The Architectural Treatise in the Italian Renaissance: Architectural Invention, Ornament and Literary Culture

by Alina A. Payne

• ISBN13: 9780521622660
• ISBN10: 0521622662
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-02-13
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

Vitruvius's Ten Books of Architecture, the only architectural treatise to have survived from antiquity, 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 14001600, Alina Payne identifies ornament as the central issue around which much of this debate focused. Ornament, she argues, facilitated a dialogue across disciplines and invited exchanges with literary and rhetorical practices. Payne's study also highlights the place of the architectural treatise in the text-based culture of the period and of architectural discourse in Renaissance thought.

Table of Contents

Preface	ix	(2)
List of Illustrations	xi	(4)
Editorial Note	xv
Introduction	1	(12)
PART I TEXTS, RUINS, AND ACADEMIES	13	(100)
Chapter 1 Of License and Archaeology	13	(21)
Chapter 2 Vitruvius	34	(18)
Chapter 3 Literary Grids and Artistic Intersections	52	(18)
Chapter 4 Alberti	70	(19)
Chapter 5 Francesco di Giorgio Martini	89	(24)
PART II LA QUESTIONE DEL ORNAMENTO	113	(124)
Chapter 6 Serlio and the Theoretization of Ornament	113	(1)
Chapter 7 Spini and Architectural Imitatio	114	(56)
Chapter 8 Palladio and the Aesthetics of Necessita	170	(44)
Chapter 9 Scamozzi and Gesamttheorie	214	(23)
Coda	237	(4)
Notes	241	(72)
Bibliography	313	(16)
Index	329