Architettura con il suo commento et figure Vetruvio in volgar lingua raportato

stand and learn the infinity of causes for the sake of health, and it has never yet appeared clearly who has been the most capable. Since these aforementioned false Architects exist, they should be deposed of the title and called merely builders of masons or laborers, and not Architects, because it is given by public laws that one should not feign and adorn unworthily, so that the true students of such science may more magnanimously arrive with summa doctrine at the true and excellent doctorate, or rather at the supreme name of Architect. And thus, taking these ordinations and consequences, the centuries would not be so long in producing diligent and true Architects. But the builders of works are also named from ἀρχιτέκτων architect, or rather ἀρχιτέκτων in Greek, which in Latin means Author, Prince, and Ruler; τέκτων carpenter/builder, or in Latin a craftsman, almost like a prince or master of Craftsmen, and also the principal of Architecture or preservation. Can he also be called an Architect from τέκτων, which in Latin signifies Fabrico Tectonicos, that is, craftsmanship? τέκτων, but a craftsman is called the master of timber, under which art almost all artificers and manual laborers are subjected for the use of our human life: which these excellent ones deserve, as Aristotle says in the first book of the Politics: "Men who watch with reason and with intellect are naturally Patrons and Rulers of others." Seeing as the ruler is naturally more worthy than the ruled, because to rule is a divine thing. And therefore this does not seem to us a thing to be chosen, as virtue is better than art. But because that is best which not only uses virtue for itself, but also for others; and thus also to the contrary, as we have in the eighth book of the Physics, the wise man sometimes sins when he uses his science perversely. And therefore, since man is a rational and political animal, and endowed by nature with many intelligences in doctrines and arts, it is necessary that everyone naturally inclines in this world to some operation for some effect of his, shunning idleness, and as a supplement to natural lack, using life to observe for life: not only for us present, but for the successors, as it has always been since eternity. Because in the second book of the Metaphysics, "The action of the intellect is life." Therefore, Vitruvius, speculating with every thought that the science of Architecture is necessary for the use of the common life of men, and of all living creatures and things grateful to us, has with great reason wanted to write it faithfully. And with which sciences and instructions it is adorned, he has here treated diligently. And therefore you, not only mechanics, but all professors of the good sciences, and in species you Lords of the Military art, do not be discordant or slow to understand this science, so that you do not remain unlearned from the ingenuity which certainly surpasses the forces that one might wish to achieve many effects and marvelous operations, and also so that you may hold the people of others to you aptly. And thus if you will be diligent problem-solvers, you will achieve the true Ratiocination—that is, speech with good discourse of reason or with good calculation of numbers and comparisons—although Ratiocination is also placed for Dialectic. Because Aristotle says of the motions of animals: "All those things that operate without reason operate quickly," that is, imprudently and without verified cognition. Therefore, if you will operate with Ratiocination and mirror yourselves in the clarity of the body of reason, and not in the idea of the shadow, knowing how to prove with true arguments, your works will be able to give you famous authority and you will make yourselves loved, and by the excellent and most learned men in examinations. And you will appear as true soldiers or Athletes to be adorned with all the arms, which will make for you the occurring terms of the art, as it is the true reason of the things that are feasible, which are to the purpose of the formation of the thing that you will intend to do without doubt, because of practice and science. And therefore you will accept with good reasons the speeches consonant with the operations, and you will shun the dissonant ones.

Seeing as in all things, and also in Architecture, these two things are especially there: that which is signified, and that which signifies. That which is signified is the proposed thing, which it is said that it signifies the manifest demonstration with the reasons of the doctrines. Because it seems in the one and in the other part that he who makes profession of Architect must be exercised. And thus he needs to be ingenious, and apt for science. Because ingenuity without science, or science without ingenuity, a perfect artificer cannot make. And so that he may be literate, he needs to be learned in Graphida.

Seeing as in all things, and also in Architecture, these two things are especially there, etc. Here Vitruvius briefly manifests this proposed reason, which is certainly pertinent to Architecture. But we will be able to extend it even more magnanimously, and seeing as that which is said to need to be demonstrated in effect as it is used in the proportion of Architecture: But considering similarly that all the things of the universal world also demonstrate themselves signified by these two things, that is, by natural figure, their idea: so that with the graphiata figure or with other modes, just as it is given to the patient by the agent. As we have from Vitruvius at the end of the sixth book where he says: "For all men, not only Architects, can prove what is good," etc. Also by other modes, as the sites of the earth and the sea are seen, or the aspects of the animals of all the world, which are covered under the heaven: and these thus operated and signified by nature, we seek to understand, and to demonstrate them to others. Therefore Vitruvius has said: Seeing as in all things and especially also in Architecture these two things are there, that is, that which is signified or which we want to say demonstrated with clear manifestation, as is to design an Icnographia ground plan/floor plan, Ortographia elevation/vertical projection of some thing to be made, or to give a sign of it manifestly by archetypal demonstration, which has more

Icnographia on page 19.

Ortographia on page 19.