Vitruvius

A 1684 depiction of Vitruvius (right) presenting De Architectura to Augustus

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (born c. 80–70 BC, died after c. 15 BC), commonly known as Vitruvius, was a Roman author, architect, civil engineer and military engineer during the 1st century BC, known for his multi-volume work entitled De architectura.

By his own description[1] Vitruvius served as an artilleryman, the third class of arms in the military offices. He probably served as a senior officer of artillery in charge of doctores ballistarum (artillery experts) and libratores who actually operated the machines.[2]

Life and career

Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci, an illustration of the human body inscribed in the circle and the square derived from a passage about geometry and human proportions in Vitruvius' writings

Little is known about Vitruvius' life. Most inferences about him are extracted from his only surviving work De Architectura. His first name Marcus and his cognomen Pollio are uncertain. He was possibly a praefectus fabrum during military service or praefect architectus armamentarius of the apparitor status group. Cetius Faventinus speaks of "Vitruvius Polio aliique auctores" in his epitome; it is possible that the cognomen derives from this mention by Cetius, meaning Vitruvius, Polio, and others – further confusing the cognomen, an inscription in Verona names Lucius Vitruvius Cordo and an inscription from Thilbilis, North Africa (near Guelma[3]) names Marcus Vitruvius Mamurra. From this inscription the archaeologist Dr. G. Q. Giglioli nearly concludes that Vitruvius and Mamurra are from the same family; his argument is presented by Ettore Pais:

That [name is] very common in Formiae and [regions adjacent], as [well] Dr. Giglioli [observes], it [is] rare [elsewhere]. Indeed [so far], except for [some historical] figures, that, [as the] writer Vitruvius [and Vacca], Formiae belonged [to or who] are assigned [to] it, this [name] is not [natively] found [in] Numidia. [And only in] a epigraph of [this] region [Dr. Giglioli] has recovered the [memory of] a member [of] the [family] Mamurra Vitruvius." [and deduces] he is "[of the] same family as [the] well [known writer from] Formia.[4]

The Roman military officer Mamurra also served as praefectus fabrum in Hispania, Gaul and Pontus under Julius Caesar. Paul Thielscher moved the conclusions of Dr. Giglioli further and concluded that these two men are the same.[5] There are inconsistencies with this conclusion, such as there is no mention of Caesar's invasions of Britain in De Architectura, nor of other things with which Mamurra was associated, such as equestrian military practices, and a love for nepotism and personal wealth. Additionally, Caesar received a letter that can be inferred to have news of Mamurra's death, whereas Vitruvius dedicated De Architectura to the emperor Augustus.

He appears to be known to Pliny the Elder through his description of constructing mosaics in the Naturalis Historia.[6] Although he is not actually named in that passage, he does appear in Naturalis Historia 1 (the table of contents). Frontinus refers to "Vitruvius the architect" in his late 1st-century work De aquaeductu.

Likely born a free Roman citizen, by his own account, Vitruvius served the Roman army under Caesar with the otherwise poorly identified Marcus Aurelius, Publius Minidius, and Gnaeus Cornelius. These names vary depending on the edition of De architectura. Publius Minidius is also written as Publius Numidicus and Publius Numidius, speculated as the same Publius Numisius inscribed on the Roman Theatre at Heraclea.[7]

As an army engineer he specialized in the construction of ballista and scorpio artillery war machines for sieges. It is speculated that Vitruvius served with Caesar's chief engineer Lucius Cornelius Balbus.[8]

The locations where he served can be reconstructed from, for example, descriptions of the building methods of various "foreign tribes". Although he describes places throughout De Architectura, he does not say he was present. His service likely included north Africa, Hispania, Gaul (including Aquitaine) and Pontus.

