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The Architectural Treatise in the Italian Renaissance: Architectural Invention, Ornament and Literary Culture
Vitruvius' Ten Books of Architecture was the fountainhead of architectural theory in the Italian Renaissance. Offering theoretical and practical solutions to a wide variety of architectural issues, this treatise did not, however, address all of the questions that were of concern to early modern architects. This study examines the Italian Renaissance architect's efforts to negotiate between imitation and reinvention of classicism. Through a close reading of Vitruvius and texts written during the period 1400-1600, Alina Payne identifies ornament as the central issue around which much of this debate focused.
362 pages, Hardcover
First published February 13, 1999
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June 13, 2026
A respectable and fastidious scholarly work, but not useful to the architectural practitioner or even the historian of architecture per se - this is about texts and their engagement with other texts, and touches very little on the realization of those ideas in the built world. Perhaps historians of ideas or of architectural writing will get more out of it. The bone dry character of any adapted dissertation also makes it kind of an unwelcoming read, but that's just the nature of things.
After an introduction to Vitruvius and some basic historical background, the text passes through fairly discrete chapters on Alberti, Francesco di Giorgio Martini, Serlio, the little-known Gherardo Spini (as a representative of the contributions of unpublished amateurs to the Renaissance architectural discourse), Palladio, and Scamozzi. A major point, and one well taken, is that Vitruvius is the author of a work with a very limited and specific perspective, whose prescriptions frequently clash with the evidence of surviving classical ruins. All of these facts caused great difficulty for Renaissance architects and humanists attempting to use Vitruvius as a key to the (literal) reconstruction of Rome's ancient glory: as a result, though the evaluation of Serlio is fairly positive, the other early authors come off as confused.
The heroic figure who comes in with the comprehensive treatise to resolve many outstanding difficulties and create the ground for a new, coherent tradition is Palladio. To a certain extent the earlier chapters are reframed in the light of Palladio's as being simply about the genesis of specific elements of the thought that Palladio would synthesize, though this narrative is not made explicit in the text (as mentioned, the chapters are relatively discrete). Great emphasis is placed on the fact that Palladio - like Vitruvius - was a practicing architect and military engineer, and the force of his thought derived from his deep engagement with practical rather than theoretical concerns. His use of copious and lavish drawings paired with a sometimes laconic text is also favorably noted. Given all that, it's a bit ironic that this book maintains such a distanced, ivory-tower perspective, and while not under-illustrated always gives a privileged status to words. In short, it presents a compelling argument for why you should read Palladio, but is not a good substitute for it or even a particularly useful addendum.
Another interesting throughline is criticism of the past. Renaissance architectural theory begins by condemning the Gothic in extremely harsh terms, and upholding an idea of the Classical (though struggling to do so coherently in light of Vitruvius). As it successively comes into its own as an architectural movement it becomes more comfortable taking a firm theoretical stance against certain work of the ancients, and then finally Scamozzi rescinds to a certain degree the anathematization of the Gothic that had driven so much of his predecessors' fervor. This move by the last significant Renaissance architectural theorist represents the culmination of Renaissance architecture's journey toward internal coherence and self-confidence, and also marks a kind of endpoint as subsequent developments push architecture into the new stylistic territory of the Baroque.
That's a cool little story, but it's not in this book, which is more about relating facts than telling stories. You'll have to read it into the text yourself.
After an introduction to Vitruvius and some basic historical background, the text passes through fairly discrete chapters on Alberti, Francesco di Giorgio Martini, Serlio, the little-known Gherardo Spini (as a representative of the contributions of unpublished amateurs to the Renaissance architectural discourse), Palladio, and Scamozzi. A major point, and one well taken, is that Vitruvius is the author of a work with a very limited and specific perspective, whose prescriptions frequently clash with the evidence of surviving classical ruins. All of these facts caused great difficulty for Renaissance architects and humanists attempting to use Vitruvius as a key to the (literal) reconstruction of Rome's ancient glory: as a result, though the evaluation of Serlio is fairly positive, the other early authors come off as confused.
The heroic figure who comes in with the comprehensive treatise to resolve many outstanding difficulties and create the ground for a new, coherent tradition is Palladio. To a certain extent the earlier chapters are reframed in the light of Palladio's as being simply about the genesis of specific elements of the thought that Palladio would synthesize, though this narrative is not made explicit in the text (as mentioned, the chapters are relatively discrete). Great emphasis is placed on the fact that Palladio - like Vitruvius - was a practicing architect and military engineer, and the force of his thought derived from his deep engagement with practical rather than theoretical concerns. His use of copious and lavish drawings paired with a sometimes laconic text is also favorably noted. Given all that, it's a bit ironic that this book maintains such a distanced, ivory-tower perspective, and while not under-illustrated always gives a privileged status to words. In short, it presents a compelling argument for why you should read Palladio, but is not a good substitute for it or even a particularly useful addendum.
Another interesting throughline is criticism of the past. Renaissance architectural theory begins by condemning the Gothic in extremely harsh terms, and upholding an idea of the Classical (though struggling to do so coherently in light of Vitruvius). As it successively comes into its own as an architectural movement it becomes more comfortable taking a firm theoretical stance against certain work of the ancients, and then finally Scamozzi rescinds to a certain degree the anathematization of the Gothic that had driven so much of his predecessors' fervor. This move by the last significant Renaissance architectural theorist represents the culmination of Renaissance architecture's journey toward internal coherence and self-confidence, and also marks a kind of endpoint as subsequent developments push architecture into the new stylistic territory of the Baroque.
That's a cool little story, but it's not in this book, which is more about relating facts than telling stories. You'll have to read it into the text yourself.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review