University of Virginia Library

Introduction

I

As recently as March 9, 1975, the nation's leading architectural critic,
Ada Louise Huxtable, has pointed out that "Jefferson was `fixated' on
books and on `fishing' his designs out of them, according to Benjamin
Latrobe, his friend and America's outstanding architect at that time."[1]
Fiske Kimball said much the same thing sixty years earlier when he
pointed out that "to know what architectural books were at hand is particularly
important in Jefferson's case on account of his dependence on
books for his inspiration."[2]

Colonel Isaac A. Coles gives us an eyewitness account of this use
of books by Jefferson. In writing on February 23, 1816, to General John
Cocke, who had asked Coles to consult with Jefferson about Cocke's proposed
new dwelling at Bremo, Colonel Coles said that Jefferson pointed
out that Palladio "was the bible. He has sent all his Books &c. &c. to
Washington, or he would have drawn yr. House for you - it would have
been a pleasure to him - but now he could not undertake to do it before
the fall, when he expected other Books from Paris."[3]

With his wide personal experience of architecture through books,
Jefferson also realized the importance of architectural experience
through actual examples, and when he began the design of the University
of Virginia, he wrote on April 13, 1817, that he wanted the buildings
there to be "of various forms, models of chaste architecture, as
examples for the school of architecture to be formed on."[4] Thus the University's
holdings in architectural books, for which he made the want
list, and the physical aspect of the University were to reinforce one another
architecturally, a process which has taken place throughout the
University's existence.

In the spring of 1825 Jefferson spent what must have been a happy

time compiling a catalogue of books for the proposed library of the University.
Although he had some help, notably from Bishop James Madison
for the section on theology,[5] when he worked with the list for
architecture, gardening, painting, sculpture, and music he was on firm
ground, since he himself had owned one of the largest such fine art collections
in the country.

When Jefferson sold his "great library" to Congress in 1815, he
started reassembling this fine arts collection to include what was for the
time a respectable number of architectural books. Forty-nine works on
architecture alone were sold in 1815, while at least six, and possibly
eleven, on the same subject were in Jefferson's library at his death.[6]

Comparable libraries in the United States usually contained fewer
such books. Samuel McIntire had seven works on architecture at his
death in 1811.[7] Charles Bulfinch had in his possession about fifteen architectural
books before his death in 1844.[8] William Byrd's library at Westover
showed some twenty-seven architectural entries when it was offered
for sale in 1777.[9] The catalogue of the Carpenter's Company of Philadelphia
lists only thirty-two architectural books printed before 1826.[10]

Some version of Palladio was the most commonly owned architectural
book, both by gentlemen as well as by those more actively engaged
in building. Joseph Coolidge presented a Palladio to the young University,
as did James Madison, its second Rector.[11] There is also a letter
from James Oldham, a master carpenter, to Jefferson mentioning his
own copy of Palladio and telling how it lacked certain information:
"J. Oldham sends Mr. Jefferson the Draughts of the window frames for
his examination. The Dorick of Diocletians baths, Chambray, is not in
the Book of Palladio which I have, and I must aske the favor of Mr.
Jefferson to lone me the book to lay down my cornice and I will immediately
return it safe."[12]

The University of Virginia Library has a manuscript copy of Jefferson's
want list of books for the institution. It is labeled "President
Jefferson's Catalogue of Books for the University of Virginia Library.
1825." Written in what is probably the hand of Nicholas Trist, Jefferson's
secretary, it is endorsed by Jefferson: "The preceding catalogue is
that of the books with the purchase of which Mr. Wm. Hilliard is
charged on behalf of the University of Virginia. Th: Jefferson Rector
June 3. 1825."

The catalogue is arranged in the order Jefferson had devised for his
own library. This method divided knowledge into the three faculties of
Memory, Reason, and Imagination, subtitled respectively History, Philosophy,
and Fine Arts. These are further subdivided into a total of
forty-two headings, of which several contain books in the fields of building
and the fine arts. Such books are found under "Hist-Civil-Antient,"
"Technical Arts" (a subdivision of "History, Civil"), "Architecture" (a
subdivision of "Fine Arts"), "Gardening. Painting. Sculpture. Music."
(also a subdivision of "Fine Arts"), and "Polygraphical," a section
which fell outside the three main subdivisions.

Jefferson's signed endorsement of the existing catalogue and his
mention of it in a letter of June 3, 1825, to Hilliard ("The copying of our
Catalogue was finished yesterday and I now inclose it")[13] attest to its
use for ordering his original selections for the library of the new University.

