Juan Bautista Villalpando

Juan Bautista Villalpando (also "Villalpandus", or "Villalpanda", born 1552 in Córdoba, Spain—died 22 May 1608 in Rome) was a Spanish Jesuit scholar, mathematician, and architect.

Life

Villalpando became a Jesuit in 1575, and for the Society he designed buildings such as the Cathedral in Baeza and San Hermenegildo Church in Seville. [James Stevens Curl. "A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture." Oxford University Press. 2006. ISBN 0192806300] He studied geometry and architecture with Juan de Herrera, the architect of Philip II of Spain. After ordination, he specialised in Exegesis of the Old Testament. After first publishing his "Ezechielem Explanationes", or "Commentary on Ezekiel", [CathEncy|wstitle=Juan Bautista Villalpandus] with Jerónimo del Prado in 1596 he was accused of heresy and faced an Inquisition, subsequently he was found innocent. Also in 1596, Villalpando traveled to Rome where he published further volumes in 1604, and died in 1608. [Bernd Evers, Christoph Thoenes, et al. "Architectural Theory from the Renaissance to the Present." Taschen: 2003. Page 366. ISBN 382281699X]

Work

Villalpando's major work as a scholar was a commentary on the prophet Ezekiel, which was published with the support of Philip II. This text included imaginative reconstructions of Solomon's Temple and depictions of Jerusalem, which were renowned and influential. They were based on the vision of the prophet Ezekiel, and appeared in his "Ezechielem Explanationes". They inspired many European illustrators and were circulated among the master builders of the 17th century. His reconstructed drawings were based on the assumption that the buildings of Jerusalem were designed using the laws of geometry, and they were drawn in parallel or orthographic projection, which is a form of image Villalpando likened to God's vision. [Alberto Pérez Gómez, Louise Pelletier. "Architectural Representation and the Perspective Hinge." MIT Press. 1997. Page 150. ISBN 0262661136] Furthermore, they proposed an original link between the classical orders and Solomon's Temple. After the Renaissance republication of Vitruvius' "De architectura", which had reported that the origins of the orders lay in the Architecture of ancient Greece, Villalpando reinterpreted them to provide a higher authority. His reading was that they had been derived from the architecture of Solomon's Temple, thus reconciling the Bible with the antique architecture described in Vitruvius' text, and finding classical architecture's origins in God. [Joseph Rykwert. "The Dancing Column: On Order in Architecture." MIT Press. 1996:27. ISBN 0262681013] The illustrations brought an Inquisitorial investigation against Villalpando, claiming a misinterpretation of the holy writing, which was however, decided in his favour. In the opinion of some art historians, Villalpando's illustrations of Solomon's temple had an influence on numerous monastery constructions of the baroque era, as well as on the gridded arrangements of urban planning. [George L. Hersey. "Architecture and Geometry in the Age of the Baroque." University of Chicago Press. 2000:114. ISBN 0226327841] Villalpando's imagery was used also in design of Protestant churches and synagogues, at least in the 17th century. [Sergey R. Kravtsov, "Juan Buatista Villalpando and Sacred Architecture in the Seventeenth Century," "Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians", 3(2005), 312-339.] Geometrical designs of facilities with quadratic inner courtyards and risalits are also found in the built form of El Escorial: Villalpando was a disciple of Juan de Herrera, architect of El Escorial. [Alberto Pérez-Gómez. "Juan Bautista Villalpando's Divine Model in Architectural Theory". In Alberto Pérez-Gómez, Stephen Parcell. "Chora 3: Intervals in the Philosophy of Architecture". McGill-Queen's Press. 1999. ISBN 077351712X]

Some criticisms of Villalpando's work on Solomon's Temple bring up points with relevance to both architecture and philosophy. An architectural criticism is the exaggerated sized of the substructure of the Temple in his designs. [Matt Goldish. "Judaism in the Theology of Sir Isaac Newton." Springer. 1998. Page 88. ISBN 0792349962] Incidentally, this feature of an enormous buttressed base was subsequently used by Fischer von Erlach in his "Entwurf einer historischen Architektur", an early history of architecture, figuring prominently in the early pages. [Evers-Thoenes. Page 577.] A second related criticism is the lack of an archaeological basis, and apart from the detail of the renderings, a lack of grounding in realism. [Gómez-Pelletier. Page 151.] A textual criticism focuses on his failure to use Jewish sources distinct from the Hebrew Bible, such as the writings of Josephus, the Talmud, and the writings of Maimonides. [Goldish. Page 88.]

Villalpando also wrote theoretical tracts on gravity, geometry and architecture, occupying himself above all with conveying the geometrical principles of constructions. The great scholar of physics Isaac Newton made use of Villalpando's works in his studies of architecture. [Goldish. Page 91.]

References

Further reading

* Hanno-Walter Kruft. "A History of Architectural Theory: From Vitruvius to the Present". Princeton Architectural Press. 1996. ISBN 1568980108
* Gregor Martin Lechner: '"Villalpandos Tempelrekonstruktion in Beziehung zu barocker Klosterarchitektur", in: Piel, Friedrich / Traeger, Jörg (ed.), "Festschrift Wolfgang Braunfels", Tübingen 1977, 223-237
* Harry Francis Mallgrave. "Architectural Theory - Volume I: An Anthology from Vitruvius to 1870". Blackwell Publishing. 2005. ISBN 1405102586
*Joseph Rykwert. "On Adam's House in Paradise The Idea of the Primitive Hut in Architectural History." Museum of Modern Art. 1972. ISBN 0870705121

External links

*Ancient Maps of Jerusalem. [http://jnul.huji.ac.il/dl/maps/jer/html/jer205.htm "Villalpando, Juan Bautista, 1552-1608"] Jewish National & University Library.
* Jerusalem 3000: Three Millennia of History. [http://www.usm.maine.edu/~maps/exhibit1/theme7.html "VII. Jerusalem: From Town to Metropolis"] University of Southern Maine.
*Joseph MacDonnell, S.J. [http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/jmac/sj/scientists/villalpando.htm "Juan Bautista Villalpando, S.J. (1552 to 1608) and his version of Solomon's Temple"] Fairfield University.
*Museum of the History of Science. [http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/gatt/temple/catalog.asp?CN=51 "The Temple: Catalogue Number 51"] University of Oxford.