Today, we wonder why a castle was built. The
University of Houston's College of Engineering
presents this series about the machines that make
our civilization run, and the people whose
ingenuity created them.
Just north of the heel in
Italy's boot sits an odd gem, the Castel Del
Monte. It reminds me of designing an apparatus
to be used in semiconductor research while I was in
the army. I felt the need of intellectual elbow
room, so I contrived to build every conic section
into the apparatus. Around the functional parts I
shaped an array of lovely, purposeless,
soul-satisfying curves.
The Castel Del Monte was designed in a similar way
by a 13th-century emperor of the Holy Roman Empire,
Frederick II. Frederick was a scholar and an
architect. He knew Arabic as well as Latin, and he
was influenced by all he'd seen on a crusade into
the Arabic world. He founded the University of
Naples. He was also a friend to the great
mathematician Leonardo Fibonacci, who introduced
the Arabic representations for zero and ten into
European calculation.
Frederick's architecture is marked by strong planar
surfaces with circular towers and half-towers. It's
all very geometric and even willful. In the words
of one architectural historian, it makes no
concession to the land around it. And the imprint
of abstract Islamic ornamentation runs through
Frederick's work.
He built the Castel Del Monte in the 1240s. In a
land were snow is rare, it reminds us of the
fractal shape of snowflakes. It's a perfect
octagon, 123 feet across, with an octagonal center
court. Octagonal towers on each corner carry the
octagonal theme downward in scale. Its floor plan
reflects octagonal Islamic tile work. It makes me
think of my own play with conic sections. It's an
eye-catching exercise in geometry that outruns any
purpose.
So why did Frederick build it? His castles all over
Sicily and southern Italy were certainly meant to
express imperial power. But in this building we see
something more. It's a dark and closed place
inside, with a form so coolly mathematical as to be
beautiful. A contemporary looked at it and wrote
Stupor mundi et immutator mirabilis. That
was more an astonished outcry than a sentence. It
meant something like, Amazed world -- wondrous
novelty!
Frederick's son Manfred died in battle in 1266, and
Frederick's three grandsons were condemned to life
imprisonment in the Castel del Monte. One escaped
after 30 years, only to disappear into Egypt. And
that dreary footnote is the only role in history
I've been able to find for this 760-year-old
exercise in geometry.
This beautiful castle chokes on self-indulgence.
When I went back to Fort Monmouth in the 1960s and
found my apparatus still in use, it was an enormous
relief. My own self-indulgence hadn't been quite
been enough to've made the design useless. Any good
design must have the designer's personality written
upon it. But it should be etched lightly. It should
be there, but only hovering -- only an aura.
I'm John Lienhard, at the University of Houston,
where we're interested in the way inventive minds
work.
(Theme music)
Götze, H., Castel del Monte: Geometric
Marvel of the Middle Ages. New York: Prestel,
1998.
Willemsen, C. A., and Odenthal, D., Apulia:
Imperial Splendor in Southern Italy. New York:
Frederick A. Praeger, Publishers, 1959.
Godfrey, . M., Italian Architecture up to
1750. New York: Taplinger Publishing Co.
Inc. 1971.
See also various encyclopedia listings under
Frederick II.
My thanks to Margaret Culbertson, UH Art and
Architecture Librarian, for suggesting the episode
and providing most of the source material.
From A history of Architecture in
Italy, Vol. II, 1901
Click on the thumbnail above to see the full
size image.
Details from working drawings by JHL for an
apparatus to measure magnetic properties of
semiconductor materials, Signal Corps Engineering
Labs.
Left: Sample holder
bracket Right: part of
the upper bed of the apparatus
The Engines of Our Ingenuity is
Copyright © 1988-1998 by John H.
Lienhard.
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