Timber-reinforced structures in Greece: 2500 BC–1900 AD

The survey of numerous monuments and historic structures in Greece – a country situated in the most earthquake-prone area of the eastern Mediterranean – has revealed a systematic and continuous through-centuries use of timber elements within masonry. The extent of the use of timber in the structures, the contribution of the timber to the overall structural system, the specific measures taken to protect timber from decay and, hence, the efficiency of the developed structural systems present a vast variety, associated with social and economical factors. This extensive use of timber makes it legitimate to assume that our predecessors were aware of the effect of timber-reinforcing systems on the seismic behaviour of structures. This paper provides information on the use of timber in structures in Greece ranging from the Minoan Crete 2500 years BC to Akrotiri, Thera sixteenth century BC, to Byzantine churches and monasteries, and finally to more than 70 urban nuclei within the country that were developed in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.