Hippodamus of Miletus
Hippodamus of Miletus (sometimes also called Hippodamos, Greek: Ἱππόδαμος), was a Greek town planner of the 5th century BC. He created plans of Hellenic colony cities that featured order and regularity, in contrast to the more common intricacy and confusion common to cities such as Athens, and he is seen as the originator of the idea that a town plan might formally embody and clarify a rational social order. According to Aristotle (in Politics), he originated the art of Town Planning, and devised an ideal city to be inhabited by 10,000 citizens, divided into three classess (soldiers, artisans and 'husbandmen'), with the land also divided into three (sacred, public and private). He also evidently had a reputation as a lover of attention. According to Aristotle's description in Politics, "Some people thought he carried things too far, indeed, with his long hair, expensive ornaments, and the same cheap warm clothing worn winter and summer."
For Pericles he planned the arrangement of the harbour-town Piraeus at Athens in the middle of the fifth century BC. When the Athenians founded Thurii in Italy in 443 BC he accompanied the colony as architect - although he was not actually an architect in the sense of a building designer. He is credited with, in 408 BC, the building of the new city of Rhodes, however as he was involved in 479 BC with helping the reconstruction of Miletus he would have been very old when this project took place.
His grid plans consisted of series of broad, straight streets, cutting one another at forty-five and one hundred thirty-five degree angles.
(See the post below about the quincunx-planned 'Hippodamian' Henrichemont in Berry. And the cadastral plan of La Ville de Richelieu.)
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