THE MAIN FEATURES OF THE IONIC ORDER ENTABLATURE IN VITRUVIUS'S TREATISE

The Treatise of Vitruvius, also known as The Ten Books On Architecture, has the privilege of being the only book from its time that has been passed on until today, and hence is the reference in order to understand the principles of the ancient architecture. It has been studied from both the historian and the translator-philologist points of view, and also by the Renaissance architects as a confrontation with the Roman architecture, or its ruins, that they were observing. However, we understand that it is necessary to analyze it with a new vision, coming from the point of view of the contemporaneous architect, focusing on its arithmetic, geometric, compositional and technical aspects. The article gathers a way of approaching a new research on Vitruvio try reviewing the text, but without explicitly assuming the conclusions that were obtained try the Renaissance architects. Focusing on the Ionic Entablature, we have deciphered the connections and proportions of every one of its components, analyzing and refuting, when necessary, some prescriptions included in Vitruvius' theory, as well as certain interpretations that the different consulted translators have made, two different sides with inconceivable disagreements amongst them. The goal we want to achieve is to reach, throughout a very thorough research, a quantifiable rule that we will summarize in tables, providing, in an innovative way, coherent connections between the heights of the column and the entablature.