Serlio - Primo e Secondo Libro d'Architettura - 1545

Serlio and the birth of modern architecture: the code that shaped Europe
A truly rare specimen, the central node of the entire Serlian project and a crossroads through which Italian architecture of the early Cinquecento is definitively integrated into French culture. This 1545 Paris edition, the first and fundamental for Books I and II, represents the meeting point between the science of proportions, construction practice, and political ambition: a treatise conceived to shape not only architects but also sovereigns, ministers, and court masters. Thanks to the power of its images and the clarity of its technical discourse, the work imparts a new grammar of building to Europe, transforming geometry into a tool of governance and perspective into a language of power. An intact copy in its essential parts, technically interesting, profoundly authentic, with signs of use that do not detract but rather add history and authority.
Market value
The first Paris edition of 1545 of Books I and II is among the rarest and most sought after in the entire Serlio corpus. A copy of the same edition, with similar characteristics, was sold in 2024 at a renowned London auction house for approximately 15,000 euros. Comparable copies on the international market, when available, range within a high rarity bracket, with estimates reflecting the foundational importance of the work in the landscape of modern architecture. This copy, intact in its structural and iconographic components, equipped with the rare out-of-text plate and the editorial cancellation diagram, presents a market value consistent with these high references.

Physical description and condition
Contemporary binding in semi-rigid parchment with a five-rib spine, ancient handwritten title, two intact passing ties at the edges of the back cover, traces of previous ties. Some reddening and moisture marks. Frontispiece within a woodcut frame featuring a royal salamander. All 132 woodcuts in the text are present, including 26 full-page illustrations. The rare woodcut plate inserted between pages 2 and 3 is present. The editorial cancellation diagram originally glued onto page 5 verso is included. An ancient pencil drawing on page 3 recto. The last leaf, page 10, has been professionally restored on ancient watermarked paper, with parts of the publisher's mark and the reader's warning skillfully reintegrated. Original endpapers are present. Pages (2); 8 unnumbered; 148; (2).

Full title and author
The first book of architecture.
The second book of perspective
Paris, Jean Barbé, 1545.
Sebastiano Serlio

Context and Significance
The Serlian project of the seven books of architecture constitutes the first major modern treatise, not only because it systematizes theory and practice but also because it introduces a visual method that radically transformed architectural education. The Books I and II, written at Fontainebleau, originate from the heart of Francesco I's artistic policy, the ruler who transformed France into the European laboratory of the Renaissance. The first book provides the mathematical foundation of architecture, making geometry not a speculative exercise but the operational basis for every proportion, plan, module, and construction drawing. The second book expands the scope of perspective into the scenic field, integrating observation, calculation, and representation. Here, Serlio codifies the three scenes – tragic, comic, satirical – destined to become archetypes of Western scenography. The importance of this work is immense: for the first time, images do not merely illustrate the text but replace and determine it, creating a self-sufficient visual system. This book is the gateway for Italian architecture into the French language, thanks to the translation by Jean Martin, a central figure in the history of architectural reception (translator of Vitruvius and the Hypnerotomachia). The result is a foundational work that spreads the Mannerist grammar across Europe and inaugurates a new way of thinking about architecture as science, art, and politics.

Biography of the Author
Sebastiano Serlio (1475-1554) was an architect, theorist, and scenographer, a direct witness to Bramante and Raphael's Rome, the artistic fervor of Venice, and the magnificence of the court of Francesco I. His works exerted a decisive influence throughout Europe, especially thanks to the didactic and illustrated nature of his treatises. He was the first to develop an accessible, replicable, and widely exportable architectural language, anticipating the modern concept of an illustrated technical manual.

Printing history and circulation
The Paris edition of 1545 of Books I and II is the very first for these texts, published in the same year that Serlio completed the drafting of the corpus. Jean Barbé produced a refined and complex print, equipped with an iconographic apparatus unmatched in scope and clarity. The presence of the plate outside the text – often missing – and the editorial cancellation diagram attest to the original structure of the work, which is preserved here almost entirely. Circulation was limited: restricted print runs, targeted recipients mainly architects, courtiers, and aristocratic libraries. The surviving copies are very few and often mutilated. This copy therefore belongs to the circle of the most complete and representative witnesses of the edition.

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND REFERENCES
Millard, French, 153.
Brunet, Jacques-Charles. Bookseller's Manual, V, 304.
Fowler, Alfred. Architectural Books, 303.
Harvard College Library, Mortimer, French 492.
Cicognara, Leopoldo. Critical catalog of art and antiquity books, 698–700 (for Serlio and related treatises).
Adams, Catalogue of Books Printed on the Continent of Europe, S 1033 (for the French editions of the 16th century).
Upjohn, E. Studies in the Architectural Treatise of Sebastiano Serlio.
Hart, Vaughan; Hicks, Peter. Sebastiano Serlio on Architecture.
Ackerman, James. The Architecture of the Italian Renaissance (chapters on Serlio as a bridge between Italy and France).
Anthony Blunt. Art and Architecture in France 1500–1700 (fundamental steps on the Fontainebleau period).
Guide, Markus. Sebastiano Serlio and the architecture theory of the Renaissance.
Bury, Michael. The Print in Italy 1550–1620 (for the iconographic framework of Renaissance woodcuts).
Mortimer, Ruth. French Sixteenth Century Books (reference bibliography for the Parisian workshops).
Renouard, Philippe. Parisian printers and booksellers of the 16th century (on the typographic history of Jean Barbé).
Cohen, Henry. The Collector's Guide to 18th-Century Illustrated Books (with iconographic comparisons and collecting criteria).
Pettegree, Andrew; Walsby, Malcolm. French Vernacular Books (on the circulation of books in France in the 16th century).
All editions of Serlio can be consulted in: Edit16; USTC; ICCU; WorldCat; Gallica BnF.