The importance of Vitruvius is due to his treatise on architecture: The De Architectura, a work divided into 10 books, dedicated to Augustus, was probably written between 29 and 23 BC.
The work was written during the same years in which Augustus was focused on a general renovation of public buildings.
However, at a time when large buildings in Roman architecture were being renewed, Vitruvius paid little attention to the use of clay bricks or vaults and domes.
In the Middle Ages the work was not considered particularly highly. Instead, it was rediscovered in the 15th century, thanks to another scholar and theorist of architecture, Leon Battista Alberti, thus becoming a point of reference throughout the Renaissance.
