| De architectura libri dece traducti de latino in vulgare affigurati | |
| 1521 |  |
| Vitruvius Pollio(fl. 25 B.C.) | |
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Vitruvius was a Roman architect who lived in the first century B.C. and who served Julius Caesar (100–44 B.C.) and Emperor Augustus (27–14 B.C.). However, details related to the manner in which Vitruvius came to serve them are not renowned. According to this book, he is most likely to have worked for the Roman army under the command of Julius Caesar and to have constructed a siege machine as well as a bridge. It is said that while serving Emperor Augustus, he engaged in aqueduct construction in Rome. It seems, however, that he was not an excellent architect at that time because none of his works and none of historic documents mentioned his name as an architect have been known. He retired from public service in 33 B.C. and was supported by a pension provided by Empress Octavia. At that time, Vitruvius began to write this book, which was the culmination of his knowledge on architecture, and completed writing the book in approximately 14 B.C. The book, dedicated to Empress Octavia, enlightened the Empress about architecture. In addition, it appears that Vitruvius intended to be commissioned by the Emperor for architectural design, if possible. The architectural theory described in this book includes various pieces of architectural theory that have been obtained from the ancient Greek architectural theories. However, because the theory which is described in this book is confessional, ambiguous and inconsistent, it was considered to be of little significance and was not influential during the imperial era in which Vitruvius lived. Regardless, this book became the sole authority for the Renaissance architects who wished to learn and revive ancient classical architectural design because this is the only book survived from ancient in which contained the ancient architectural theory in its comprehensive form. Therefore, this book substantially influenced the architecture and the architectural theory until the 19th century. In fact, the architectural theories developed before the 19th century could not be understood by ignoring their relation with Vitruvius’ architectural theory. Thus, this book can be considered to be the most influential book in the history of Western architecture. |
