Ancient Near Eastern Architecture: The Ziggurat

 

Ziggurats

Recently I've been researching types of NE architecture for inspiration within my world concept. One of the most defining structure types of this historical milieu is undoubtedly the ziggurat, a tiered, terraced structure that housed a deity within the temple that sits atop its highest layer. There are many notable ziggurats found all across Mesopotamia and built by many of its most prominent societies. Here are some examples: 

The Great Ziggurat of Ur, modern day Iraq

Artist's Impression of the Ziggurat of Ur

Uruk Ziggurat Reconstruction

Buried Ruins

The first way I wanted to incorporate these structures into my world was in the form of buried ruins found across the lands that hint at the many lost civilisations previously established by former wielders of the creation power. Given that within the historical context, ziggurats would have been the largest structures, towering above the rest of their cities, it makes sense that within my game world these would be the structures that protrude from the surface of the sand, hinting at the larger body of ruins below like the tip of an iceberg. I have visualised this idea with the sketches below. 

Buried Ziggurat Ruins 

A Dune explorer stumbling upon the remains of a great city, established long ago by a creator that tied themselves to the image of the sun

As you can see, just the top of the structure is visible above the surface of the sand, and the larger structure below could act as an explorable 'dungeon'/'tomb' as in games such as the Tomb Raider series. This sketch was just one example of a possible previous people, but it was fun to think of an identifying characteristic for that civilisation and its creator, in this case the sun motif. I can imagine that if the game featured multiple discoverable ruins across its world, thorough exploration could reward the player with lore revelations uncovering aspects of these previous civilisations and their rulers, such as how they chose to present themselves or the reasons why they eventually fell. In this case, the implication is that the ruler placed himself/his throne at the top of a towering ziggurat, at the core of a sun-like disc that replaces the divine temples of a historical ziggurat. Perhaps this ruler was particularly assertive of their ascended status, demanding worship from their subjects by presenting themselves in this way

The Oasis City

Next I started to think about Ziggurat-like structures within the context of the great cities of the central brothers. Since the majority of my work so far has been centred around the Oasis city, I decided to continue on with that for now. I started with some quick sketches that were done on the coach on the way to the Yorkshire Games Festival in Bradford, a couple weeks back.

Ziggurat Inspired Structure Sketches

In these sketches I went for a much more vertical appearance than the historical inspiration, which tends to be far more tapered, most likely due to physical limits that can be bypassed within the context of my world. I especially liked the idea of including large columns, as at least to me, they tend to further exaggerate that feeling of verticality and grandeur. The more open feeling that columns provide in comparison to solid walls also fits the theme of the oasis city nicely, especially in contrast to the closed off mountain city of the other brother.

Another sketch, drawing more on Persian influences as well

In all of these sketches, but particularly with the last one, I was also experimenting with incorporating some Achaemenid Persian inspired aspects in the architecture. The Achaemenids are known to have actively worked to fit themselves within the Near Eastern context as their territory expanded rapidly into that of other cultures, and their architecture was one aspect that was clearly influenced by this context. Notably, the famous palace at Persepolis is known for incorporating various Mesopotamian architectural motifs in its design. This is why I thought it would be interesting to incorporate some Persian ideas in my designs, as heavy crossover exists already within the historical material.  Hopefully the examples below will help to make this evident.

Persian Columns

Artist Impression of Persian Court

Reconstruction of Persepolis

Polished Ziggurat Concept

My goal with this research into ziggurats and other structures was ultimately to create a polished concept of what a ziggurat structure could look like in my game world, in one of the brothers' great cities. As I mentioned in a previous post, I've been experimenting with new workflows, and this was my first opportunity to have a go with a 3D blockout process before moving to photoshop for paint-over. Here is the render of my 3D blockout for a ziggurat of the Oasis City, done in Blender.

Oasis City Ziggurat Concept Blockout

I decided to keep some of the added verticality from my sketches, although i did find more of a balance between that and the more terraced feel of the source material. I also kept the pillars, although i made them a lot broader and more square, as I feel this helps to differentiate them further from the Greek or Roman style columns that we are more used to seeing in pop culture.

Oasis City Ziggurat Concept Piece

This is the finished concept, which I am quite pleased with. I found working from a 3D blockout very helpful because it eliminated most of the stress of dealing with perspective, and lighting is also similarly simplified. I will definitely be looking to continue incorporating 3D within my workflow as it's definitely a big timesaver, particularly if I manage to develop my proficiency with 3D software. Use of 3D also appears to be a fairly standard industry practice too, so it's a good skill to work on and be able to present in my portfolio, particularly if I look to apply to the bigger studios.

Mural depiction of Lamassu

 In keeping with my City wall concept from last term, I have incorporated the blue-glazed brick aesthetics of the Ishtar Gate from Babylon, to maintain a consistent visual language within the city. I have also incorporated the mythical creature motifs of the Near East, and I used a mural depiction of the Assyrian God Lamassu (above) as a base for the central winged statue at the structure's entrance in my concept. In the background you can see other ziggurats and structures across the city, although I didn't spend much time on these and left them pretty vague. In hindsight this was probably fine as it doesn't draw too much attention away from the 'main event' of the concept.

In my next post on this Near Eastern project, I'll likely be moving away from the oasis city for now, so stay tuned for that. Thanks for reading.