Auctoritas & Fama: reflections on the recognition of the architect in ancient society based on the Vitruvian text

Abstract

This article discusses public recognition of architects and artists in ancient society based on the Vitruvian text. The concept of auctoritas is approached as the broadest notion of recognition, achieved through the public scrutiny of actions, confronting it with the notion of fama, or notoriety, achieved by different, and sometimes less noble, means. From these key questions, the Vitruvian text is scrutinized in search of evidence of his position on the subject, resorting,
above all, to the prefaces and small parables which the author uses as a way of illustrating his judgments. Through these different passages, the very notion of authorship is also discussed from the identification of traces of this form of recognition, although still alien to the ancient world, and its association with the very idea of imitation and the late-republican environment in which Vitruvius is inserted.