The research for this task was quite complicated in the beginning, because I tried to use Alice in a “learning-by-doing” way, and didn’t fully get the system at first. After experimenting a bit and changing the topics, brains, etc. I developed a work flow and was able to do my research more precisely. I mainly used the key words “Italy”, “Travelling”, “Travel guide”, “17th Century”, “Architecture” and “towns”, adapted and conjugated depending on the context. Other key words like “Illustration” and the title of the book itself (I was interested in books referring to “Newes Itinerarium Italiae”) led to a dead end or/and too many unfitting outcomes.
There weren’t many books that met my expectations of similarities with “Newes Itinerarium Italiae”, although I varied my search settings in many different ways. The first book I chose, which Alice suggested quite early in the research progress, was “Tristes Tropiques” by C. Levi-Strauss, written between 1935 and 1938. It is a Travel Diary about his trip to Brazil, mainly motivated by his interest in indigenous people. The similarities it has with “Newes Itinerarium Italiae” are simple but important: the narrator travels to a place of his interest and wants to share his adventures and experiences with others. Levi-Strauss also talks about towns and their developments, mainly their growth, which he compares to European and Asian Cities. Like Furttenbach, he clearly is an explorer, who wants to share his message with the world. The similarities of the two books are, in my opinion, the writer’s intentions.
The second book was suggested by Alice in many different variations. No matter which “body” or key words I changed, Vitruvius’ “Ten books on Architecture” were always suggested at some point. Although the two books differ in many ways, their contents clearly cross a few times. Furttenbach has a less technical way of describing the towns and landscapes of Italy, but still both of them share the interest in the Italian Country and its Architecture. In contrast to “Triste Tropiques”, here the intentions of the authors differ from one another: Vitruvius explained Roman Architecture in a very technical, meticulous way, while Furttenbach states his personal opinion. One could say, Furttenbach‘s „Newes Itinerarium Italiae“ is an intermediate sort of book between the „Ten books on architecture“ and „Tristes Tropiques“. It is not as factual and compelling as Vitruvius‘ work, but also not as personal and diary-like as Levi-Strauss‘ book.