F. W. Page, a former librarian of the University, described an
earlier want list, evidently in Jefferson's hand:

The manuscript described by Page has disappeared, presumably as
a result of the disastrous library fire of 1895.[16]

We have two ways of knowing which of the books ordered by Jefferson
for the University were actually delivered in his lifetime. One
source is a manuscript catalogue of the library compiled even before the
date the Hilliard list was completed, and the other is a printed catalogue
that appeared two years after Jefferson's death.

The slight manuscript list, "Catalogue of the Library of the University
of Virginia" by John V. Kean, a student and Jefferson's first appointee
to the post of librarian, was dated May 16, 1825, and thus was
completed some two months after the University had opened its doors and
before any books recommended by the faculty could have been added to
the collection. This source and the 1828 Catalogue are both noted with
the relevant books in the descriptive catalogue.

When one remembers that Jefferson was eighty-two when he completed
a list of more than six thousand volumes for the University's
library, one realizes the magnitude of his achievement. When one finds
further that, in the area of the fine arts, many of the volumes are still
considered as monuments in their field, Jefferson's choices become even
more remarkable.

When it is also remembered that Jefferson's architectural achievements
are second only to his political contributions to the United States,
the importance of the group of books dealt with here can be appreciated.
Without these books it is impossible to understand fully either Jeffersons'
philosophy of architecture or his sources for the visual forms with
which he gave objective life to that philosophy.

II

One fact needs to be emphasized here. The present catalogue has been
made up of fine arts items culled from the list prepared by Jefferson for
the University and from the Kean list, and has been supplemented by
architectural[17] books from his private libraries. A listing of Jefferson's

personal books on music, painting, and sculpture has been placed outside
this discussion except for those titles which appeared in both collections.
The information for his personal architectural books has been taken from
Sowerby's catalogue of his "great" library which was sold to Congress
and from the catalogue of the 1829 sale of those volumes he had assembled
for his own use after the 1815 sale, and two which appear only in a
manuscript catalogue now at the Massachusetts Historical Society.

Those volumes not owned by the University at this time have been
assigned numbers in order that they may fall into the right place in the
descriptive catalogue, but they are clearly indicated as not being present.
There are twenty-three of these titles, but two (Nos. 31 and 77) are almost
or wholly impossible to reassemble, and three (Nos. 12, 41, and 50)
are owned in microprint, except for a few volumes of No. 41. Of the remaining
eighteen another two (Nos. 16 and 17) are price books, almost
the most fugitive of all, for they were normally worn out with use. Four
have to do with structures (Nos. 9, 30, 79, and 82), and others are a surveying
manual (No. 57), a guidebook (No. 74), an elements of architecture
handbook (No. 103), a book on gems (No. 65), a work on public
monuments (No. 62), a treatise on geometry (No. 70), and a study of
naval architecture (No. 115). One (No. 125b) is a copy of Vitruvius
duplicated in two other editions included in the scope of this catalogue,
as are two (Nos. 43a and 61a) with single duplicates each, also within
the scope of this study. Only the remaining two are of prime importance;
both Nos. 11 and 81 are not only works of considerable worth in themselves
but both were referred to by Jefferson in his notes.

Of the books themselves it is possible to say that, though there is a
wide range in dates, they all share a very strong sense of clarity. The
purpose is normally stated, sometimes on the title page (the longer the
title page, the more important it usually becomes, and the more necessary

it is to read it), and the development of the book follows the most
direct and logical course.

The vocabularies used are often strange to our eyes and ears. The
word art is especially troublesome for the present-day reader, for it could
often mean, in the centuries covered by these books, either a craft and
the pursuit of a craft or a fine art, whereas modern usage implies fine
whenever art is used. But the tone and intent of words as well as the
qualities described by them were frequently very different in the early
writing Jefferson knew. Words such as sublimity, magnitude, grandeur,
beauty, magnificence, elegance, and even terror are just beginning to
creep back into architectural language after a long absence. Phrases such
as "a glowing Pile of Beauty," "justness in proportion," "singularity in
manner," "an astonishing projection" of a cornice, a feature "to wound
the eye of a savant," "the grandeur of an entablature," "proper ornaments,"
"a flowery imagination," "a delicate fancy," and "grand and
pompous edifices which always mark the glory of those for whom they
were raised" display a world of architectural thought which raises many
difficulties to our appreciation but which helps to explain the attitudes of
the designers of the time, attitudes that are often reflected in their architecture.

From the books themselves a glimpse of the architectural book market
may be seen. Availability is, of course, fundamental to anyone's
choice of books. As late as 1804 Jefferson pointed out that there had
never been a copy of Palladio in Washington until he brought the London,
1700 edition there (No. 94). In the preface to that particular edition
of Palladio, the translator said there are "few books we can recommend
to you besides the excellent Discourses of Sir H. Wotton and John Evelin,
Esq." This was written, presumably, for the book's first edition of
1663. Although the translator for Leoni's 1715 edition of Palladio claims
that its illustrations are the first to have been engraved (as opposed to
the use of woodcuts) for any Palladio (No. 92a), he is mistaken since
our earlier one also has engraved plates. The earlier one comprises, however,
only the first book rather than the entire text of Palladio, whereas
the 1715 issue is complete.

