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Book/Printed Material Treatise on Field Fortifications. Trattato delle fortificazione di Terra

About this Item

Title

  • Treatise on Field Fortifications.

Other Title

  • Trattato delle fortificazione di Terra

Summary

  • Giovan Battista Belluzzi (1506--54) was a San Marino native who served as chief military engineer to Cosimo I de' Medici (1519--74), duke of Florence. This manuscript, believed to be in Belluzzi's own hand, was written for Stefano IV Colonna, a Florentine general also in the employment of the Medici family. The manuscript contains instructions for building military fortifications in remote areas, using only local resources such as earth and wood as structural elements. The text includes a discourse on how to evaluate the condition of the soil, how to treat soil to turn it into a binding agent or plaster, and how to apply it to wooden supports to fashion a defensive wall. The text also includes measurements for determining the height and length of a planned wall and a description of where to position the framework section of a wall. The manuscript contains a series of drawings to illustrate the methods described in the text, including an image depicting the pattern in which wooden poles were to be placed in the ground to form a section of wall. Another image shows a platform that was to be built so that workers could construct the elevated parts of the fortification. Belluzzi also provides illustrations of tools, methods of weaving strips of wood to form parts of walls, and other ways of using local elements to build fortified structures. He concludes the work with a description of the walls of the city of Pistoia, which he constructed in 1544. Belluzzi died in Medici service during the siege of Siena.

Names

  • Belluzzi, Giovan Battista, 1506-1554 Author.

Created / Published

  • [place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified], [1540 to 1554]

Headings

  • -  Italy
  • -  1540 to 1554
  • -  Barricades
  • -  Construction
  • -  Forts and fortifications

Notes

  • -  Title devised, in English, by Library staff.
  • -  Original resource extent: 45 folios ; 232 x 168 millimeters.
  • -  Original resource at: Riccardiana Library of Florence.
  • -  Content in Italian.
  • -  Description based on data extracted from World Digital Library, which may be extracted from partner institutions.

Medium

  • 1 online resource.

Digital Id

Library of Congress Control Number

  • 2021667871

Online Format

  • compressed data
  • pdf
  • image

Additional Metadata Formats

IIIF Presentation Manifest

Rights & Access

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Credit Line: [Original Source citation], World Digital Library

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Cite This Item

Citations are generated automatically from bibliographic data as a convenience, and may not be complete or accurate.

Chicago citation style:

Belluzzi, Giovan Battista, Author. Treatise on Field Fortifications. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified, to 1554, 1540] Pdf. https://www.loc.gov/item/2021667871/.

APA citation style:

Belluzzi, G. B. (1540) Treatise on Field Fortifications. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified, to 1554] [Pdf] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021667871/.

MLA citation style:

Belluzzi, Giovan Battista, Author. Treatise on Field Fortifications. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified, to 1554, 1540] Pdf. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/2021667871/>.