Columnated buildings have been used for millennia and the styles of the columns have changed over time. Often the changes in the local styles are triggered by events happening in the society, either locally or globally, when a society feels the need of defining themselves through their architecture against their neighbours or enemies. The local columnated style was often created as a manifestation of the societies self-identification or political power. The most known example of this is off course the Greek Doric and Ionic styles of architecture, which often but not always were hybridized with local traditions in pre-Roman Italy and the later Roman architecture. The mediated messages must have changed when the architecture was hybridized in these new cultural settings. 

We find columnated architecture all over pre-Roman Italy, but can we understand the messages being conveyed in these new contexts? Can we understand the difference in the meaning behind the monuments, when neighbouring towns use the same style for different reasons? In constructing Doric octagonal columns, the local society had chosen inspiration from a regional style in the Peloponnese, but seldom with the purpose of reconnecting themselves to the Archaic Peloponnese, but other messages must have been mediated. So, why did the local societies chose to adapt a less commonly used Greek style of octagonal columns? And can we understand what they wanted to communicate when single monuments were constructed in several different local pre-Roman societies?