Editorial

Abstract

 When the metric system was introduced in Europe in the late eighteenth century, while the previous measurement systems disappeared, the very concept of architecture, tightly connected to it, was subverted. The previous geometric design had found in the various numeral bases of the ancient modules the appropriate framework linking the articulation of the shapes to the figures of geometry. These plots became legitimized by numerical theorems, series, proportions that made it easy to remember, to transfer and to operate the plan. The direct manual survey of the past tradition, described by analogical drawings, did not allow to recover all the contents of historical knowledge, forgotten after the scientific revolution, but attractive for the present. Part of the ancient knowledge is not preserved/stored in literary sources, but in material constructions, i.e. in monuments. Meaningful immaterial heritage is preserved in material records. Technological innovation brought by information technology can give to the scientific survey of monuments the value of means of access to a new unexpected knowledge, more responsive to the questions of today’s culture.