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Architecture and the bee : virtue and memory in Filarete's Trattato di architettura

Antonio Averlino, known as Filarete (1400--1469), wrote that architecture is a gestational process, likening the architect to the mother and the father as the client. The process requires the architect-mother to " fantasticare e pensare e rivoltarselo per la memoria," fermenting ideas and incubating them in conjunction with one's memory. The intent is to understand mnemonics as a creative operation in Filarete's Trattato di Architettura. A key to this lies with Filarete's personal symbol, the bee. The bee's process of mellification acts as a metaphor of the architect's gestational design. The bee, long utilized as a memorative trope, points towards other memory models created throughout the treatise, culminating with the design for the House of Vice and Virtue. Directing the reader and inhabitants of the city in a social narrative, Filarete's architecture reveals the dependence upon remembrance and virtue for the city's creation and public rituals to sustain its life.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.20940
Date January 1998
CreatorsYocum, Carole.
ContributorsPerez-Gomez, Alberto (advisor)
PublisherMcGill University
Source SetsLibrary and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeElectronic Thesis or Dissertation
Formatapplication/pdf
CoverageMaster of Architecture (School of Architecture.)
RightsAll items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated.
Relationalephsysno: 001641639, proquestno: MQ50694, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest.

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