Mariano Taccola and His Book De Ingeneis

Abstract

On Engines, dated 1433, is an early and previously unknown treatise on engineering which was prepared for King Sigismund's arrival in Siena as he traveled to Rome for rites of coronation. Mariano Taccola has been described as a designer of military devices, but drawings and texts of De ingeneis show his interest in field of technology to encompass far more than machines of attack and defense. He deals actively, at times creatively, with bridges and their foundations, with harbors, harbor equipment for loading of freight, aqueducts both above and below ground, equipment for operating wells at end of an aqueduct, mill houses, and machines and power plants associated with them. The numerous figures and landscapes that accompany his texts also reveal Taccola to be an interesting and original Sienese artist. He portrays human figures in situations that seldom appear in major arts, and nature studies among vignettes beside his texts are distinctive to his art.As in a previous study of Brunelleschi's technology and inventions (MIT Press 1970), authors represent different viewpoints in their analysis--Frank Prager, history of technology, and Gustina Scaglia, history of art. Together they have transcribed and translated Latin texts and indicated original form of De ingeneis from manuscripts in two libraries. They have summarized as much as is known about Taccola, whose work earned him name of the Sienese Archimedes, and have evaluated his achievements as writer, graphic artist, and engineer.The drawings and descriptions of four books of De ingeneis are presented clearly and concisely, to inform and to teach. For it was about Taccola's time, and with his help, that long stagnation of many technical practices of Middle Ages came to an end, and De ingeneis became starting point for a long line of copybooks. Taccola, unlike his predecessors, was particularly interested in describing or suggesting classes of machines, their common parts and basic functions or general rules. He was moved to experiment with different forms of cross-reference between chapters and to develop various means of illustration, using at times a distinct and original method of balancing drawings, texts, and marginal vignettes used to identify each illustration.Although Mariano Taccola's work was soon surpassed, his manuscripts were copied throughout fifteenth century as textbooks, and their rediscovery provides invaluable source material for studying early, transitional history of mechanical technology and adds a new dimension to history of Quattrocento art.

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