To be honest, I was a little disappointed when I examined the book in the Old Prints in the Zurich Central Library. It looked to me more like a plan collection folder with pictures glued in, so it looked to me like a photo album and not like an old book of importance. Nevertheless, I then discovered, also through one of the lectures, that fortress construction, which is the theme of the book, was also of importance in the architecture of the time. Even if I would attribute it to engineering before. I think the reason why the text of the book, although it has already been digitized, was not recorded, is probably because it is not relevant for us, it is not worth the effort, so to speak. Whether this is really the case, I could not determine so far. But it is a fact that there is very little written information and I could not get much out of the text recognition software neither . That means, the different ground plans of the fortresses in their countless variations seem to be especially important. That these are not hand sketches, but printed ones, which through the technique of copperplate engraving, shows that this collection is of good quality and the plans could be handed down to posterity.
For me the book is rather a boring uninteresting friend, to whom I certainly do not contact every day. But the exercises have taught me to examine the material soberly and scientifically, and not just to look at it superficially. But Task 2, i.e. to visit the book on site, was the most exciting. The environment of the library gave the whole undertaking something very serious and valuable. When I had to find out if it was already digitized, I couldn’t find it on the net at that time and so it was reproduced in Task 3 for now. Therefore I assumed that there was no digitized copy of the book yet. But later, during further exercises, I dug a little deeper and found the copy in the Google Library. I’ve adjusted it retroactively. So this situation is maybe a good example of the learning effect, the ever more precise and systematic investigation. This is also due to the length of the friendship, a synonym for this analysis, more and more things could come to light in the course of time. The duration of 2 semesters, that is a good year, therefore certainly has the effect that one becomes really familiar with the matter to be studied, an expert in a field, so to speak. So it is a kind of simulation of a long lasting investigation, one could almost say and I am glad to have been a part of it.