The stereotomy role in the Geometric transition from perspective to descriptive geometry

Abstract

The eighteenth‐century studies on Perspective, of a rigorously scientific nature ‐ begun so brilliantly and synthetically by s'Gravesande ‐ reached their peak with the Brook Taylor and Lambert works. Although some of the later works rise notably for their scientific quality and expository rigor, the period of maximum development of Perspective can be considered concluded at the end of that century. In agreement with G. Loria, it was precisely in that period that a new branch of mathematics came to maturity, which was to take the place of Perspective as a trait d'union between the exact sciences and the arts of drawing. In fact, the interest aroused by the codification of the double orthogonal projection, destined to assume a dominant role in the corpus of the nascent Descriptive Geometry, will attract the interest of scholars, even if its intuitive use was already widespread, as demonstrated for example by Durer's drawings. In addition, the tradition of Stereotomy, which had always employed this type of representation, allowed obtaining directly from the graph those metric and angular data necessary for a correct 'cutting of the stones'.
In this sense, we propose a theoretical reflection about the eighteenth‐century treatises on Stereotomy, where we find, together with an exceptional graphic quality, founding aspects of Descriptive Geometry, codifed by Monge.