The Israelites were a culture with nomadic roots and the Greeks with urban roots. The first had a God who opposed cities, while the other had no cities without gods. The Israelite God walks, while the Greek gods prefer to move around in vehicles. The Old Testament, since the earliest chapters, presents God as a driver of men. First, God places Adam in paradise and eventually expels him to the land of punishment. The divine guidance, in choosing the time of departure and destination, also happens with Noah, with the pilgrimages of the patriarchs, and with the exodus from Egypt. In the narrative, the chosen people seem to have no desires. Without desires or needs, there is no movement. Plato explains this in Timaeus [22]. The fact is that, transportation engineering also identifies urban travels as lines of desire. In the biblical narrative, the representation of the first displacement, apparently by human will, is done by Adam and Eve, and happens in paradise in the direction of the forbidden trees. The second one was done by Cain, after killing Abel, when he is condemned by God for being an errant or wanderer. But, Cain continues towards the land of Nod and founds a city, determining his destiny. With such a beginning, the biblical narrative conveys the message that man, in control of his path, follows the direction of temptation, crime, and escape, until he reaches the city. Believing that the divine will is infallible, Cain, the first town planner and urban man, becomes an eternal errant. At first glance, this may seem to be contradictory, being the urban man, by definition, sedentary. But discarding the interpretation of errant as a nomad, it has the meaning of being lost, without direction or in eternal movement that are the first attributes given, by the holy texts, to the urban inhabitant. Noah’s ark is the first biblical vehicle. This ship begins, at sea, the grand collective voyages that occur in the Pentateuch. The first of them, on land, is led by the patriarch Abraham that departs from Ur, one of the most prominent cities of its time, headed to the desert; similar to Adam leaving the Garden of Eden, a place designed by God, to a wild land. Abraham is followed by
his family and servants. With him are donkeys and sheep. The collective voyage, which also occurs with the patriarchs Isaac and Jacob, is slow, with a maximum trip length of 30km per day [23]. The pilgrimage of Moses, however, stands out because it represents the most comprehensive vehicle of God, and the longest journey towards the Promised Land. Interpreting this event using the reasoning of Kevin Lynch [24], the path must have been unsettling, because in the desert, without a sense of direction, with no sense of progress, and without information regarding the proximity to the destination, the journey was nearly adrift. In accordance with the book of Exodus, there were about 600,000 followers, not counting women and children. This group, walking on a path with a width of approximately 3 meters, each individual occupying about 1 m2, not counting carriages or animals, formed a line of more than 200 km. In addition to the patriarchs and the exodus, two other significant representations of collective voyages are described in the Old Testament. The first occurs with the fall of the capital of Samaria in 722 BCE, when the Israelites walk towards Assyria in bondage. The second corresponds to the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BCE, when the Isrealites walk as prisoners towards Babylon. Despite the fact that, in the Bible, God and his angels have dignified the walk, traveling on foot in paradise and in the desert, the human voyages in the Old Testament are associated with waiting, punishment, exile and bondage. Donkeys and camels are presented as forming a part of caravans and serving the displacement of people and cargo. While the chariot, since its first appearance in the narrative, signifies power, ostentation or glory; as in the procession of the Pharaoh with Joseph in Egypt and in the funeral of Jacob (Gen 41:43, 50:9). Horse drawn carriages are then presented in the persecution of the Israelites by the Egyptians. From this moment on, chariots appear in the Bible predominately as instruments of oppression. In some sections, they are shown as the opposing force of God, as seen in Psalm 20:7, "Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God." However, after the conquest of Jerusalem, the chariot begins to represent the protection and strength of the city. Solomon personifies this moment establishing a trade of chariots and horses with Egypt, Syria and the Hittite kings; and having forty thousand stalls and 1.400 battle chariots distributed throughout the kingdom (3Kgs 9:20, 1Kgs 4:26). However, the chariot receives another negative depiction in the Bible, in the verse of the destruction of Nineveh, by Nahum (Nah2: 4), which describes the impacts caused by vehicles, similar to present day, “The chariots race madly in the streets, They rush wildly in the squares, Their appearance is like torches, They dash to and fro like lightning flashes”. In Greek mythology, there is a different representation of mobility. Quickness is one of the most important indicators of man’s skill, being the first attribute given in the Iliad [17a] to the hero Achilles, known as the warrior with quick feet. Quickness is also a quality of objects and animals, and because of this, is said that the ships are fleeting and dogs are rapid. Chariots in Greek myths represent perfection and power. The majority of the gods have chariots pulled by horses, dolphins, whales, or swans. Considered valuable objects, vehicles and horses are among the most preferred presents for gods and kings, and because of this, the Iliad described that the king Agamemnon offered twelve of the best race horses to the warrior Achilles, in asking for forgiveness. [17b] Similar to modern day, in mythology, the chariot is represented as a pleasant mode of transportation and the inability to use it is seen as a punishment, even for the gods. For this reason, Homer tells in the Iliad that Zeus, in order to reprimand the goddesses Hera and Athena, threatened to take away their cars for the voyages between Earth and Olympus [17c]. The appreciation for vehicles is shown by the zeal with which they are manufactured. As with the
modern automobile, cars are designed with a great esthetic emphasis and are, at times, adorned with gold and silver. When these cars aren’t being used, gods and men keep the vehicles covered with cloth, as in the scene of the Iliad in which Poseidon leaves his chariot protected by a linen cloth at the altar in Olympus. [17d] The Greek narrative shows that the driver of a chariot needed great skill. The bravery of a hero is associated with his ability to drive chariots and horses. For this reason, the races are presented as a mechanism for choosing the best man. An example of this argument is the story of Pelops and his participation in the contest to win the hand of Hippodamia, the daughter of Oenomaus, who is destined to marry the man who defeats her father in a horse race. Perhaps, the best representation of man’s fascination with the car and speed, similar to modern day, is the myth of the youth Phaeton. His greatest desire was to drive the fast car of his father, the god Helios. However, without possessing the necessary skills, he causes an accident and his ultimate demise. [17e] Even in the collective treks, the Greek narratives attribute different meanings than those represented in the Bible. In Greek mythology, the groups of Pan and Dionysus are distinguished by song and dance, joy and luxury. In the Exodus, the journeys towards an unknown land happen without euphoria or detailed planning. The Achaeans, on the contrary, in a temporary campsite, constituted a mobile group, composed of chariots, ships and horses, in a well planned siege to a walled and immobile Troy.
