Principles of Sustainability in Byzantine Mortar Construction Technology

As sustainability has become an important parameter in modern world due to the environmental crisis, building materials and technologies that have a significant portion of responsibility to the CO2 emission, aim at achieving zero waste to promoting more eco-friendly building practices. Lessons for achieving that aim can come from the study of old materials and practices. Particularly the study of Byzantine architecture has a lot to teach. Byzantine architecture covers a large part of the building history and the study of the materials and techniques of that era can highlight sustainable principles used for construction. This article intends to show the technological characteristics of mortars used in the Byzantine masonry that includes principles that can be a motive for modern sustainable construction.