Esther M. Zimmer Lederberg
Renaissance Architecture and Harmony

Palladio introduced the use of Classical orders from ancient Greece and ancient Rome. "Plato's preferred mode or style was that of the Dorians: the Dorian or Doric style, in all the arts, was considered to be noble, manly, dignified, and restrained." Furthermore, "By the sixth century BC the styles of Greek monumental architecture were classified according to these tribal or ethnic distinctions into three principal modes (genera): the prestigious Dorian or Doric; the Ionic (a more feminine style from eastern Greece); and the Corinthian, an elaborate variant of the Ionic which appeared during the fifth century BC." Lastly, "The crucial connection between the architectural and the musical genera is found in the concepts of 'mode' and 'ethos'. The Greek theorists recognized that each tribe or ethnic tradition had its own distinctive style or mode of poetry, song, music, dance, architecture, and other arts; and, having distinguished the regional or ethnic modes in the musical and plastic arts, they tried to codify the specific ethos in Dorian music and architecture - a characteristic found in the pitch, tuning, and rhythm of Dorian music (and a fortiori dance), as well as in the construction and decoration of the Dorian or Doric style of architecture. Certain features of this regional or ethnic character were eventually defined in precise measures: in the proportions of the Dorian musical scale (harmonia) and rhythm and in the forms and proportions of Doric architecture." The result was as follows. "Having identified three different scales used by the Greeks - the Diatonic, the Chromatic, and the Enharmonic - the theorists arrived at very exact measures for each tuning system, as well as attempting a general description of their respective ethos or character. Thus they formulated the 'Ethos of the Genera': the diatonic genus as 'natural, masculine and more austere'; the Chromatic as 'sweet and plaintive,' and Enharmonic as 'exciting and gentle.' They also measured the specific rhythms of song and dance in metrical 'feet' divided into long and short (double and single) units and tried to define the ethos of each rhythmic pattern as noble or ignoble, serious or gay, tragic or comic, et cetera." The Greeks saw architecture as 'frozen music.' 1

Quintilian's views concerning rhetorical gesture were extended to architecture. Thus Daniele Barbaro was interested in architecture viewed as "... the anatomy of a building." 2 "Vasari, describing the qualities of a well-proportioned building, said that it should 'represent' the human body both as a whole and in all its parts. The facade should have the symmetry of the human face, the door placed like the mouth, the windows like eyes,... staircases...are the arms and legs of the building."2 Thus making use of the rhetorical trope of prosopopoeia. Palladio also viewed architecture as one would view the human body. 1 Alberti's theory of architecture was based upon dimensions that created musical harmony and the physical proportions found in god's greatest creation: man (see the Vitruvian man). However, not everone agreed with Alberti's views concerning architecture. Two examples of architecture that could be in close proximity: one building of a pagan (ancient Greek) temple in purposeful disrepair in a rustic setting, but nearby, a church, with garden carefully maintained, the church in perfect condition. The stark difference was a rhetorical device to show the victory of Christianity over the pagan religion. However, as time passed, another major viewpoint emerged, that was based upon the views of Longinus in his book, "Peri Hypsous" ("On The Sublime"). This new viewpoint allowed for the unity or combination of divergent "styles"(for example, the architectural styles of the Renaissance, the Baroque, the Gothic, unities of "male" with "female": harmony with deliberate disharmony), to create an aesthetic of fear, horror, and excess: a radical destruction of assumptions. Thus it should not be surprising that different parts of a building might strongly clash or appear discordant with each other.

Brief Table of Architectural Terms
Classical Orders: Columns and Pedestal
Harmonic Ratios: Alberti, Palladio, the Vitruvian Man
Longinus ("The Sublime") and Architecture


1 Nevile, jennifer; (Ed.), "Dance, Spectacle, and the Body Politic, 1250-1750", Indiana Univ. Press, 2008, pp. 275, 276
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2 Peacock, John; "The Stage Designs of Inigo Jones: The European Context", Cambridge Univ. Press, 1995, p. 121.

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