To place the role of Vitruvius the military engineer in context, a description of "The Prefect of the camp" or army engineer is quoted here as given by Flavius Vegetius Renatus in The Military Institutions of the Romans:

The Prefect of the camp, though inferior in rank to the [Prefect], had a post of no small importance. The position of the camp, the direction of the entrenchments, the inspection of the tents or huts of the soldiers and the baggage were comprehended in his province. His authority extended over the sick, and the physicians who had the care of them; and he regulated the expenses relative thereto. He had the charge of providing carriages, bathhouses and the proper tools for sawing and cutting wood, digging trenches, raising parapets, sinking wells and bringing water into the camp. He likewise had the care of furnishing the troops with wood and straw, as well as the rams, onagri, balistae and all the other engines of war under his direction. This post was always conferred on an officer of great skill, experience and long service, and who consequently was capable of instructing others in those branches of the profession in which he had distinguished himself.[9]

At various locations described by Vitruvius, battles and sieges occurred. He is the only source for the siege of Larignum in 56 BC.[10] Of the battlegrounds of the Gallic War there are references to: the siege and massacre of the 40,000 residents at Avaricum in 52 BC; Vercingetorix commented that "the Romans did not conquer by valor nor in the field, but by a kind of art and skill in assault, with which they [Gauls] themselves were unacquainted."[11] The broken siege at Gergovia in 52 BC. The circumvallation and Battle of Alesia in 52 BC; the women and children of the encircled city were evicted to conserve food, where they starved to death between the opposing walls of the defenders and besiegers. And the siege of Uxellodunum in 51 BC. These are all sieges of large Gallic oppida. Of the sites involved in Caesar's civil war, we find the Siege of Massilia in 49 BC,[12] the Battle of Dyrrhachium of 48 BC (modern Albania), the Battle of Pharsalus in 48 BC (Hellas – Greece), the Battle of Zela of 47 BC (modern Turkey) and the Battle of Thapsus in 46 BC in Caesar's African campaign.[13] A legion that fits the same sequence of locations is the Legio VI Ferrata, of which ballista would be an auxiliary unit.

Mainly known for his writings, Vitruvius was himself an architect. In Roman times architecture was a broader subject than at present including the modern fields of architecture, construction management, construction engineering, chemical engineering, civil engineering, materials engineering, mechanical engineering, military engineering and urban planning;[14] architectural engineers consider him the first of their discipline, a specialization previously known as technical architecture. Frontinus mentions him in connection with the standard sizes of pipes.[15] He is often credited as father of architectural acoustics for describing the technique of echeas placement in theaters.[16] The only building, however, that we know Vitruvius to have worked on is one he tells us about,[17] a basilica completed in 19 BC.[18] It was built at Fanum Fortunae, now the modern town of Fano. The Basilica di Fano (to give the building its Italian name) has disappeared so completely that its very site is a matter of conjecture, although various attempts have been made to visualise it.[19] The early Christian practice of converting Roman basilicae (public buildings) into cathedrals implies the basilica may be incorporated into the cathedral located in Fano.

In later years the emperor Augustus, through his sister Octavia Minor, sponsored Vitruvius, entitling him with what may have been a pension to guarantee financial independence.[1] Whether De architectura was written by one author or is a compilation completed by subsequent librarians and copyists, remains an open question. The date of his death is unknown, which suggests that he had enjoyed only little popularity during his lifetime.

Gerolamo Cardano, in his 16th book De subtilitate rerum, ranks Vitruvius as one of the 12 persons whom he supposes to have excelled all men in the force of genius and invention; and would not have scrupled to have given him the first place, if it could be imagined that he had delivered nothing but his own discoveries.[20]

Vitruvius' De Architectura libri decem (De Architectura)

Roman house plan after Vitruvius
Further information: Mathematics and architecture

Vitruvius is the author of De architectura, known today as The Ten Books on Architecture,[21] a treatise written in Latin on architecture, dedicated to the emperor Augustus. In the preface of Book I, Vitruvius dedicates his writings so as to give personal knowledge of the quality of buildings to the emperor. Likely Vitruvius is referring to Marcus Agrippa's campaign of public repairs and improvements. This work is the only surviving major book on architecture from classical antiquity. According to Petri Liukkonen, this text "influenced deeply from the Early Renaissance onwards artists, thinkers, and architects, among them Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472), Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519), and Michelangelo (1475–1564)."[13] The next major book on architecture, Alberti's reformulation of Ten Books, was not written until 1452.

Vitruvius is famous for asserting in his book De architectura that a structure must exhibit the three qualities of firmitas, utilitas, venustas – that is, it must be solid, useful, beautiful. These are sometimes termed the Vitruvian virtues or the Vitruvian Triad. According to Vitruvius, architecture is an imitation of nature. As birds and bees built their nests, so humans constructed housing from natural materials, that gave them shelter against the elements. When perfecting this art of building, the Greeks invented the architectural orders: Doric, Ionic and Corinthian. It gave them a sense of proportion, culminating in understanding the proportions of the greatest work of art: the human body. This led Vitruvius in defining his Vitruvian Man, as drawn later by Leonardo da Vinci: the human body inscribed in the circle and the square (the fundamental geometric patterns of the cosmic order).

