University of Virginia Library

4. Alberti, Leon Battista.

L'ARCHITETTVRA / DI LEONBATTISTA / ALBERTI / TRADOTTA
IN LINGVA / Fiorentina da Cosimo Bartoli, / Gentilhuomo,
& Academico / Fiorentino. / Con la aggiunta di Disegni. / In Venetia,
Appresso Francesco Franceschi, Sanese. 1565.

Small 4to. Title page (1 unnumbered p.); woodcut portrait (1 unnumbered
p.); dedication (1 leaf); poem ([1-2]); 2d dedication ([3]-4);
Alberti's preface (5-8); text, with 48 woodcut plates, of which 1 is folding,
all in numbered pagination, and with 35 additional woodcut figures
(9-404); index (14 unnumbered leaves).

Leon Battista Alberti (1404-72) was born in Genoa. He wrote easily in
Latin, was considered a fine organist, and was the author of Della statua,
De Pictura, and De re aedificatoria. His importance, not only in the fifteenth
century but also in the following centuries, may be partially measured
by the fact that all his books went into many editions, while the De
re aedificatoria, one of the monuments of architectural literature, was
translated into Italian, English, French, Spanish, and German.[5] It was
first printed by Alemanus in Florence in 1485. This translation into Italian
by Cosimo Bartoli (ca.1503-ca.1572), an Italian architect and
scholar, was first published in 1550.

There are two illustrations in the book which may have had some
influence on Jefferson. The first is an arcade which, in its simple form,
may have helped to suggest the simplicities of the arcades on the Ranges
at the University of Virginia (see Plate IV), though the book was no
longer in Jefferson's hands at the time he designed them. The second,
taken from Book VII, whose title may be translated as "On Ornaments
of Sacred Temples," would have reinforced Jefferson's argument with

Plate IV. From No. 4. Woodcut of arcade (p. 67).

his ornamentist, William Coffee, about the appropriateness of ornament
in domestic and public use (see Plate V).[6]

Sowerby points out that Jefferson paid "4." (dollars?) for his own
copy, which Kimball says was purchased between 1785 and 1789 (p.
92). That copy was sold to Congress. The book was not ordered for the
University. The present copy in the library is the gift of the Thomas
Jefferson Memorial Foundation.

M

Sowerby 4199

*NA2515.A33.1565