The Ten Books on Architecture
replacing tiles, roof timbers, and rafters, we need not be so particular
about them as about the parts just mentioned, because they can easily be
replaced, however defective they may become. Hence, I have shown by what
methods the parts which are not considered solid can be rendered
durable, and how they are constructed.
9. As for the kind of material to be used, this does not depend upon the
architect, for the reason that all kinds of materials are not found in
all places alike, as has been shown in the first book. Besides, it
depends on the owner whether he desires to build in brick, or rubble
work, or dimension stone. Consequently the question of approving any
work may be considered under three heads: that is, delicacy of
workmanship, sumptuousness, and design. When it appears that a work has
been carried out sumptuously, the owner will be the person to be praised
for the great outlay which he has authorized; when delicately, the
master workman will be approved for his execution; but when proportions
and symmetry lend it an imposing effect, then the glory of it will
belong to the architect.
10. Such results, however, may very well be brought about when he allows
himself to take the advice both of workmen and of laymen. In fact, all
kinds of men, and not merely architects, can recognize a good piece of
work, but between laymen and the latter there is this difference, that
the layman cannot tell what it is to be like without seeing it finished,
whereas the architect, as soon as he has formed the conception, and
before he begins the work, has a definite idea of the beauty, the
convenience, and the propriety that will distinguish it.
I have now described as clearly as I could what I thought necessary for
private houses, and how to build them. In the following book I shall
treat of the kinds of polished finish employed to make them elegant, and
durable without defects to a great age.
BOOK VII
INTRODUCTION
1. It was a wise and useful provision of the ancients to transmit their
thoughts to posterity by recording them in treatises, so that they
should not be lost, but, being developed in succeeding generations
through publication in books, should gradually attain in later times, to
the highest refinement of learning. And so the ancients deserve no
ordinary, but unending thanks, because they did not pass on in envious
silence, but took care that their ideas of every kind should be
transmitted to the future in their writings.
2. If they had not done so, we could not have known what deeds were done
in Troy, nor what Thales, Democritus, Anaxagoras, Xenophanes, and the
other physicists thought about nature, and what rules Socrates, Plato,
Aristotle, Zeno, Epicurus, and other philosophers laid down for the
conduct of human life; nor would the deeds and motives of Croesus,
Alexander, Darius, and other kings have been known, unless the ancients
had compiled treatises, and published them in commentaries to be had in
universal remembrance with posterity.
3. So, while they deserve our thanks, those, on the contrary, deserve
our reproaches, who steal the writings of such men and publish them as
their own; and those also, who depend in their writings, not on their
own ideas, but who enviously do wrong to the works of others and boast
of it, deserve not merely to be blamed, but to be sentenced to actual
punishment for their wicked course of life. With the ancients, however,
it is said that such things did not pass without pretty strict
chastisement. What the results of their judgments were, it may not be
out of place to set forth as they are transmitted to us.
4. The kings of the house of Attalus having established, under the
influence of the great charms of literature, an excellent library at
Pergamus to give pleasure to the public, Ptolemy also was aroused with
no end of enthusiasm and emulation into exertions to make a similar
provision with no less diligence at Alexandria. Having done so with the
greatest care, he felt that this was not enough without providing for
its increase and development, for which he sowed the seed. He
established public contests in honour of the Muses and Apollo, and
appointed prizes and honours for victorious authors in general, as is
done in the case of athletes.
5. These arrangements having been made, and the contests being at hand,
it became necessary to select literary men as judges to decide them. The
king soon selected six of the citizens, but could not so easily find a
proper person to be the seventh. He therefore turned to those who
presided over the library, and asked whether they knew anybody who was
suitable for the purpose. Then they told him that there was one
Aristophanes who was daily engaged in reading through all the books with
the greatest enthusiasm and the greatest care. Hence, when the gathering
for the contests took place, and separate seats were set apart for the
judges, Aristophanes was summoned with the rest, and sat down in the
place assigned to him.
6. A group of poets was first brought in to contend, and, as they
recited their compositions, the whole audience by its applause showed
the judges what it approved. So, when they were individually asked for
their votes, the six agreed, and awarded the first prize to the poet
who, as they observed, had most pleased the multitude, and the second to
the one who came next. But Aristophanes, on being asked for his vote,
urged that the poet who had least pleased the audience should be
declared to be the first.
7. As the king and the entire assembly showed great indignation, he
arose, and asked and received permission to speak. Silence being
obtained, he stated that only one of them--his man--was a poet, and that
the rest had recited things not their own; furthermore, that judges
ought to give their approval, not to thefts, but to original
compositions. The people were amazed, and the king hesitated, but
Aristophanes, trusting to his memory, had a vast number of volumes
brought out from bookcases which he specified, and, by comparing them
with what had been recited, obliged the thieves themselves to make
confession. So, the king gave orders that they should be accused of
theft, and after condemnation sent them off in disgrace; but he honoured
Aristophanes with the most generous gifts, and put him in charge of the
library.
