† 2 This "signature mark" was used by early printers to help bookbinders assemble the pages in the correct order.

TO THE MOST SERENE PRINCE

LORD CHARLES EMANUEL,

GRAND DUKE OF SAVOY

MY LORD.

NATIONAL LIBRARY OF ROME, VITTORIO EMANUELE

THERE GO FORTH, Most Serene Lord, these books of mine regarding Painting under the glorious name of Your Highness, as the singular and—among all the Princes of this age—the most generous protector of all the liberal Arts|In the Renaissance, these were the intellectual disciplines (like grammar, logic, and music) considered worthy of a free person, as opposed to "mechanical" manual labor.. Among these arts, there is no doubt that Painting—not only in its Theory and contemplation, but also in its most worthy practice and exercise—should be numbered; as I have discussed at length in several places within these books. Especially since there have been, at various times, both Princes and Kings who have not disdained, having sometimes set aside their scepters, to take up the brush and, with the greatest delight, handle the ruler and the stylus original: "la rega, & lo ſtile." These are the physical tools used for drawing and measuring in geometric compositions..

Nor have I been induced to dedicate these books to you solely for this reason—that Your Highness, emulating the Great Augustus A reference to the first Roman Emperor, Augustus, who was famously a patron of the arts and letters. in this regard as in all others, so loves and prizes all the liberal Arts, and particularly takes such high pleasure in this very art of Painting—but also from considering within myself how marvelously the soul of Your Highness is composed and adorned with all those parts from which this most noble art is itself composed. These are the very subjects treated and discussed throughout these pages, namely: Motion (which I also call Decorum), Color, Light, Perspective, and Proportion.

For one sees in Your Highness, to the supreme astonishment of everyone, the motions|original: "moti." In Renaissance art theory, this refers both to physical movement and the "motions of the mind"—the outward expression of inner emotions through gesture and posture. in this so slippery age of youth, and amidst so many delights and comforts of a most ample state, always regulated by reason and continually directed, as if toward a final goal—