TY - BOOK ID - 58812341 TI - Author and audience in Vitruvius' De architectura AU - Nichols, Marden Fitzpatrick AU - Cambridge University Press PY - 2017 SN - 9781107003125 1108546765 0511758596 1108547869 9780511758591 1107003121 1108969259 PB - Cambridge [etc] Cambridge university press DB - UniCat KW - Authors and readers KW - Architecture and society KW - Architecture KW - Architecture and sociology KW - Society and architecture KW - Sociology and architecture KW - Readers and authors KW - Authorship KW - Social aspects KW - Human factors KW - Vitruvius Pollio. KW - Criticism, Textual. KW - E-books UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:58812341 AB - Vitruvius' De architectura is the only extant classical text on architecture, and its impact on Renaissance masters including Leonardo da Vinci is well-known. But what was the text's purpose in its own time (ca. 20s BCE)? In this book, Marden Fitzpatrick Nichols reveals how Vitruvius pitched the Greek discipline of architecture to his Roman readers, most of whom were undoubtedly laymen. The inaccuracy of Vitruvius' architectural rules, when compared with surviving ancient buildings, has knocked Vitruvius off his pedestal. Nichols argues that the author never intended to provide an accurate view of contemporary buildings. Instead, Vitruvius crafted his authorial persona and remarks on architecture to appeal to elites (and would-be elites) eager to secure their positions within an expanding empire. In this major new analysis of De architectura from archaeological and literary perspectives, Vitruvius emerges as a knowing critic of a social landscape in which the house made the man. ER -