M. Vitruvius per Iocundum solito castigatior factus cum figuris et tabula ut iam legi et intelligi possit

reasoning, however, is that which demonstrates and is able to explain the constructed things by skill and the reason of proportion. Therefore, those architects who have striven without letters book learning, as if they were exercised only by their hands, have not been able to achieve authority for their labors. Those who have trusted only in reasoning and letters seem to pursue a shadow, not the thing itself. But those who have learned both, as if armed with all weapons, have more quickly and with authority achieved what was proposed. Since in all things, but especially in architecture, these two are present: that which is signified, and that which signifies. The thing proposed is signified, about which one speaks. The demonstration explained by the reasoning of doctrines signifies this. Therefore, it seems that he who professes to be an architect must be exercised in both parts. Therefore, it is necessary for him to be both talented and docile to discipline. For neither talent without discipline, nor discipline without talent, can make a perfect artisan. And that he may be literate, skilled in drawing, learned in geometry, not ignorant of optics, instructed in arithmetic, knowing many histories, having diligently listened to philosophers, knowing music, not ignorant of medicine, knowing the responses of lawyers, and having knowledge of astrology and the laws of the sky. The reasons why this is so are these: It is necessary for an architect to know letters, so that he may make his memory firmer through commentaries. Then, to have the knowledge of drawing, so that he may more easily be able to design the appearance of the work he wants through painted examples. Geometry provides many aids to architecture: and first, it teaches the use of the compass from straight lines; from which, descriptions of buildings on sites, and the directions of squares, levels, and lines, are most easily expedited. Also through optics, 1.2 lights are correctly led into buildings from certain regions of the sky. Through arithmetic, the costs of buildings are consumed: the ratios of measurements are explained, and difficult questions of symmetries are found by geometric methods. It is necessary to know many histories, because architects often design many ornaments in their works, about which they must render the reason for what they have done to those who ask. Just as if someone were to set up marble statues of women in stoles long robes, which are called caryatides caryatids, instead of columns in a work, and placed over them mutules and crowns, he will render the reason to those inquiring thus: Carya, a city of the Peloponnese, consented with the Persian enemies against Greece. Afterward, the Greeks, gloriously liberated from war by victory, proclaimed war upon the Caryatids by common counsel. Thus, with the town captured, the men killed, and the city destroyed, they led their matrons into slavery. Nor did they suffer them to put down their stoles or matronly ornaments; so that they might not be led in one triumph, but as an eternal example of servitude, pressed by heavy humiliation, they might be seen to pay the penalty for the city. Therefore, the architects who were there then designed their images on public buildings placed to carry the load, so that the penalty of the sin of the Caryatids might be handed down to memory even to posterity.