The importance of place—as a unique spatial identity—has been recognized since antiquity. Ancient references to the ‘genius loci’, or spirit of place, evoked not only the location of a distinct atmosphere or environment, but also the protection of this location, and implicitly, its making and construction. This volume examines the concept of place as it relates to architectural production and building knowledge in early modern Europe (1400-1800). The places explored in the book’s ten essays take various forms, from an individual dwelling to a cohesive urban development to an extensive political territory. Within the scope of each study, the authors draw on primary source documents and original research to demonstrate the distinctive features of a given architectural place, and how these are related to a geographic location, social circumstances, and the contributions of individual practitioners. The essays underscore the distinct techniques, practices and organizational structures by which physical places were made in the early modern period.

Elizabeth Merrill is a specialist of early modern Italian art and architecture, with a focus on architectural practices and the development of the architectural profession. She has published several articles on these themes and the work of the Sienese architect Francesco di Giorgio. She has held fellowships at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin (MPIWG), New York Public Library, The Morgan Library and Drawing Institute, and Humboldt University. She has recently been appointed as Assistant Professor at the University of Ghent.

List of Illustrations
Abbreviations
Introduction: Embracing Specificity, Embracing Place (Elizabeth Merrill)
Architecture on Paper: The Development & Function of Architectural Drawings in the Renaissance (Wolfgang Lefèvre)
Part I: Marking Place
The Santacroce Houses along the Via in Publicolis in Rome: Law, Place & Residential Architecture in the Early Modern Period (Nele De Raedt)
Towards a New Architecture of Cosmic Experience (Noam Andrews)
Architecture for Music: Sonorous Spaces in Sacred Buildings in Renaissance & Baroque Rome (Federico Bellini)
Part II: Teaching Place
The Spedale di Santa Maria della Scala & the Construction of Siena (Elizabeth Merrill)
Places of Knowledge Between Ulm & the Netherlands in the seventeenth Century: The ‘Kunstkammer’ of Johannes Faulhaber (Paul Brakmann and Sebastian Fitzner)
Nicola Zabaglia’s Scaffoldings for the Maintenance of Architectural Space in St. Peter’s Basilica & Throughout Europe in the seventeenth to nineteenth Centuries (Stefan M. Holzer and Nicoletta Marconi)
Part III: Excavating Place
Building on ‘Hollow Land’: Skill & Expertise in Foundation-Laying Practices in the Low Countries (fifteenth-seventeenth century) (Merlijn Hurx)
The ‘Conquest’ & Construction of an Urban Place: The Insula dei Gesuiti in Venice in the Early Modern Period (Ludovica Galeazzo)
Exploring the Book of Fortresses (Edward Triplett)
Index