OEUVRES D'ARCHITECTURE DE VINCENT SCAMOZZI Vicentin, Architecte de la Republique de Venise, Contenues dans Son Idee De L'Architecuture Universelle; Dont les Regles des Cinq Ordres, que le fixiéme Livre contient, ont eté traduites en François... Tradutes en Francios Par Mr. Augustin Charles Daviler, Architecte du Roi Tres...& le reste traduit nouvellement Par Mr. Samuel Du Ry...Avec Les Planches Originales; Le tout revü & exactement corrigé sur l'Original Italien

A Leide (Leiden): Chez Pierre Vander, 1713. The First French edition of Scamozzi with impressive engraved full-page architectural renderings and illustrations. With half-title, elaborately engraved frontispiece, engraved title-page printed in red and black, handsomely engraved dedication, engraved head and tail pieces throughout, and with a vast number of engraved full page architectural plans, renderings and other illustrations including 42 engravings to text (37 full-page, five half-page), 44 full-page woodcuts to text (two double-page), and with 18 (of 21) fine sculptural plates of the Edifices of Rome. Folio, bound in contemporary full mottled calf, the spine with gilt tooled and framed compartments between raised bands. [xii], 276 pp., lacking leaf ee4 (page 219/220). A handsome volume, internally the paper is fresh and clean, unpressed and well preserved, the contemporary calf unrestored and unsophisticated in original state, with some age wear evident to the board edges and corners, the hinges strong, some external cracking to a few joints, the spine mellowed and a bit worn with some loss of leather to both the head and tail, evidence of old worming at the endleaves and boards, affecting only the first few and last few leaves, just a single small dot by the titlepage and gone completely by the preface and not showing again till the final page of the index. A VERY HANDSOME EARLY PRINTING OF ONE OF THE GREAT ARCHITECTURAL WORKS AND A FUNDAMENTAL manual on buildingS AND CONSTRUCTION throughout Europe. Scamozzi was arguably the most important figure in European architecture between Andrea Palladio, whose projects he inherited when Palladio died in 1580, and Baldassarre Longhena, Scamozzi's own and only student. This is a fine French translation of his "Universal Architecture" with his rules of the orders; “the book which gave the final codification of the orders and of Palladian classicism in Vignola’s mathematics based system with its own demonstrable laws."- Fowler.
"Of ten books planned [on the Vitruvian model] only six were completed: Books 1-3 and 6-8. Of these, book six [frequently reprinted and translated separately] became the leading manual on building according to the Rule of the Orders throughout Europe, while book two provided the basis for subsequent "ideal city" concepts. Scamozzi's own executed work is illustrated in book three - town houses at Vicenza, Venice and Bergamo and a series of country estates [on the model of the classical villa] including the two related Palladio-based designs for the Villa Pesaro at Lonigo and the Villa Molina at Padua."
As a further note to placing the books: the first book is dedicated to fundamental theoretical premises of and a summary of the history of architecuture; the second part concerns the construction of the city and includes certain studies of military architecture as well; the third part concerns civil architecture with particular regard to the classical house and with interesting notes about the construction of the diverse cities throughout Europe but with an approach to linking the forms created throughout history. In the Second Part, the sixth book is dedicated to the five orders, the seventh to architectural materials, the eighth to directing construction.
The very handsome engraved illustrations throughout the work are beautifully reproduced here from the Italian originals.