Della architettura di Gioseffe Viola Zanini

First edition. P. Michel (works in Italian preserved in libraries in France) VIII, 120. Work illustrated with 95 plates on wood.

Contemporary binding in full vellum, handwritten title in ink. Spine browned and stains on the boards. A clear waterstain on the lower margin throughout the work, not affecting the text.

Giuseppe Viola Zanini (1575-1631), who was born in Vicenza and died in Padua, was a painter and an architect who worked in the Venice area. He was more of a decorative painter, renowned for such, than an active architect; architecture interested him as a means of expression of painted decoration. The work is divided into two parts, the first part focuses on the origins of architecture and its composing elements, as well as the way in which we must build; the second book is entirely devoted to the five orders. This book was largely studied outside of Italy, and in particular by Blondel in France.