The Ten Books on Architecture
CHAPTER I
ON SYMMETRY: IN TEMPLES AND IN THE HUMAN BODY
1. The design of a temple depends on symmetry, the principles of which
must be most carefully observed by the architect. They are due to
proportion, in Greek [Greek: analogia]. Proportion is a correspondence
among the measures of the members of an entire work, and of the whole to
a certain part selected as standard. From this result the principles of
symmetry. Without symmetry and proportion there can be no principles in
the design of any temple; that is, if there is no precise relation
between its members, as in the case of those of a well shaped man.
2. For the human body is so designed by nature that the face, from the
chin to the top of the forehead and the lowest roots of the hair, is a
tenth part of the whole height; the open hand from the wrist to the tip
of the middle finger is just the same; the head from the chin to the
crown is an eighth, and with the neck and shoulder from the top of the
breast to the lowest roots of the hair is a sixth; from the middle of
the breast to the summit of the crown is a fourth. If we take the height
of the face itself, the distance from the bottom of the chin to the
under side of the nostrils is one third of it; the nose from the under
side of the nostrils to a line between the eyebrows is the same; from
there to the lowest roots of the hair is also a third, comprising the
forehead. The length of the foot is one sixth of the height of the body;
of the forearm, one fourth; and the breadth of the breast is also one
fourth. The other members, too, have their own symmetrical proportions,
and it was by employing them that the famous painters and sculptors of
antiquity attained to great and endless renown.
3. Similarly, in the members of a temple there ought to be the greatest
harmony in the symmetrical relations of the different parts to the
general magnitude of the whole. Then again, in the human body the
central point is naturally the navel. For if a man be placed flat on his
back, with his hands and feet extended, and a pair of compasses centred
at his navel, the fingers and toes of his two hands and feet will touch
the circumference of a circle described therefrom. And just as the human
body yields a circular outline, so too a square figure may be found from
it. For if we measure the distance from the soles of the feet to the top
of the head, and then apply that measure to the outstretched arms, the
breadth will be found to be the same as the height, as in the case of
plane surfaces which are perfectly square.
4. Therefore, since nature has designed the human body so that its
members are duly proportioned to the frame as a whole, it appears that
the ancients had good reason for their rule, that in perfect buildings
the different members must be in exact symmetrical relations to the
whole general scheme. Hence, while transmitting to us the proper
arrangements for buildings of all kinds, they were particularly careful
to do so in the case of temples of the gods, buildings in which merits
and faults usually last forever.
5. Further, it was from the members of the body that they derived the
fundamental ideas of the measures which are obviously necessary in all
works, as the finger, palm, foot, and cubit. These they apportioned so
as to form the "perfect number," called in Greek [Greek: teleion], and
as the perfect number the ancients fixed upon ten. For it is from the
number of the fingers of the hand that the palm is found, and the foot
from the palm. Again, while ten is naturally perfect, as being made up
by the fingers of the two palms, Plato also held that this number was
perfect because ten is composed of the individual units, called by the
Greeks [Greek: monades]. But as soon as eleven or twelve is reached, the
numbers, being excessive, cannot be perfect until they come to ten for
the second time; for the component parts of that number are the
individual units.
6. The mathematicians, however, maintaining a different view, have said
that the perfect number is six, because this number is composed of
integral parts which are suited numerically to their method of
reckoning: thus, one is one sixth; two is one third; three is one half;
four is two thirds, or [Greek: dimoiros] as they call it; five is five
sixths, called [Greek: pentamoiros]; and six is the perfect number. As
the number goes on growing larger, the addition of a unit above six is
the [Greek: ephektos]; eight, formed by the addition of a third part of
six, is the integer and a third, called [Greek: epitritos]; the addition
of one half makes nine, the integer and a half, termed [Greek:
hêmiolios]; the addition of two thirds, making the number ten, is the
integer and two thirds, which they call [Greek: epidimoiros]; in the
number eleven, where five are added, we have the five sixths, called
[Greek: epipemptos]; finally, twelve, being composed of the two simple
integers, is called [Greek: diplasios].
7. And further, as the foot is one sixth of a man's height, the height
of the body as expressed in number of feet being limited to six, they
held that this was the perfect number, and observed that the cubit
consisted of six palms or of twenty-four fingers. This principle seems
to have been followed by the states of Greece. As the cubit consisted of
six palms, they made the drachma, which they used as their unit, consist
in the same way of six bronze coins, like our _asses_, which they call
obols; and, to correspond to the fingers, divided the drachma into
twenty-four quarter-obols, which some call dichalca others trichalca.
