Palladio, Andrew

, a celebrated Italian architect, was born in 1518 at Vicenza in Lombardy. As soon as he had learned the principles of art from Trissino, the celebrated poet, who was his townsman, he went to Rome, and applying himself with great diligence to study the ancient monuments, he entered into the spirit of their architects, and formed his taste upon them. On his return he was employed to construct various edifices, and obtained great reputation throughout Italy, which abounds in monuments of his skill, particularly the palace Foscari, at Venice, and the Olympic theatre at Vicenza, where he died in 1580. He excelled likewise in the theory of his art, as appears by his publications, which are still in the highest reputation. His first was his treatise on architecture, “I quattro libri dell‘ Architettura,” Venice, 1570. This has been often reprinted, and our country has the merit of a | very splendid edition, published at London in 1715, in English, Italian, and French, 2 or 3 vols. fol. This edition, published by Leoni, is enriched with the most valuable of the notes which Inigo Jones wrote on his copy of the original, now in the library of Worcester college, Oxford. A French edition of the London one was published by Nic. du Bois, at the Hague in 1726, 2 vols. fol.; and in 1740, one much enlarged in Italian and French, at Venice, 5 vols. fol. This has been more recently followed by Scamozzi’s fine edition in Italian and French, printed at Vicenza, 1776—83, 4 vols. fol. In 1730, our countryman, lord Burlington, printed an elegant work, entitled “Fabriche antiche designate da Andrea Palladio, e date in luce da Riccardo Conte de Burlington,” fol. This collection of Palladio’ s designs is very scarce, as the noble editor printed only a limited number of copies for his friends. Palladio also composed a small work, entitled “Le Antichita di Roma,” not printed till after his death. He illustrated Caesar’s “Commentaries,” by annexing to Badelli’s translation of that work, a preface on the military system of the Romans, with copper-plates, designed, for the most part, by his two sons, Leonida and Orazio, who both died soon after. Palladio was modest in regard to his own merit, but he was the friend to all men of talents; his memory is highly honoured by the votaries of the fine arts; and the simplicity and purity of his taste have given, him the appellation of the Raphael of architects. ¹