8. Some years later, Zoilus, who took the surname of Homeromastix, came
from Macedonia to Alexandria and read to the king his writings directed
against the Iliad and Odyssey. Ptolemy, seeing the father of poets and
captain of all literature abused in his absence, and his works, to which
all the world looked up in admiration, disparaged by this person, made
no rejoinder, although he thought it an outrage. Zoilus, however, after
remaining in the kingdom some time, sank into poverty, and sent a
message to the king, requesting that something might be bestowed upon
him.
9. But it is said that the king replied, that Homer, though dead a
thousand years ago, had all that time been the means of livelihood for
many thousands of men; similarly, a person who laid claim to higher
genius ought to be able to support not one man only, but many others.
And in short, various stories are told about his death, which was like
that of one found guilty of parricide. Some writers have said that he
was crucified by Philadelphus; others that he was stoned at Chios;
others again that he was thrown alive upon a funeral pyre at Smyrna.
Whichever of these forms of death befell him, it was a fitting
punishment and his just due; for one who accuses men that cannot answer
and show, face to face, what was the meaning of their writings,
obviously deserves no other treatment.
10. But for my part, Caesar, I am not bringing forward the present
treatise after changing the titles of other men's books and inserting my
own name, nor has it been my plan to win approbation by finding fault
with the ideas of another. On the contrary, I express unlimited thanks
to all the authors that have in the past, by compiling from antiquity
remarkable instances of the skill shown by genius, provided us with
abundant materials of different kinds. Drawing from them as it were
water from springs, and converting them to our own purposes, we find our
powers of writing rendered more fluent and easy, and, relying upon such
authorities, we venture to produce new systems of instruction.
11. Hence, as I saw that such beginnings on their part formed an
introduction suited to the nature of my own purpose, I set out to draw
from them, and to go somewhat further.
In the first place Agatharcus, in Athens, when Aeschylus was bringing
out a tragedy, painted a scene, and left a commentary about it. This led
Democritus and Anaxagoras to write on the same subject, showing how,
given a centre in a definite place, the lines should naturally
correspond with due regard to the point of sight and the divergence of
the visual rays, so that by this deception a faithful representation of
the appearance of buildings might be given in painted scenery, and so
that, though all is drawn on a vertical flat façade, some parts may seem
to be withdrawing into the background, and others to be standing out in
front.
12. Afterwards Silenus published a book on the proportions of Doric
structures; Theodorus, on the Doric temple of Juno which is in Samos;
Chersiphron and Metagenes, on the Ionic temple at Ephesus which is
Diana's; Pytheos, on the Ionic fane of Minerva which is at Priene;
Ictinus and Carpion, on the Doric temple of Minerva which is on the
acropolis of Athens; Theodorus the Phocian, on the Round Building which
is at Delphi; Philo, on the proportions of temples, and on the naval
arsenal which was[9] at the port of Peiraeus; Hermogenes, on the Ionic
temple of Diana which is at Magnesia, a pseudodipteral, and on that of
Father Bacchus at Teos, a monopteral; Arcesius, on the Corinthian
proportions, and on the Ionic temple of Aesculapius at Tralles, which it
is said that he built with his own hands; on the Mausoleum, Satyrus and
Pytheos who were favoured with the greatest and highest good fortune.
[Note 9: Codd. _fuerat_.]
13. For men whose artistic talents are believed to have won them the
highest renown for all time, and laurels forever green, devised and
executed works of supreme excellence in this building. The decoration
and perfection of the different façades were undertaken by different
artists in emulation with each other: Leochares, Bryaxis, Scopas,
Praxiteles, and, as some think, Timotheus; and the distinguished
excellence of their art made that building famous among the seven
wonders of the world.
14. Then, too, many less celebrated men have written treatises on the
laws of symmetry, such as Nexaris, Theocydes, Demophilus, Pollis,
Leonidas, Silanion, Melampus, Sarnacus, and Euphranor; others again on
machinery, such as Diades, Archytas, Archimedes, Ctesibius, Nymphodorus,
Philo of Byzantium, Diphilus, Democles, Charias, Polyidus, Pyrrus, and
Agesistratus. From their commentaries I have gathered what I saw was
useful for the present subject, and formed it into one complete
treatise, and this principally, because I saw that many books in this
field had been published by the Greeks, but very few indeed by our
countrymen. Fuficius, in fact, was the first to undertake to publish a
book on this subject. Terentius Varro, also, in his work "On the Nine
Sciences" has one book on architecture, and Publius Septimius, two.
15. But to this day nobody else seems to have bent his energies to this
branch of literature, although there have been, even among our
fellow-citizens in old times, great architects who could also have
written with elegance. For instance, in Athens, the architects