As determined in Task 2, “Recueil élémentaire d’architecture” by Jean-François de Neufforge was meant to give general examples and inspirations from all known architecture at the time. While doing my research I worked with the Xenotheka library and Alice as well as the Online Etymology Dictionary and Thesaurus. I worked with most of Alice’s brains, the Xenotheka Library and the Library of Shakespeare’s Friends being the main ones.
I began my search for related books with the title of my book and words connected to engraving since the book had a collection of beautiful illustrations – de Neufforge was an engraver. Both searches lead to dead ends. The closest I got to a connection was Piranesi’s “Observations on the Letter of Monsieur Mariette”, but only because of the fact that Piranesi himself was an engraver himself. Searches with words connected to the decoration of architecture, one of the book’s topics, also only lead to dead ends. While searching with different words and phrases, books by Vasari kept coming up in the results over and over but lacked a true connection just as Piranesi’s piece of literature.
“Recueil élémentaire d’architecture” is known to be a kind of lexicon for architecture and while searching with the word “lexicon” (and related ones) I stumbled upon multiple works, as an example Alberti’s “On the Art of Building in Ten Books” and “Architecture Volume 1” by Serlio, that matched this purpose. The one that fit it probably the best though must be “The Four Books on Architecture” by Andrea Palladio. Even though the book contains way more text than de Neufforge’s and does not cover the exact same topics, it also acts as a sort of lexicon for architecture.
De Neufforge’s piece covers all known architecture at the time. While looking for a book that also covers the five orders, I found Kruft’s “A History of Architectural Theory”, a contemporary book that covers all known architectural epochs and hence has a clear connection to the work of de Neufforge.
Also, as an honorable mention, I would have to suggest Rem Koolhaas’ “Elements of Architecture” which, as a very recent book, tries to cover everything noteworthy to know on parts of a building, and acts as a lexicon as well.
It is possible, as I have tried to show, to find books that have a connection to de Neufforge’s book. What also has to be mentioned, is that I did not find a book that covers as much of architecture’s history with as beautiful illustrations as de Neufforge’s work, which, to me, shows the importance of his book to architecture.