The essay explores an unpublished work by Giovanni Maria Galli Bibiena, son of the famous Ferdinand, who still today remains
the most enigmatic and less historical member of the famous family of theatre stage designers and architects. Giovanni Maria
first visited Naples in the forties of the 18th century, and for over thirty years he taught architecture there to many young people
in the Kingdom.
The manuscript can be looked at in relation to his educational activity, as it was most likely the manual he
used in his lessons. The way it is organised perfectly respects the editorial line of Vignola ancestry, which was hugely successful
in Europe between the 17th and 19th centuries. The most original aspects of his writing reveal that Giovanni Maria was able
to detach himself from the solid roots of his family’s theoretical culture, and make an innovative contribution to teaching
architecture in Naples.
