Mariano Taccola and His Books on Engines and Machines

Abstract

Mariano Taccola, 15th-century author and illustrator of two technological treatises entitled De ingeneis and De machinis, was affectionately referred to in his own life as the Archimedes of Siena. However, his books and his fame were soon surpassed by his fellow townsman Francesco di Giorgio Martini and by other Renaissance figures like Alberti, Filarete, and Leonardo da Vinci. Indeed, Taccola received relatively little attention from the scholarly world until recently, when a surge of interest on the part of three American scholars-J. H. Beck, Gustina Scaglia, and F. D. Prager-resulted in three editions of his books.1 Unfortunately, the three editions were published so closely in time that the editors could not take full advantage of each other's work, even though Scaglia was involved in the production of two of the editions. Perhaps it will be a useful service to readers of this journal to review the three editions simultaneously, in order to evaluate the specific contributions of each and to correlate the results of the three separately executed editions. First, a few biographical details about Taccola for the benefit of those readers unfamiliar with his life. Mariano di Jacopo, detto Taccola, was born in Siena in 1382 and died at some unknown date after 1453. He pursued a varied career in Siena as an urban administrator (notary, secretary of a scholarly foundation, tax estimator, and

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