Historical Overview
Pre-history, Antiquity and Middle Ages
When talking about the history of shell structures, the vaults and domes built by the Romans such as the Temple of Mercury in Baiae, Italy (1st c. BCE) and the Pantheon in Rome (around 126 CE) are usually considered the earliest ancestors of modern shells \cite{Addis2014} (Fig. \ref{774439}). The technological achievements of the Romans notwithstanding, the history of domed structures can easily be traced back a lot further to earliest human endeavours to build structures for ceremonial, burial, storage and shelter purposes.