This rather slow start of the English architectural book market
changed quickly, since in 1724 it was necessary for an author to apologize
for bringing out another volume "at a Time when the Town is already
burthened with Volumes" (No. 53a). At some time before 1788
I. and J. Taylor had established a publishing house and book shop called
the Architectural Library at 56 High Holborn in London. Their catalogue
included in a 1788 book had 59 entries, primarily of the handbook
variety (No. 16). The speed at which architectural publishing was

growing is shown by the Architectural Library's 1793 catalogue (No.
89), which listed over 100 items, including books by John Soane, James
Paine, Hepplewhite, John Wood, Sir William Chambers, Stuart and
Revett, Brook Taylor, and Batty Langley as well as an expanded group
of handbooks.

Jefferson, then, had access to a narrow selection at home but a comparatively
wide one abroad. Millicent Sowerby is especially careful
in giving the sources of his purchases, and there is little need to amplify
that information here. We know, also, from Kimball (pp. 92-101) that
of the 49 architectural titles in Jefferson's own library no less than 23
were purchased during his stay abroad between 1785 and 1789.

A cursory examination of the subscription lists included in so many
eighteenth-century books turns up further, and sometimes surprising,
information about the book market. Gentlemen, that is, people of title or
persons dignified with an "Esq.," were very much in the majority, a fact
which certainly corroborates the widely held opinion that architecture
was a gentlemanly interest during the late seventeenth, the eighteenth,
and the early nineteenth centuries. The next largest group of subscribers
seems to have been clergymen and physicians, of whom the clergymen
were usually and the physicians sometimes included in the ranks of gentlemen.
After them come the architects, who are often a very small minority.
The crafts - carpenters, carvers, glaziers, joiners, masons, and
plasterers - also subscribed but usually in comparatively small numbers.
It would seem, then, that a book large enough or important enough to
carry a subscription list reached an audience most of whose members
were not engaged in the practice of architecture.

We have no way, of course, of tracing the purchasers of handbooks,
but since many of the surviving copies are in a very worn condition, it
may be assumed that they were in daily use by craftsmen as well as by
architects.

In the minute book of the Board of Visitors of the University of
Virginia under the date of October 15, 1825, Thomas Jefferson recorded
in his own hand the resolution "that the board approves of the advance
of 18,000. Dollars to William Hilliard, agent for procuring the library."[18]
A letter of May 22, 1825, from Jefferson to Hilliard shows that
this approval was given after the money had been deposited to Hilliard's
account: "Our money is deposited in the Virginia and Farmer's banks at
Richmond and our Bursar will write by the next mail (of the 25th) to
have the sum of 18,000 D. immediately deposited to your credit in the
bank of the U.S. at Philadelphia. I have added 3000. D. to the 15. M.

originally agreed upon. Further than this our funds do not admit us to
go at present with convenience, and moreover I confidently expect that
that sum may cover the whole purchase."[19]

This $18,000 was a portion of the $50,000 received from the "central
government"[20] as a partial compensation to the Commonwealth of
Virginia for its advances during the War of 1812.[21] As early as 1820
Jefferson was dealing with budgetary matters concerning the purchase
of books, for in that year he proposed uses for hypothetical revenues of
$15,000 and $30,000 a year. For the first amount he included an item
"Books, say 150. vols. a year @ 10.D. - 1,500," or 10 percent of the total
budget, while for the second he suggested "Books, suppose 600. vols. a
year @ 10.D. - 6,000,"[22]
or 20 per cent of the total budget.

Bruce stated that "all the volumes [in Jefferson's catalogue] descriptive
of architecture, sculpture, painting, and music were written in
Italian."[23] That this was incorrect is seen when one examines the list
itself or considers Jefferson's explanation to Hilliard dated November 4,
1825: "in foreign books a strong regard to the edition named except
where a newer and obviously better has been published, and a discretionary
latitude as to recent editions of English books, and in no case a
translation unless expressly specified. In general I wrote the title in the
language described, but where I did not understand the language, I was
not always exact in doing that, but the face of the catalogue shows that
originals in all languages are what we want."[24] As we have seen Jefferson
also preferred the octavo size, but in the field of the fine arts a great
variety of sizes had to be purchased.

Only seventeen of the titles originally purchased survived the 1895
fire in the Library of the University, and some of these survived only in
part, but under the seventeen titles are fifty-seven volumes.

