Vitruvius Without Text: The Biography of a Book
by André Tavares
gta Verlag, July 2022

Paperback | 4-1/2 x 6-3/4 inches | 250 pages | 61 illustrations | English | ISBN: 9783856764227 | $30

PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION:
Vitruvius?s De Architectura, written in the first century BCE, has been revered as the first treatise on architectural theory. Since its resurrection during the Renaissance, the enigmatic text has been adjusted, refined, and redefined in subsequent iterations. This book bypasses exegeses of the text to focus on the material history of the printed editions disseminated throughout Europe. It surveys over a hundred editions of Vitruvius from 1486 to the present, tracing the power of the printed page in establishing the Roman author as an authority. Focusing on the impact of the physical objects that embody the Vitruvian canon, Vitruvius Without Text highlights how book history and architectural history cross paths while illuminating how a symbiotic relationship emerges between the printed and the built. André Tavares is an architect and founding director of Dafne Editora, an independent publishing house in Portugal.
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REVIEW:
Number 26 of Richard Weston's 100 Ideas that Changed Architecture is "Commodity, Firmness, and Delight," attributed to Sir Henry Wotton in his 1624 book, The Elements of Architecture, a "free translation of the Roman architect Vitruvius's De Architectura, now universally known as the Ten ...