ABSTRACT

At first glance, it is counterintuitive to connect architecture and spirituality. After all, how could the most material and enduring constructs be related to the most ethereal and immaterial of human experiences? Yet, since the earliest settlement building cultures, the stable physicality of buildings has symbolized, supported, and even elicited the spiritual dimension. The fact that the most historically significant built works incorporated the immaterial indicates the ubiquitous congruity of metaphysical concerns and architecture. Consequently, it is not surprising that recent archaeological discoveries have suggested that early settlements may have originated from the invention of religion not agriculture (Mann 2011).