Many, if not all, of the books on the manuscript want list were already
known to Jefferson. His own library, either before or after the sale
to the Library of Congress, or both, contained most of the architectural
titles that also appeared in the catalogue sent to Hilliard,[25] and these have
frequently helped to identify the editions Jefferson must have had in
mind for the University.

To reconstruct the fine arts library as it was proposed in the catalogue

sent to Hilliard is not as difficult a task as it first appeared. Such a
reconstruction was begun by the late E. S. Campbell, Chairman of the
School of Art and Architecture at the University from 1927 until his
death in 1950. Campbell had purchased a dozen titles as they became
available and as funds permitted. Since his death and before the 1956
desiderata list was issued, another dozen items had been acquired. With
the titles surviving from Jefferson's original purchase and with replacements,
the University of Virginia was at that time already numerically
in almost as strong a position as it was in 1828 toward establishing the
collection in the fine arts that had been proposed. Since then all but
twenty-three titles have been acquired, all but two of them the generous
gift of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation. Thus a large proportion
of the total is available in the University's collection.

It has been a much smaller step to attempt a complete reconstruction
of Jefferson's personal architectural library. Of the books listed by
Kimball,[26] the library owned a few, including two of the Palladios. In
addition, the library also had a copy of Palladio not listed by Kimball,
the Leoni edition of 1721, which Jefferson used in building the University,[27]
though it is uncertain whether the copy used by Jefferson was his
personal property.[28] To complete the collection of the entire section on
architecture in the personal library will be an important step, and the
titles in architecture from the personal list have been added to this study
as being relevant to a discussion of Jefferson's sources for architecture
and knowledge of the field of architectural books.[29]

An examination of Sowerby shows that there are only nineteen additional
titles needed to complete a duplication of Jefferson's personal
books on music, painting, and sculpture. The University already owns
six of these and two different editions of the seventh and eighth. This
leaves only eleven titles unrepresented on the library's shelves.[30]

Of one entry in the descriptive catalogue there is some doubt. It was
thought at one time that the notation in Jefferson's want list "Portfeuille
des artistes ou dessins de chateaux etc. [4to] Leips. 1800" was intended
to be identical with No. 117, Christian Ludwig Stieglitz, Plans et dessins
tirés de la belle architecture . . . , Leipzig, 1800. It now appears
that this may not be exact. For a fuller discussion of this point, see the
entry in the text.

III

The sources used for the inclusion of titles in the descriptive catalogue
follow.

Pertinent volumes from "President Jefferson's Catalogue of Books
for the University of Virginia Library, 1825": Nos. 1, 2, 3, 6, 9, 10, 11,
15, 18b, 19, 21, 23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 31, 33, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43b,
45, 46, 47, 48, 49a, 51b, 52, 54, 55, 56, 59b, 61b, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67,
69, 71, 72, 73, 75, 76, 78, 81, 83, 84, 86, 88, 89, 90, 91, 95, 96a, 97, 98a,
99, 100, 102, 104, 106, 107, 108, 109, 111c, 112, 114b, 115, 116, 117, 118b,
119, 120, 121, 122, 123a, 124, 125c, 125d, 126a or 126b, 127a or 127b,
128b, 129, and 130.

Pertinent volumes from John V. Kean's "Catalogue of the Library
of the University of Virginia" (May 16, 1825): Nos. 5, 7, 8, 13, 22, 32,
34, 60, 92b, 93, and 114b.

Pertinent volumes from the 1828 Catalogue: Nos. 1, 6, 10, 13, 24,
25, 27, 32, 34, 36, 39, 40, 41, 43b, 48, 52, 56, 59b, 60, 61b, 67, 68, 70, 71,
73, 75, 76, 78, 93, 95, 96a, 98b, 100, 102, 104, 114b, 116, 118b, 120, 124,
125d, 127a or 127b, 129, and 130.

Pertinent volumes from the Monticello "great" library, taken from
Sowerby: Nos. 4, 6, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 18a, 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26, 28, 29,
30, 31, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 41, 42, 43a, 45, 46, 48, 49b, 50, 53a or 53b, 55,
58, 59a, 61a, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79,

80, 81, 82, 84, 87, 92a, 92c, 92d, 95, 96b, 97, 99, 101, 103, 105, 107, 108,
109, 110, 111a, 111b, 112, 113, 114a, 116, 117, 118a, 119, 120, 122, 123b,
125d, 127a, 128a, and 129.

Pertinent volumes from the 1829 sale catalogue: Nos. 2, 17, 46, 51a,
57, 77, 83, 85, 123a, 125a or 125b, 126a or 126b, and 127a or 127b.

Pertinent volumes from the manuscript catalogue of Jefferson's library
in the Massachusetts Historical Society: Nos. 44 and 94.