Les précédents du plan de Jefferson pour l'Université de Virginie

Abstract

The present article explores the problem of various sources and the iconographic programme of Thomas Jefferson's project for campus of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville (1817-1826). In conclusion, the author points out that it was the sacred architecture which dominated among the possible sources of Jefferson's idea, rather that the similarly laid out royal residence of Marly-le-Roi (as many scholars had suggested). Although the campus of the University of Virginia formally draws on ecclesiastic models, it was built as a "ville seculiere", where the sacred dimensions of architecture disappeared for the benefit of democratic ideals. At the time of Jefferson, the esoteric and metaphysic dimensions of architecture had disappeared and caused a sort of migration of architectural types.