5. ARCHETYPES OF MOBILITY AND OF CITIES Archeological remains seem to reveal the existence of archetypes of mobility that form two city models; one that emphasized quickness, and the other, slowness. The existence of two images of cities, based on mobility, is defended by Paul Virilio, Massimo Cacciari and Stuart Piggot. Paul Virilio [25a] believes that, in Western history, two types of society can be distinguished, with and without hope, according to the greater or lesser value given to quickness. Massimo Cacciari [26] also distinguishes cities according to an emphasis given to mobility or permanence. For the author, mobility is associated with the idea of the expanding city, and thus, Rome would be a “mobile city” in contrast with Athens. Stuart Piggott [10c] recognizes the difference between innovative and conservative societies, or in other words, between the cities that are accustomed to changes and the cities that prefer routine. In the prologue of the Timaeus, by Plato[22a], mobility, despite not being highlighted explicitly as an indicator of difference between city models, can be disregarded from the description of Athens and Atlantis, presented as opposing examples regarding virtue. Atlantis represents the will for power and domination over other groups of people and is expressed by the investment in its mobility in the sea. Its description, made in Crítias [22], points to the privilege of mobility in the infrastructure of the city that has a Hippodrome as a centerpiece, and a main statue of a car harnessed with six winged horses of the god Poseidon, its founder. The expression of power through speed, in the reading of the Timaeus and Critias, resonates with the thinking of Paul Virilio [25b] and Bauman [9b]. For the first author, the purpose of quickness is supremacy. For the second author, power and inequality in the use of space are predicated on speed. In fact, this was already communicated in old mythology. In the Bible, the two archetypes of mobility are represented by Jerusalem and Babylonia, or, Jerusalem and Nineveh, with the image of the journey of imprisoned Israelites as opposed to the Babylonians and Assyrians with their chariots of war. In the Iliad, Troy is immobile and surrounded by the mobile city of the Achaeans represented by one solitary vehicle, the Trojan horse.
In the writings of the past, cars and pedestrians seem to symbolize war and peace. Homer conveys this contrast of human existence when describing the design of the shield of Achilles, and when composing his two masterpieces. In fact, the Iliad is a story of a decade of war, with vehicles playing the leading role; while the Odyssey [18] describes the voyage of Odysseus after the conflict, with the same duration of 10 years, without the creator of the Trojan horse riding a single chariot or stallion throughout his entire journey. Thus, Homer's work reinforces the contrast between two settings presented on the Standard of Ur, of the third millennium. The first shows a war, with chariots and horses; and the other displays a scene of peace, with people in their activities on foot.
6. CONCLUSIONS History shows that the vehicle facilitated transport and the expansion of territories, giving power to man and cities since the beginning of history. Acceleration, therefore, at any time in history, must have fascinated or terrorized, and thus, is not an exclusive phenomenon of the modern world. The difference, with respect to modern day, is a matter of interpretation of space and time. In the past, power was obtained in the conquest of space, today, it gained through the annulment of time. Nowadays, high speed vehicles permit the expansion of space and trade; while in the past, the chariot and the wagon also aided the expansion of kingdoms and the forming of empires. Although, smaller than those of modern day, the territories conquered by the armies of chariots, under the command of Alexander the Great or of Julius Cesar, were much larger than the modern day market of numerous motorized countries. Regarding time, the duration of the exodus and the siege of Troy seemed to fill space and time, while in modern day, space has an ephemeral lifetime. In the past, the Israelites lived the present for posterity, and the Greek heroes for immortality. For both, the path and the destination made sense. In modern life, travel time has been perceived as lost of time. For the individual, the traveling slowly can often signify weakness, or also can be seen as a punishment. Seeking to reduce commuting time, cities have invested in systems of highways and equipment to facilitate transport. In the last century, these constructions have slighted nature and the beauty of landscapes, which were sacrificed in order to provide the speed desired by the modern city. But we currently know that speed also means destruction. Regarding walking, the Bible presents two scenarios. The first, a planned garden; and the other, an unlimited and miserable desert. While the first is associated with pleasant walk, but within a limited area; the other resembles an endless punishment. Confronting these models, some urban designers are inspired by the Garden of Eden to design walled condominiums exclusively for the privileged class. However, Troy, in mythology, and Carthage, in history, show that the immobility of city walls is fragile. Others urban designers prefer restructuring the highway system to give rise to sidewalks, gardens and bike lanes, reconstructing the landscape for leisurely strolls, like Pan and Dionysus. This seems to be the start of a new cycle. If the twentieth century began driven by the acceleration and with the enchantment by the speed promised by cars and airplanes, a hundred years later, man searches to restore the quality of life provided by slowness, promoting walking and the use of bicycles. Although, modern day man, just like a mythological god, an Assyrian monarch or a Roman general, still enjoys seeing himself in automobiles with the power of hundreds of horses.
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