8. But our countrymen at first fixed upon the ancient number and made
ten bronze pieces go to the denarius, and this is the origin of the name
which is applied to the denarius to this day. And the fourth part of it,
consisting of two asses and half of a third, they called "sesterce." But
later, observing that six and ten were both of them perfect numbers,
they combined the two, and thus made the most perfect number, sixteen.
They found their authority for this in the foot. For if we take two
palms from the cubit, there remains the foot of four palms; but the palm
contains four fingers. Hence the foot contains sixteen fingers, and the
denarius the same number of bronze _asses_.
9. Therefore, if it is agreed that number was found out from the human
fingers, and that there is a symmetrical correspondence between the
members separately and the entire form of the body, in accordance with a
certain part selected as standard, we can have nothing but respect for
those who, in constructing temples of the immortal gods, have so
arranged the members of the works that both the separate parts and the
whole design may harmonize in their proportions and symmetry.
CHAPTER II
CLASSIFICATION OF TEMPLES
1. There are certain elementary forms on which the general aspect of a
temple depends. First there is the temple in antis, or [Greek: naos en
parastasin] as it is called in Greek; then the prostyle, amphiprostyle,
peripteral, pseudodipteral, dipteral, and hypaethral. These different
forms may be described as follows.
2. It will be a temple in antis when it has antae carried out in front
of the walls which enclose the cella, and in the middle, between the
antae, two columns, and over them the pediment constructed in the
symmetrical proportions to be described later in this work. An example
will be found at the Three Fortunes, in that one of the three which is
nearest the Colline gate.
3. The prostyle is in all respects like the temple in antis, except that
at the corners, opposite the antae, it has two columns, and that it has
architraves not only in front, as in the case of the temple in antis,
but also one to the right and one to the left in the wings. An example
of this is the temple of Jove and Faunus in the Island of the Tiber.
4. The amphiprostyle is in all other respects like the prostyle, but has
besides, in the rear, the same arrangement of columns and pediment.
5. A temple will be peripteral that has six columns in front and six in
the rear, with eleven on each side including the corner columns. Let
the columns be so placed as to leave a space, the width of an
intercolumniation, all round between the walls and the rows of columns
on the outside, thus forming a walk round the cella of the temple, as
in the cases of the temple of Jupiter Stator by Hermodorus in the
Portico of Metellus, and the Marian temple of Honour and Valour
constructed by Mucius, which has no portico in the rear.
6. The pseudodipteral is so constructed that in front and in the rear
there are in each case eight columns, with fifteen on each side,
including the corner columns. The walls of the cella in front and in the
rear should be directly over against the four middle columns. Thus there
will be a space, the width of two intercolumniations plus the thickness
of the lower diameter of a column, all round between the walls and the
rows of columns on the outside. There is no example of this in Rome, but
at Magnesia there is the temple of Diana by Hermogenes, and that of
Apollo at Alabanda by Mnesthes.
7. The dipteral also is octastyle in both front and rear porticoes, but
it has two rows of columns all round the temple, like the temple of
Quirinus, which is Doric, and the temple of Diana at Ephesus, planned by
Chersiphron, which is Ionic.
8. The hypaethral is decastyle in both front and rear porticoes. In
everything else it is the same as the dipteral, but inside it has two
tiers of columns set out from the wall all round, like the colonnade of
a peristyle. The central part is open to the sky, without a roof.
Folding doors lead to it at each end, in the porticoes in front and in
the rear. There is no example of this sort in Rome, but in Athens there
is the octastyle in the precinct of the Olympian.
CHAPTER III
THE PROPORTIONS OF INTERCOLUMNIATIONS AND OF COLUMNS
1. There are five classes of temples, designated as follows: pycnostyle,
with the columns close together; systyle, with the intercolumniations a
little wider; diastyle, more open still; araeostyle, farther apart than
they ought to be; eustyle, with the intervals apportioned just right.
2. The pycnostyle is a temple in an intercolumniation of which the
thickness of a column and a half can be inserted: for example, the
temple of the Divine Caesar, that of Venus in Caesar's forum, and others
constructed like them. The systyle is a temple in which the thickness
of two columns can be placed in an intercolumniation, and in which the
plinths of the bases are equivalent to the distance between two plinths:
for example, the temple of Equestrian Fortune near the stone theatre,
and the others which are constructed on the same principles.
3. These two kinds have practical disadvantages. When the matrons mount
the steps for public prayer or thanksgiving, they cannot pass through
the intercolumniations with their arms about one another, but must form
single file; then again, the effect of the folding doors is thrust out
of sight by the crowding of the columns, and likewise the statues are
thrown into shadow; the narrow space interferes also with walks round
the temple.
4. The construction will be diastyle when we can insert the thickness of
three columns in an intercolumniation, as in the case of the temple of
Apollo and Diana. This arrangement involves the danger that the
architraves may break on account of the great width of the intervals.