To step into the crowded marketplace of scholarship on Vitruvius is doubtless a daunting proposition; as the sole surviving text on architecture from antiquity, the De architectura has been variously painted as a compendium of architectural and artistic prescriptions, an embodiment of Augustan projects of constructing Rome anew and a rhetorical showpiece celebrating the adoption of Greek technical concepts into Roman society. N. takes on the challenge of doing something new with Vitruvius by arguing that ‘Vitruvius never intended to provide an accurate and objective view of the contemporary built environment’, but rather ‘to appeal to elites (and would-be elites) eager to secure their positions within an expanding empire’ (p. 3).
Vitruvius’ ‘middle class’ status as an apparitor and the role of that status in shaping the De architectura to appeal to an audience of elite potential patrons steeped in Greek paideia has of course previously been explored (e.g. in M. Masterson, ‘Status, Pay, and Pleasure in the De Architectura of Vitruvius’, AJP 125.3 [2004], 387–416). What is new here is N.’s emphasis on similarities between the rhetoric Vitruvius uses to shape his text for that readership and that used by his literary contemporaries and recent predecessors. Where much Vitruvian scholarship marks him as a harbinger of the Augustan age, shaping buildings and rhetoric alike for the new tastes of the principate, N. makes a particular point of pursuing Republican textual precedents. A Vitruvius who looks outward to the larger rhetorical world in which he operates as an author, a Vitruvius who looks back to strategies for navigating that world drawn from the recently defunct Republic: this is the novel figure N. creates.
The introduction situates Vitruvius within a ‘Roman culture of display’ (p. 4), reaching from the rhetorical to the material, and places him ‘at a moment when architectural construction … was central to the articulation and maintenance of social status’ (p. 15). Here too N. situates herself within the context of existing scholarship, which she characterises as falling into the two basic camps of literary studies mainly focused on his prefatory material on the one hand and prescriptive archaeological studies on the other; later in the introduction, scholarship placing Vitruvius in the context of ancient technical literature appears as a third camp. None of these approaches will be adopted here; the intention of this book is, instead, to ‘consider De architectura’s engagement with a literary culture far beyond the treatises named as his source material’ (p. 9).
That literary culture was itself constructed on a foundation of Greek knowledge (both literary and technical) appropriated into the Roman world. N. productively focuses in her first chapter on ‘three figures Vitruvius identifies as key actors within Rome's culture of appropriation: the architect, the author, and the general’ (p. 26). She explores Roman rationales for ‘plunder’ ranging from simple transfer of material goods to authorial adoption of canonical literature, putting to effective use images like Vitruvius’ comparison of the author's work to those who siphon off spring water for their own needs (p. 35).
The second chapter shifts to consider how Vitruvius’ authorial programme and relationship to his audience were shaped by his status as an apparitor. N. uses Vitruvius’ fellow scriba Horace as a lens through which to view his authorial priorities, a clever way to supplement our notoriously sparse knowledge of Vitruvius’ own biographical details. Previous studies of Vitruvius’ social status have delved deeply into the testimony of the De architectura itself, whereas N. elects instead to follow the parallels between Vitruvius’ and Horace's education and status to suggest that their ‘claims of diffidence’ are a coping mechanism for defusing elite fears of uppity apparitores (p. 75).
Roman convictions that domestic architecture reflects the homeowner's character draw Plautus’ Mostellaria into the spotlight in the third chapter, as ‘Plautus’ equation of house and man’ (p. 105) becomes a prompt to reconsider Vitruvius’ views on domestic elegantia and magnificentia. In particular, N. argues that Vitruvius in fact meant his apparent prescriptions for respectable households to be taken as flexible guidelines, and calls on further studies of the De architectura to look for ‘elasticity and nuance’ (p. 90) rather than strict rules. The parallels between Vitruvius and Plautus are a bit murkier than those with Horace in the previous chapter, but N.’s intervention in a scholarly tradition that has often been prescriptive and inflexible is welcome.
The fourth chapter likewise invites the reader to consider the De architectura not as a ‘descriptive source on ancient painting’ (p. 132), but as a text composed in an atmosphere of sophisticated rhetorical display and persuasion. Vitruvius’ treatment of painting as an architectural ‘finishing touch’, N. argues, reflects a parallel commitment to rhetorical polish and reminds the reader that he writes from a position of ‘entrenchment within the intellectual culture of his time’ (p. 132).
The fifth chapter and the epilogue speed the reader towards the end, both aiming to draw together the varied threads of the book: socio-economic status and technical expertise, invective rhetoric and measured moralisation. The fifth chapter presents the case study of a scriba called Faberius who foolishly tinted his outdoor walls with vermilion, which blackens in the sun. N. turns Vitruvius’ critique of Faberius into an opportunity to discuss Catullus’ invective against Mamurra, who then reappears in the conclusion as a kind of mirror of Vitruvius: ‘Mamurra's flaws are, in many cases, Vitruvius’ virtues in reverse’ (p. 184). The De architectura, N. argues, should thus be seen within a context where mastery of political invective was particularly crucial for apparitores like Vitruvius to navigate the Roman social and political landscape.
N.’s contemplation of the audience for whom Vitruvius crafted his book prompts some final considerations about the audience her own book might suit. There is less Vitruvius in this book than in most Vitruvius scholarship, as most of the textual analysis concerns the comparative material N. draws from authors in other genres. Thus it may be most enlightening for readers who already know Vitruvius fairly well and can supplement the often rather cursory textual references with their own knowledge. At the same time, the book is not overburdened with technical material, so literary scholars averse to technical literature may find this an agreeable point of entry. The elegance and vigour of N.’s prose will further enhance its attractiveness for readers new to the subject; she does not shy away from witty formulations like the comparison of the newly impoverished Publius Valerius Cato to ‘some former starlet wearing a tattered fur’ (p. 171), and the book is a delight to read.
N.’s arguments are grounded in a capacious knowledge of the literary comparanda she brings to bear on Vitruvius, particularly in discussing rhetorical invective; her command of authors both canonical (Cicero) and otherwise (Marcus Furius Bibaculus) creates an extraordinarily rich backdrop for the De architectura. Vitruvius himself might have been more visible against this backdrop had N. taken his advice on authorial plunder to heart and siphoned off a bit more of the scholarship on Vitruvius’ place within a larger context of technical literature. While N. does admittedly explicitly eschew engagement with this context in the introduction, one misses in particular the additional richness that might have emerged from explicit engagement between her arguments about Vitruvius’ rhetorical strategies and literary background and the French tradition represented, for example, by P. Gros, Le Projet de Vitruve (1994) and A. Novara, Auctor in Bibliotheca (2005). But of course, as N. notes, ‘unlike Vitruvius, I make no grandiose claim for my book's comprehensiveness’ (p. 194). She has given us an elegant, wide-ranging exploration of the literary and rhetorical background to Vitruvius’ project, which encourages us to read the De architectura with fresh eyes, and that is more than enough.
