Abstract
Relating to the thought of beauty conceived in Alberti, I have compared two definitions of architectural beauty in the "De re aedificatoria", namely following two summary quotations are. "I shall define beauty to be 'concinnitas' of all the parts, ・・・with 'ratio'・・・ of the parts nothing could be added diminished or moved, but for the worse." (L. VI, c. 2) "We may conclude beauty to be ・・・ made by means of 'numerus, finitio et collocatio', which include all reasonable methods. " (L. JX, c. 5) In these sentences, he wrote "define" and "conclude", but as a matter of fact he didn't say what beauty is, but he said a condition of beautiful formation. I would rather say that he had insisted a condition. Referring to all other beauty explained in the original text, I found two phrases in that definitions showing the same substance of condition, I think that addition and diminution relating to the parts, correspond to 'numerus' (special symbolic numbers) and 'finitio' (special proportions), likewise moving to 'collocatio' (transposition). Therefore these methods of formation are necessary and enough to create architectural beauty. And these methods are characterized by the quantitative operations. In other words, the beauty of architecture should be made by a condition bringing only with special and limited numbers, proportions and transpositions of all parts. And finally, when the condition gains parfection, he says, suddenly quantitative operations make up another quality of beauty. This is a new classical proposal in early-renaissance.