Vitruvius is sometimes loosely referred to as the first architect, but it is more accurate to describe him as the first Roman architect to have written surviving records of his field. He himself cites older but less complete works. He was less an original thinker or creative intellect than a codifier of existing architectural practice. It should also be noted that Vitruvius had a much wider scope than modern architects. Roman architects practised a wide variety of disciplines; in modern terms, they could be described as being engineers, architects, landscape architects, artists, and craftsmen combined. Etymologically the word architect derives from Greek words meaning 'master' and 'builder'. The first of the Ten Books deals with many subjects which now come within the scope of landscape architecture.

Roman technology

Drainage wheel from Rio Tinto mines

Books VIII, IX and X form the basis of much of what we know about Roman technology, now augmented by archaeological studies of extant remains, such as the water mills at Barbegal in France. The other major source of information is the Naturalis Historia compiled by Pliny the Elder much later in c. 75 AD.

Machines

The work is important for its descriptions of the many different machines used for engineering structures such as hoists, cranes and pulleys, as well as war machines such as catapults, ballistae, and siege engines. As a practising engineer, Vitruvius must be speaking from personal experience rather than simply describing the works of others. He also describes the construction of sundials and water clocks, and the use of an aeolipile (the first steam engine) as an experiment to demonstrate the nature of atmospheric air movements (wind).

Aqueducts

His description of aqueduct construction includes the way they are surveyed, and the careful choice of materials needed, although Frontinus (a general who was appointed in the late 1st century AD to administer the many aqueducts of Rome), writing a century later, gives much more detail of the practical problems involved in their construction and maintenance. Surely Vitruvius' book would have been of great assistance in this. Vitruvius was writing in the 1st century BC when many of the finest Roman aqueducts were built, and survive to this day, such as those at Segovia and the Pont du Gard. The use of the inverted siphon is described in detail, together with the problems of high pressures developed in the pipe at the base of the siphon, a practical problem with which he seems to be acquainted.

Materials

He describes many different construction materials used for a wide variety of different structures, as well as such details as stucco painting. Concrete and lime receive in-depth descriptions, the longevity of many Roman structures being mute testimony to the Romans' skill in building materials and design.

Vitruvius is well known and often cited as one of the earliest surviving sources to have advised that lead should not be used to conduct drinking water, recommending clay pipes or masonry channels. He comes to this conclusion in Book VIII of De Architectura after empirical observation of the apparent laborer illnesses in the lead foundries of his time.[22]

Vitruvius gives us the famous story about Archimedes and his detection of adulterated gold in a royal crown. When Archimedes realised that the volume of the crown could be measured exactly by the displacement created in a bath of water, he ran into the street with the cry of Eureka!, and the discovery enabled him to compare the density of the crown with pure gold. He showed that the crown had been alloyed with silver, and the king defrauded.

Dewatering machines

Design for an Archimedean water-screw

He describes the construction of Archimedes' screw in Chapter X (without mentioning Archimedes by name). It was a device widely used for raising water to irrigate fields and drain mines. Other lifting machines he mentions include the endless chain of buckets and the reverse overshot water-wheel. Remains of the water wheels used for lifting water were discovered when old mines were re-opened at Rio Tinto in Spain, Rosia Montana in Romania and Dolaucothi in west Wales. The Rio Tinto wheel is now shown in the British Museum, and the Dolaucothi specimen in the National Museum of Wales.

Surveying instruments

That he must have been well practised in surveying is shown by his descriptions of surveying instruments, especially the water level or chorobates, which he compares favourably with the groma, a device using plumb lines. They were essential in all building operations, but especially in aqueduct construction, where a uniform gradient was important to the provision of a regular supply of water without damage to the walls of the channel. He also developed one of the first odometers, consisting of a wheel of known circumference that dropped a pebble into a container on every rotation.

Central heating

Ruins of the hypocaust under the floor of a Roman villa. The part under the exedra is covered.

