Title: L’expérience de l’architecture militaire
Author: The Martins
Publication Date: 1687
At a started the assignment I wondered what topics I should begin with. I decided to brainstorm a little. The first step I took was write the whole title and choosing some of the words. For example the obvious one in this case would be “architecture militaire” Military Architecture. The whole title of the book is “The experience of military architecture, where we will thoroughly learn the method of making work in the squares” So I decided to also search for architecture in the squares and experience of military architecture. I tried to search with the topic of architecture, war and military. Which are all related to the main argument of my book.
First I tried Architecture as a topic and searched for military Architecture. I showed a lot of books about architectural theory and how it had evolved over the years. With some mentions about the military architecture for example in the book of Vitruvius or the teaching of military and architecture in architecture school. None of the books were about military architecture.
So I went with another approach. I searched for military architecture in the topics war and military. This time it appeared a lot of books about politics and philosophy and more about strategies in war and the military in. I continued with the other architecture in the squares, but Alice understood squares as the geometrical form, so that was a dead end. The other search experience in military architecture was more successful.
At the end I decided to select one book that had to do with architecture and one that didn’t but at some point mentioned the use of military architecture.
The first book I chose is “The Architecture of Michelangelo” by Ackerman. In this book Ackerman writes about the architectural career of Michelangelo, one of the greatest artist of the renaissance. He discusses in detail the designs and buildings finished by Michelangelo. I chose this book, because when I searched for the term experience of military architecture with the topic of military in the Xenotheka library, it showed a quote “This places Michelangelo’s fortification projects among the incunabula of modem military architecture, just at the most fluid and inventive moment in its history, at a time when experience had established no proven formula of design.” The main topic of the book isn’t military architecture, but it mentions that some of Michelangelo’s projects of fortification brought the military architecture forward.
The second book I chose is the “Forensis: The Architecture of Public Truth” by Forensic Architecture which deals with the architecture used in the political struggles of the 21st century. I chose this book because in comparison to the others that are shown, this book talks about our times. The other books that I found talked about the past and how the military architecture was taught or how it was used. In this book it mentioned a part where they discuss about a strategy that the NATO used in cities to be able to remove the architecture. I interpreted this part as military strategy and military architecture. I also chose this book, because when I searched for military architecture with the topic of military in the Xenotheka library, it was the first book that showed up.
In conclusion, the search for similar books to mine where a great struggle. Due to the concepts that where discussed and presented in my book where of more technical and methodical nature, it was difficult to search for the same, when the books shown where in text only.
Written by Anneke Iten de Leon