The form of the nave was adapted by the early Christian builders from the Roman hall of justice, the basilica. The nave of the early Christian basilica was generally lighted by a row of windows near the ceiling, called the clerestory; the main, central space was usually flanked on either side by one or two aisles, as in the Basilica of Old St. Peter's (AD 330) and San Paolo Fuori le Mura (380), both in Rome. A flat timber roof characteristically covered the nave until the Romanesque and Gothic eras, when stone vaulting became almost universal in the major churches of northern Europe.

Medieval naves were generally divided into many bays, or compartments, producing the effect of great length by the repetition of forms. The standard medieval division of the nave wall into ground-floor arcade, tribune (a vaulted gallery space over the side aisles), optional triforium arcade (a blind or open arcade between the tribune and clerestory), and clerestory became more flexible during the Renaissance, so that frequently—as in San Lorenzo (Florence; 1421–29) by Filippo Brunelleschi—the tribune and triforium are eliminated, and the nave wall is divided only into arcade and clerestory. During the Renaissance, the nave also was divided into fewer compartments, giving a feeling of spaciousness and balanced proportion between the height, length, and width. Extreme, dramatic effects, such as the marked verticality of the Gothic in cathedrals such as Reims (begun c. 1211), gave way to a more rationally designed nave space in which no single directional emphasis or sensation was stressed; St. Paul's Cathedral in London (1675–1711), rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren after the Great Fire of 1666, provides a fine example.