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By Root 2844 0

respect an improvement on Vitruvius, being clear, orderly, well written and good on theory and practice alike. He begins by giving the reader definitions, moves on to concepts and discusses materials, construction methods, town planning and the plans of different types of buildings. Then he goes on to consider the nature of beauty in architecture and how it applies to religious, domestic and public buildings. He had an inquisitive and in some ways encyclopedic mind, so a great many matters are dealt with, including water supply, archaeology, restoration and cost. It is the kind of book that every budding builder and would-be architect wanted to get his hands on, and could not until Alberti wrote it. And it has lasted: the way in which we approach architecture, distinguishing for instance between its basic, functional design and its ornamental superfluities, is still Albertian.

Alberti also practiced architecture, though not as a rule in the customary sense. He produced plans and designs that were executed with another architect in charge of the site. Thus the Palazzo Rucellai in Florence was built on his instructions but with Bernardo Rossellino in charge (c. 1450), and the Tempio Malatestiano in Rimini, also by Alberti (c. 1447), was built by Matteo de’ Pasti. He engaged directly in a number of important projects in and around the Vatican and Old St. Peter’s, but usually his plans and instructions for buildings, in places as diverse as Ferrara and Mantua, were sent by messenger. In some cases Alberti never even saw the creations for which he was ultimately responsible. His influence was nonetheless wide and pervasive, perhaps even more so than Brunelleschi’s. Not that Alberti ever underrated the older master. On the contrary, his admiration overflowed. His first sight of the great Florence dome was the central aesthetic experience of his life, and he wrote, “Who could ever be so cold or envious as to fail to recognize the genius of an architect capable of creating such an enormous structure, rising into the sky, big enough to cover all the people of Tuscany with its shadow—and all done without the aid of centering or even much scaffolding?” Alberti cited the dome as an example of how modern Florentine artists—and others—could not merely imitate the ancients but surpass them. That, he maintained, was the object: to build on the past even finer and more audacious structures. However, the study of the past came first. Alberti saw Brunelleschi’s work as in some respects only a superficial departure from medieval barbarism—his ground plans still tended to be nonclassical.

Alberti altered all that, and his designs were classical in inspiration from start to finish and from top to bottom. After his instructions were followed and his plans, as well as his book, circulated throughout Italy, it became rare for any architect, creating a church ab initio, to use a simple east-west axis. The old west front became a classical façade, created around a door that led into a space, usually circular or octagonal, the east end choir disappeared, and all the activities of the edifice revolved around a central point. However, Alberti was not a man who preached rigid uniformity. He also used the Greek cross as a floor plan, and he sometimes combined a circular rotunda with a short nave. His façades divided into three main prototypes. He rang the changes with the different classical orders, and he formulated alternative schemes of fenestration. But in doing all this he was merely, as it were, completing the architectural vernacular of the new style. Brunelleschi introduced it; Alberti turned it into a complete system, which students could absorb until it became second nature to them. Thus Alberti set patterns in the visual appearance of buildings, especially their main façades, that were replicated in essentials for centuries, and are still with us.

We must not think, however, that the newly emerging architectural face of Italy was entirely the work of one or two men of genius. In fact there were hundreds of journeyman architects, and one or