He describes the many innovations made in building design to improve the living conditions of the inhabitants. Foremost among them is the development of the hypocaust, a type of central heating where hot air developed by a fire was channelled under the floor and inside the walls of public baths and villas. He gives explicit instructions how to design such buildings so that fuel efficiency is maximised, so that for example, the caldarium is next to the tepidarium followed by the frigidarium. He also advises on using a type of regulator to control the heat in the hot rooms, a bronze disc set into the roof under a circular aperture which could be raised or lowered by a pulley to adjust the ventilation. Although he does not suggest it himself, it is likely that his dewatering devices such as the reverse overshot water-wheel was used in the larger baths to lift water to header tanks at the top of the larger thermae, such as the Baths of Diocletian. The one which was used in Bath of Caracalla for grinding flour.

Lists of names given in Book VII Introduction

In book seven's introduction Vitruvius goes to great lengths to present why he is qualified to write De Architectura. This is the only location in the book where Vitruvius specifically addresses his personal breadth of knowledge. Similar to a modern reference section, the author's position as one who is knowledgeable and educated is established. The topics range across many fields of expertise reflecting that in Roman times as today construction is a diverse field. Vitruvius is clearly a well-read man.

In addition to providing his qualification, Vitruvius summarizes a recurring theme throughout the 10 books, a non-trivial and core contribution of his treatise outside simply a construction book. Vitruvius makes the point that the work of some of the most talented are unknown, while many who are of lesser talent but greater political position are famous.[21] This theme runs through Vitruvius’s ten books repeatedly - echoing an implicit prediction that his works and himself will also be unknown. Which was true for over a thousand years after he completed the 10 books.

Vitruvius illustrates this point by naming what he considers are the most talented individuals in history.[21] Implicitly challenging the reader that they have never heard of some of these people. Vitruvius goes on and predicts that some of these individuals will be forgotten and their works will be lost. While other less deserving political characters of history will be forever remembered with pageantry - again a non-trivial claim when we remember that this is the builder of Julius Caesar's war machines and fortifications; the inclusion of this list is important to illustrate the truth of Vitruvius's claim and should not be removed.

Rediscovery

Battle of Thapsus as depicted in an engraving after Andrea Palladio
The interior of the Pantheon (from an 18th-century painting by Panini). Although built after Vitruvius' death, its excellent state of preservation makes it of great importance to those interested in Vitruvian architecture

His book De architectura was rediscovered in 1414 by the Florentine humanist Poggio Bracciolini. To Leon Battista Alberti (1404–1472) falls the honour of making this work widely known in his seminal treatise on architecture De re aedificatoria (c. 1450). The first known edition of Vitruvius was in Rome by Fra Giovanni Sulpitius in 1486.[23][24] Translations followed in Italian (Como, 1521), French (Jean Martin, 1547,[25] English, German (Walter H. Ryff, 1543) and Spanish and several other languages. The original illustrations had been lost and the first illustrated edition was published in Venice in 1511 with woodcut illustrations, based on descriptions in the text, probably by Fra Giovanni Giocondo.[26] Later in the 16th-century Andrea Palladio provided illustrations for Daniele Barbaro's commentary on Vitruvius (which appeared in Italian and Latin versions). However, the most famous illustration remains a 15th-century one, Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man.

The surviving ruins of Roman antiquity, the Roman Forum, temples, theatres, triumphal arches and their reliefs and statues gave ample visual examples of the descriptions in the Vitruvian text. This book then quickly became a major inspiration for Renaissance, Baroque and Neoclassical architecture. Filippo Brunelleschi, for example, invented a new type of hoist to lift the large stones for the dome of the cathedral in Florence and was inspired by De Architectura as well as viewing the many surviving Roman monuments like the Pantheon and the Baths of Diocletian in Rome.

