I Told You So, Said Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

Rural Massachusetts is delightful at the end of summer. The classic New England architecture blends with the lawns, gardens, and green forests into a picture of perfect harmony. It is sunny, and the right time in the afternoon for a stroll around the college town of Amherst. However, after a few blocks a distinct crack appears in this idyll: a traditional white wooden house is being renovated and a skull and crossbones sign on the lawn is telling us to keep out due to danger of lead poisoning. It turns out that the customary white colour of the houses around here was oft en due to lead-based pigments. The use of lead in paints was phased out in 1978, but it is still an issue judging from the 16-page pamphlet available in six languages from the US Environmental Protection Agency, and the criminal cases brought against real estate companies and landlords failing to inform tenants and buyers of the lead status of their homes. Marcus Vitruvius Pollio would probably have agreed with this pamphlet and legislation, and so most certainly would Alice Hamilton. Although almost two millennia separate the Roman engineer from the first woman on the faculty of Harvard Medical School, they are united in the fight against the dangers of lead to the workforce and to the public. We do not know much about the life of the first century BC architect and engineer Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, otherwise known as Vitruvius, except what can be inferred from his famous work The Ten Books on Architecture. This magnum opus, written in the days of the Emperor Augustus, probably represents the summary of the professional experience of an old man. The title is slightly misleading, as architecture in Roman times would cover a much broader area than today. So Vitruvius tells us a great deal about engineering in general, about the chemistry of pigments and, to the benefit of this story, about aqueducts and the proper treatment of water. He is also clearly a conservative man, lashing out against ‘decadent frescos’ and ‘these days of bad taste’.