Information AboutVitruvius |
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He was born as free Roman citizen in Campania . He is believed to have served in the Roman Army in Spain and Gaul under Julius Caesar . He was probably one of the army engineers, constructing war machines for sieges. In later years he was employed by his sponsor, the emperor Augustus , entitled with a pension to guarantee his financial independence. His date of death is unknown, which suggests that he had enjoyed only little popularity during lifetime. He was the author of '' at Fanum Fortunae, now the modern town of Fano . The basilica has disappeared so completely that its very site is a matter of conjecture. '', by Leonardo da Vinci]] Vitruvius is most 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 strong or durable, useful, and beautiful. 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, they invented the architectural orders: , as drawn magnificently 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 on his field. He himself cites older works, but less complete. 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 practiced a wide variety of disciplines; in modern terms, they could be described as being Engineer s, architects, Landscape Architects , Artist s, and Craftsmen combined. Etymologically the word architect derives from Greek words meaning 'head' and 'builder'. His book "De Architectura" was rediscovered in 1414 by the Florentine humanist Poggio Bracciolini . To Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472) befalls the honour to make this work widely known in his seminal treatise on architecture ''De Re Aedificatoria'' (ca. 1450). The first known edition of Vitruvius was in Rome by Fra Giovanni Sulpitius in 1486. Translations followed in Italian (ca. 1520), French (Jacques Martin, 1547), English, German (Walter H. Rivius, 1575) and Spanish and several other languages. The original illustrations had been lost. New woodcut illustrations, based on descriptions in the text, were added in the 16th century, probably by Fra Giovanni Giocondo in Venice in 1511. 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. REFERENCE WORKS
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