First edition of Caramuel’s seminal study of architecture, geometry and proportion, drawn from the architecture of the temple of Jerusalem. First edition, the most ambitious Spanish architectural treatise (also dealing with painting, sculpture, perspective, etc.) to date, a provocative work in which the author argues the superiority of “oblique” architecture to “straight” (Vitruvian) architecture, and famously censures Bernini’s designs for the colonnade around St. Peter’s Square and staircase (Scala Regia) in the Vatican, and equestrian statue of the Emperor Constantine. Printed at the author’s private press in Vigevano, the book is the earliest of eight publications issued under the imprint “En la Emprenta Obispal por Camillo Corrado” (Typis Episcopalibus apud Camillum Conradam) at the Italian town of Vigevano, where Caramuel was bishop from 1673 until the end of his life. It is notably difficult to obtain “complete” and in good condition, and its absence from collections of architectural books developed over many years, such as the RIBA/British Architectural Library, Fowler Collection of Early Architectural Books at Johns Hopkins University Library, and Canadian Centre for Architecture, is telling evidence of the difficulty of procuring a copy.
Called by George Hersey a ‘paradigmatic Baroque architectural treatise’, Caramuel’s work drew on Gerard Desargues’ new projective method and sought to draw up a form of ‘architectural prospective’, which would show how one could alter or exaggerate architectural forms so that from the ground they would look correct. In his exploration of architectural and geometric forms, he derived all his models from the temple of Jerusalem and underpinning his work with the latest mathematical developments in an era of rapidly expanding sophistication in mathematical methods and knowledge.
Bishop, philosopher, theologian, and diplomat as well as a mathematician, Caramuel was himself an amateur architect. His output exemplifies the overwhelming cross-disciplinary expansiveness of the baroque mentality.
The book is almost never found complete with both plates and text. All four parts were published in 1678. Part I: entitled Parte I en que se ponen las Orthographias de los Edificios Altares, y Casos del Templo de Ierusalen’, shows the Temple of Jerusalem. Part II: entitled Parte II en que se contienen las Figuras que conciernen a la Calographia, Arithmetica, Geometria. &c. y principalmente las que se explican en la Architectura Natural, contains illustrations of perspectives, geometrical rules seen in all forms of nature and also man-made devices, and construction machines and methods. Part III: entitled Parte III en que con sus verdaderas medidas, se dibujan y pintan, no solo los Ordenes Antiguos de Colunas, que en la Architectura Recta Labraron los mejores Ingenieros de Grecia, sino otros muchos Nuevos, que los ignora la Antiguedad, gives a comprehensive survey of the classical orders, as well as other styles including those current in the New World and forms incorporating elements such as griffins and elephants. Part IV: entitled Part IV en que con curiosidad se describen y miden las Prostaphereses y Parallaxes con que la Architectura oblique se origina y procede de la Comun, que en sus Libros nos enseña Vitruvio, deals with the effect of perspective on architectural forms and ways of handling distortion.
