Vitruvius On Architecture

VITRUVIUS ON ARCHITECTURE EDITED FROM THE HARLEIAN MANUSCRIPT 2767 AI TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH BY FRANK GRANGER, D. Lrr., AJLLB. A. PROFESSOR IN UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, NOTTINGHAM IN TWO VOLUMES I CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS LONDON WILLIAM HEINEMANN LTD MCMLV CONTENTS PAQK PREFACE vii INTRODUCTION VITRUVIUS AND THE ARCHITECTURE OF THE WEST ...... ix HISTORY OF THE MSS. OF VITRUVIUS . X i THE EARLIEST EDITIONS OF VITRUVIUS . XXi THE SCHOLIA OF THE MSS. . . . XXV - THE ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE MSS. . . XXVli THE LANGUAGE OF VITRUVIUS . . . XXViii BIBLIOGRAPHY THE MSS. . . . . . . XXXli EDITIONS ...... xxxiii TRANSLATIONS XXXiii THE CHIEF CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE STUDY OF VITRUVIUS ..... xxxiv BOOKS OF GENERAL REFERENCE . . XXXVi TEXT AND ENGLISH TRANSLATION BOOK I. ARCHITECTURAL PRINCIPLES . 1 BOOK II. EVOLUTION OF BUILDING USE OF MATERIALS . . . . 71 BOOK III. IONIC TEMPLES . . . 151 BOOK IV. DORIC AND CORINTHIAN TEMPLES 199 BOOK V. PUBLIC BUILDINGS I THEATRES AND MUSIC, BATHS, HARBOURS . 249 INDEX OF ARCHITECTURAL TERMS 319 CONTENTS ILLUSTRATIONS THE CAPITOL DOUGGA . Frontispiece PLATE A. WINDS AND DIRECTION OF STREETS at end PLATE B. PLANS OF TEMPLES . . . PLATE C. IONIC ORDER . . . . PLATE 0. CORINTHIAN ORDER see Frontispiece PLATE E. DORIC ORDER . . . at end PLATE F. MUSICAL SCALES . , . , PLATE O. THEATRE . . . . . PLATE H. PLAN OF STABIAN BATHS, POMPEII . vi PREFACE THIS edition has been based upon the oldest MS. of Vitruvius, the Harleian 2767 of the British Museum, probably of the eighth century, and from the Saxon scriptorium of Northumbria in which the Codex Amiatinus was written. The Latin closely resembles that of the workshop and the street. In my translation I have sought to retain the vividness and accuracy of the original, and have not sought a smoothness of rendering which would become a more polished style. The reader, it is possible, may discern the genial figure of Vitruvius through his utterances. In a technical treatise the risks of the translator are many. The help of Dr. House has rendered them less formidable, but he is not responsible for the errors which have survived revision. The introduction has been limited to such con siderations as may enable the layman to enter into the mysteries of the craft, and the general reader to follow the stages by which the successive accretions to the text have been removed. The section upon language indicates some of the relations of Vitruvius to Old Latin generally. My examination of fourteen MSS. has been rendered possible by the courtesy of the Directors of the MSS. Libraries at the British Museum, the Vatican, the Escorial, the Bibliotheque Nationale vii PREFACE at Paris, the Bodleian, St. Johns College, Oxford, and Eton College. A word of special thanks is due to his Excellency the Spanish Ambassador to London, his Eminence the Cardinal Merry del Val and the Secretary of the British Embassy at Paris, for their assistance. Mr. Paul Gray, M. A., of this College, has given me valuable help in preparing the MS. for the press. FRANK GRANGER. UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, NOTTINGHAM, September, 1929. viii INTRODUCTION VlTRUVIUS AND THE ARCHITECTURE OP THE WEST THE history of architectural literature is taken by Vitruvius to begin with the theatre of Dionysus at Athens. 1 In earlier times the spectators were accommodated upon wooden benches. According to one account, 2 in the year 500 B. C. or thereabouts, the scaffolding collapsed, and in consequence a beginning was made towards a permanent stone structure. The elaborate stage settings of Aeschylus reached their culmination at the performance of the Agamemnon and its associated plays in 458. According to Suidas, 3 the collapse of the scaffolding, which occurred at a performance of one of Aeschylus dramas, led to the exile of the poet in Sicily, where he died in 456. In that case the permanent con struction of the theatre would begin in the Periclean age some time between 458 and 456...