Taking as its principal object of study architectural treatises published and translated in France or into French between the 15th and 17th century, this book opens a hitherto unperceived global perspective on the production, diffusion and reception of civil and military architectural literature in Europe during this period. Which authors were translated into French? Which French works were translated, and into which languages? In which countries and which towns in particular? By which publishers? Through these questions an unexpected map of European architectural publishing emerges. The light shed on the production of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Dutch publishers (starting with Pieter Coecke van Aelst) reveals, for example, the influence of Serlio's treatise and its French derivatives to have had a far longer-lasting impact in Northern Europe than is generally thought. French texts issued regularly from presses based in both Antwerp and La Haye. Numerous seventeenth-century treatises, in particular those dealing with fortification, were published simultaneously in several languages in the United Provinces in order to attain the largest possible readership. Forged versions of the works of the King's Engineers (Errard, Deville, Manesson Mallet...) often circulated before the originals were officially translated. The Renaissance was the golden age of treatises: almost all the great founding texts of classical architecture, from Alberti's De Aedificatoria to Scamozzi's L'Idea dell'Architettura Universale, were written in less than two centuries. Most of the major Italian treatises were translated integrally as soon as they appeared (Vignola, Blum). Often abridged and, at the same time, augmented in the 17th century (Vignola, Palladio, Scamozzi), they gained, as it were, a certain autonomy with regards to their authors: it was very often the abridged version which were translated into English, German and Dutch. In various guises, Le Muet's Vignola and Palladio were European best-sellers. These derived and translated works influenced architectural practices on a long-term basis: the rage for Palladianism in England can only be explained through the numerous English translations of Fréart de Chambray's Parallèle and Le Muet's Palladio. The in-depth study of the various editions and translations of architectural treatises which circulated in Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries reveals a new, global history of the dynamics of architectural literature during this period. The central text is accompanied by a new and comprehensive catalogue of original and translated, manuscript and printed architectural texts produced in France or in French during the 16th and 17th centuries. Most of these texts are - or shortly will be - available online on the Architectura website of the CESR (Centre for Advanced Renaissance Studies) of Tours.
