Andrea Palladio · The Fourth Book
Chapter X. Of the temple of the Sun and of the Moon
NEAR the arch of Titus, in the garden of Santa Maria Nova, there are two temples
to be seen, of the same form, and with the same ornaments; one of which, because it is placed in the east, is thought to have been the temple of the Sun; the other, because it looks towards the west, to be that of the Moon.
These temples were built, and dedicated by Titus Tatius, king of the Romans. They come very near a round form, because they are as broad as they are long; which was done in respect of the course of the said planets, which is circular round the heavens.
The loggia’s that were before the entrance of these temples are all ruined; neither are there any other ornaments to be seen, but those that are in the vaults, which have com-parents of stucco most exquisitely wrought, and of a beautiful invention.
The walls of these temples are very thick, and between one temple and the other on the flank of the great chapels, which are opposite to the entrance, the vestigia to be seen of some stairs, which must have led up to the roof.
I have made the loggia’s forwards, and the ornaments within as I have imagined they must have been, consideration being had to that which is seen above ground, and that little that it has been possible to see of the foundations,
I have made two tables of this temple.
In the first are the plans of both, as they are joined together; and one may see where the Plate stairs were, as was said led up to the roof. Near these plans are the elevation of the outward part, and of that within,
IN the second are the ornaments, that is, those of the vaults, the others being ruined, no vestigia of them are to be seen; and the elevations on the flank.
twelve squares.
Public-domain text (London, published by Isaac Ware, 1738). Read from the Internet Archive’s scan (gri_33125011569684) of the copy in the Getty Research Institute, by way of Wikimedia Commons, where it is marked public domain. That scan’s text layer had lost the ends of the lines on every left-hand page, so the pages were read again from the scan’s images, the two readings compared word by word, and the text cleaned: the long s (ſ) is printed s and the ct and st ligatures as plain letters, words broken at the ends of lines are joined, and running heads, page numbers, signatures and catchwords are removed. Ware’s spelling, capitals and punctuation are otherwise kept (shew, publick, antient, compleat). Chapter titles and words the OCR misread were corrected against the page images. Some misreadings will remain, most of them in the italic prefaces and the Latin of Book III. Ware’s dedication, the list of subscribers, his table of terms, the errata and the bookseller’s advertisement are not reproduced. Nor are the 212 engraved plates, their inscriptions, or the keys to the letters on them that Ware prints in the text: where Palladio writes “as in the design” the figure is in the printed book.