4

"The proportion remarks that Vitruvius coins to each architectural element that he de- scribes further underline this taking to pieces of archi- tectural entities."

Comment:
Would there be any alternative in describing (ancient) architecture in a way that other architects could reuse it as a model?

"It appears to be this breaking up of the architectural order that Vitruvius’s verbal descripttion brings about that directs or is carried on into Giovanni Battista’s drawing mode with his emphasis on the individual elements of the bases."

Comment:
What – if there would be one – would be the alternative? Why did Vitruvius add (the lost) drawings to his books if not to clarify visually what is difficult to describe verbally? So, isn't Giovanni Battista (and so many others) here following Vitruvius very exactly?

[What is the purpose of the short descriptions of the pages shown in the illustrations? They are hardly an in-depth analysis, rather a sketchy overview. Does an analysis of what the drawings mean, how they have been executed, if they differ from the text's descriptions etc. follow …?]