Legacy

See also

References

  1. 1 2 De Arch. Book 1, preface. section 2
  2. ↑ Yann Le Bohec "The Imperial Roman Army" Routledge, pg 49 2000 ISBN 0-415-22295-8
  3. ↑ History of ancient North Africa: CONFLICTS AND BATTLES OF THE HUMANITY, Ancient North Africa until the Roman conquest, last assessed 10/09/2011. http://miltiade.pagesperso-orange.fr/GB/Ancient_North_Africa.htm
  4. ↑ Pais, E. Ricerche sulla storia e sul diritto publico di Roma (Rome, 1916).
  5. ↑ Vitruvius Pollio http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Vitruvius.aspx
  6. ↑ Moore, Richard E. M. (January 1968). "A Newly Observed Stratum in Roman Floor Mosaics". American Journal of Archaeology (Archaeological Institute of America) 72 (1): 57–68. JSTOR 501823.
  7. ↑ Niccolò Marcello Venuti Description of the First Discoveries of the Ancient City of Heraclea, Found Near Portici A Country Palace Belonging to the King of the Two Sicilies published by R. Baldwin, translated by Wickes Skurray, 1750. p62
  8. ↑ Trumbull, David (2007). "Classical Sources, Greek and Roman Esthetics Reading: The Grand Tour Reader; Vitruvius Background: Life of Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (c. 90–20 BC)". An Epitome of Book III of Vitruvius. Archived from the original on 9 June 2011. Retrieved 2009-11-18.
  9. ↑ Flavius Vegetius Renatus The Military Institutions of the Romans Translated from the Latin by Lieutenant John Clarke, Text written in 390 BC. British translation published in 1767. Copyright Expired, http://www.digitalattic.org/home/war/vegetius/
  10. ↑ Planning the twentieth-century American city By Mary Corbin Sies, Christopher Silver, JHU Press, 1996, page 42. https://books.google.com/books?id=TUpLvJrKc64C&lpg=PA42&dq=battle%20of%20Larignum&pg=PA42#v=onepage&q=battle%20of%20Larignum&f=false
  11. ↑ Caesar, De bello Gallico 7.29
  12. ↑ Vitruvius mentions Massilia several times, and the siege itself in Book X.
  13. 1 2 Liukkonen, Petri. "Vitruvius". Books and Writers (kirjasto.sci.fi). Finland: Kuusankoski Public Library. Archived from the original on 10 February 2015.
  14. ↑ The "Vitruvius Project" at Carnegie Mellon University, Computer Science Department This software engineering project sees itself in the Vitruvian tradition. Accessed August 2008
  15. ↑ De Aquis, I.25 (Latin) ebook of work also known as De aquaeductu, accessed August 2008
  16. ↑ Reed Business Information (21 November 1974). New Scientist. Reed Business Information. pp. 552–. ISSN 0262-4079. Retrieved 6 May 2013.
  17. ↑ (De Arch., Book V.i.6) (Latin) but with link to English translation, accessed August 2008
  18. ↑ Fausto Pugnaloni and Paolo Clini "Vitruvius Basilica in Fano, Italy, journey through the virtual space of the reconstructed memory" GISdevelopment.net last accessed 3/8/2008
  19. ↑ P. Clini "VITRUVIUS’ BASILICA AT FANO: THE DRAWINGS OF A LOST BUILDING FROM DE ARCHITECTURA LIBRI DECEM" The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences, Vol. XXXIV, Part 5/W12 pp121 – 126 2002
  20. ↑ Charles Hutton, Mathematical and Philosophical Dictionary (1795)
  21. 1 2 3 Vitruvius, Pollio (transl. Morris Hicky Morgan, 1960), The Ten Books on Architecture. Courier Dover Publications. ISBN 0-486-20645-9.
  22. ↑ Hodge, Trevor, A. (October 1981). "Vitruvius, Lead Pipes and Lead Poisoning". American Journal of Archaeology (Archaeological Institute of America) 85 (4): 486–491. JSTOR 504874.
  23. ↑ http://www.palladiancenter.org/predecessors.html
  24. ↑ http://www.historyofinformation.com/index.php?id=2840
  25. ↑ Architectura – Les livres d'Architecture (French)
  26. ↑ Architectura – Les livres d'Architecture; Center for Palladian Studies in America, Inc., Palladio's Literary Predecessors
  27. ↑ "Den Danske Vitruvius". AOK. Retrieved 2009-06-23.

Sources

  • Indra Kagis McEwen, Vitruvius: Writing the Body of Architecture. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004. ISBN O-262-63306-X
  • B. Baldwin, "The Date, Identity, and Career of Vitruvius." In Latomus 49 (1990), 425–34.
  • Kai Brodersen & Christiane Brodersen: Cetius Faventinus. Das römische Eigenheim / De architectura privata, Latin and German. Wiesbaden: Marix 2015, ISBN 978-3-7374-0998-8

External links

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