The Villa Medici in Fiesole with early terraced hillside landscape by Leon Battista Alberti
A villa is a type of house that was originally an ancient Romanupper class country house. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the fall of the Roman Republic, villas became small farming compounds, which were increasingly fortified in Late Antiquity, sometimes transferred to the Church for reuse as a monastery. Then they gradually re-evolved through the Middle Ages into elegant upper-class country homes. In the early modern period, any comfortable detached house with a garden near a city or town was likely to be described as a villa; most survivals have now been engulfed by suburbia. In modern parlance, "villa" can refer to various types and sizes of residences, ranging from the suburbansemi-detached double villa to, in some countries, especially around the Mediterranean, residences of above average size in the countryside. (Full article...)
Image 10A wood-frame American Foursquare house in Minnesota with dormer windows on each side and a large front porch
Image 11Cottage flats are a style of housing common in Scotland, where there are single floor dwellings at ground level, and similar dwellings on the floor above.
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