Tutte l’Opere d’Archittetura et Prospetiva

1619

de Beer Itb 1619 S

[Venice]: Giacomo de’Franceschi

One of Bologna’s most famous, yet relatively unknown, sons is Renaissance architect Sebastiano Serlio (1475-c.1554). Serlio trained as a painter and woodcutter before travelling to Rome in 1514 to work under architect and painter, Baldassare Peruzzi (1481-1536). Serlio’s seven volume treatise on architecture, Tutte l’Opere d’Archittetura et Prospetiva, was the first such work to be illustrated and written in Italian, not the usual Latin. Serlio’s treatise was hugely influential in disseminating Italian Renaissance architecture to Western Europe. Described as the ‘most important architectural writer and theorist of the 16th century’, it is thought Sir Christopher Wren (1632-1723) had Serlio’s work in-hand while building St Paul’s Cathedral in London.