1
Introduction
„Within the architectural all’antica-discourse of the Renaissance, Vitruvius’s De Architectura, written in the time of Augustus, played a most significant role.“
Comment:
Whas is an „all’antica discourse“? A discourse that followed the way of the ancient or was organised in „the ancient way“? Surely not. Rather a discourse about the antique or antiquity. But then, one should not use „all’antica“ = „in the way or manner of the ancient“ but something else – except when „all’antica-discourse“ is an established term in historica research – which it is not.
„It [Vitruvius’ text] was found to be obscure with its strange languate and mixture of Greek and latin terms.“ [Endnote 1: Leon Battista Alberti, De re aedificatoria, ed. and tr. by Giovanni Orlandi and Paolo Portoghesi, 2 vols, Milan 1966, VI.1: “Oltra di questo ci era an- cora, che egli non haveva scritto molto ornamente. Conciosia che egli parlava, di maniera, che a Latini pareva che e’ parlasse Greco, & a Greci pareva che egli parlasse Latino; Ma la cosa stessa nel di- mostrarcisi fa testimonianza, che egli non parlò nè Latino, nè Greco; di modo che egli è ragionevole, che egli non scrivesse a noi, poiche egli scrisse di maniera, che noi non lo intendiamo [...].” ]
Comment:
To cite Alberti’s remarks on Vitruvius is not very helpful: Alberti clearly had to find a reason to distance himself from Vitruvius, even if only to make his own attempt to write ten (new) books on architecture reasonable. – And: Could we really take one voice from the middle of the 15th century, i.e. the beginning of the Renaissance, as good or even as the best (= single) representative of Renaissance architects and their opinion about Vitruvius? I don’t think so: Architects like Fra Giocondo thought that it would be useful to edit Vitruvius in print, instead of writing a new, their own, version of a or ten book(s) on architecture.
„Vitruvius’s text posed more ques- tions than it offered answers.“
Comment:
Did someone really count the questions and the answers to make the numbers comparable?
„For many architects Vitruvius became a stable reference point, the Text, which could assist in explaining the half or completely buried ruins of ancient architecture as well as the many discrepancies that were observed, when ar- chitects, painters and humanists carefully studied the building relics of the past, especially in Rome. [Endnote 2: Alina Payne, The Architec-tural Treatise in the Italian Renaissance, Cambridge 1999, pp. 15-51.]
Comment:
Alina Payne’s book obviously received a wide reception among (architectural) historians of the Renaissance – but I doubt that her (assumed: new) point of view is the one that is common sense among architectural (and other) historians. Therefore, it should not cited as the one and authoritative source regarding a crucial point in the argumentation, because this sets a basis as a framework of interpretation which could be (partially) wrong – so that the rest of the article (or book) might be based on false assumptions.
„The many studies and publications of Vitruvius were therefore indeed attempts to structure the ancient text, so that the material could be made accessible to a then-contemporary user.“
Comment:
This is a claim that hardly can be believed: The structure of Vitruvius’ Ten Books has – as far as I know – not been altered in any edition from the Renaissance, not in the whole and not inside the single books or chapters. So, none of these editions (studies and publications) attempted to (re-) structure the ancient text, but many commented it or tried to solve riddles regarded inconsistencies by chosing special words, translations, interpretations for special words.
„Consequently, very different looking atrium houses emerged, that confirm that Vitruvius as a source was obscure, but also exactly therefore flexible. [Endote 4: Linda Pellechia, Architects Read Vitruvius: Renaissance Interpretations of the Atrium of the Ancient House, in: The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, vol. 51, no. 4, dec. 1992, pp. 377-416. On the subject of the architect as reader, see: Sarah McPhee, The Architect as Reader, in: The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, vol. 68, no. 3, 1999, pp. 454-461.]
Comment:
Is it really some sort of a proof when different interpretations of an ancient text after 1500 years emerge from different architects who lived over a time-span of almost 200 years? Would we expect contemporary architects to interprete any single text all the same way – or wouldn’t we rather expect them to try to distinguish themselves from each other by producing different interpretations? – Is there any text from Antiquity to about 1800 that would have found always the same interpretation by readers during the last 200 years? Why then, should this be the case among architects and antiquarians from the Renaissance. All in all: different interpretations of anything are a main characteristic of European or Western culture at least since the middle ages – and therefore can hardly be a proof for the obscurity of an original text or anything else. This should be a basic understanding of Humanities – and it is proven by the following sentence:
„Reading, as Robert Darnton has pointed out, has a history, it changes and is shaped by cultural configurations.“
Comment:
So, if this is the case with reading in general – why, then, would anybody expect any congruence of interpretations of the same text over time?
„Sometime in the 16th century a privatisation of reading took place. Although reading was still also a social act done in groups, it became an increasingly more silent and private activity [Endnote 5: Roger Chartier in: A History of Private Life, vol. 3, Passions of The Renaissance, ed. by Roger Chartier and translated by Arthur Goldhammer, Cambridge Mass. / London, pp. 124-127. ].
Comment: „Sometimes“ would suggest a special, distinguishable, but maybe still unknown point in time – while the next sentence states that this was a long process, that – obviously – was not ‚tuned‘ all over Europe or the West during the Renaissance. So: which sentence is true?
„In this rather vibrating field between reader and text, Roger Chartier has argued that the physical form of the book establishes an order against which reading functions.“
Comment: If there would have been such an order „against which reading functions“, i.e.: some sort of opposition among reading behaviour and books – shouldn’t our ancestors not have tried to find a more adapted form of books? Can there really be this sort of opposition?
„The ways in which the content of books are organized and presented are therefore never neutral, but can guide and direct readers, arrange knowledge and influence thought patterns. [Endnote 8: Roger Chartier, The Order of Books. Readers, Authors, and Libraries in Europe between the Fourteenth and Eighteenth Centuries, Stanford 1992 (French 1st ed. 1992), pp. 1-23.]
Comment:
If this should be the explanation of the sentence cited above, one can hardly agree: What this sentence says is the very basic understanding of what a book is. And I doubt, that the list of characteristics of „a book“ is complete … But, then again: Why should the opinion of one modern scholar named Roger Chartier be the one and only explanation of how books (in the Renaissance) were used and understood? Aren’t there any concurring interpretations? Can the aforementioned opposition be derived fromt he simple, basic understanding of how books work? – In general: Citing only single examples of interpretations like it has been done up to now in the text by not discussing contrasting views gives an author the opportunity to write one new interpretation – but the scientific approach should be to take into account all existing or at least all contrasting interpretations to come to a solution for open questions or problems. Anything else would not be more than a repetition and hardly contribute new knowledge.
„Based on these ideas this contribution analyses the literary methods employed when Renaissance architects and humanists sought to come to terms with Vitruvius’s difficult text."
Comment:
This would require a book of a few hundred, if not thousand pages … but:
„The article will evolve around two case studies.“
Comment:
Regarding the very different interpretations of only one part of Vitruvius’ text on the Atrium house cited above – could one really expect to get some sort of new understanding by comparing only two of the „literary methods“ employed by Renaissance architects in their attempt to understand Vitruvius. Can two samples be taken as representative for more than 50 – presumably: – different approaches? Here, at least, an explanation for the choice should be given.