What I intend to discuss here is precisely the viability of the central thesis of the book, which is also its innovating contribution. The author proposes the hypothesis of a Bucharest-ideal city, organized around such geometrical principles that derive from sacred fundaments. The hypothesis is three-fold: 1) The sacred seats of Bucharest would be disposed in a radial concentric fashion around an omphalos, in our case the Old St. George Church; 2) this ?navel of the city? is the angle point of a matrix composed of Old St. George / Mihai Vodă monastery / the Patriarchal Seat / Radu Vodă monastery. The axis uniting the Patriarchal Seat and Old St. George would be the bisector of the angle formed by Mihai Vodă-omphalos-Radu Vodă and would be continued by the most important commercial road that begins in Moldavia and goes all the way down to the southern border of Wallachia ? Calea Moşilor; 3) generally speaking, Bucharest would have been founded according to an ideal pattern, just like Filarete?s: a ?mandalic? pattern, a circle circumscribing two squares at a 45 degrees angle from one another.

            Were it true (but the author does not support it with sufficiently convincing evidence), the theory of Bucharest?s ideal geometry would have, besides a number of serious researchers, who would be interested to debate, continue and systematize it, at least two types of unwanted ?supporters?: those obsessed with synchronicity, who ? while up-turning the complex of the small culture into a sort of ideological-nationalist exhibitionism ? will use it as yet another proof of our European ?connection?; and, on the other hand, those too easily fascinated by all sorts of esoteric mystification, who will have Bucharest pass as the latest ideal Jerusalem descended on the banks of Dîmboviţa and the House of the Republic as the expression of the Temple.

            I?m afraid that, methodologically speaking, tempting as it might be, Dana Harhoiu?s new and fascinating theory will not stand if subjected to serious scrutiny. It combines aspects of the sacred space, as it is interpreted by the phenomenology of architecture (Eliade, Heidegger, Norberg-Schulz) ? that axis mundi, for instance, that would supposedly pass through Old St. George ? with morphologic analyses of the urban structure. The concentric circles identified by the author leave aside quite a number of other sacred seats, which proves that such a rigorous pattern is actually untenable. The identification of the corners of the two squares, on the model of Filarete, is hardly sustainable in Bucharest?s case. Batiştei Church is not exactly in the northern corner, neither is Radu Vodă where it ?is supposed? to be, nor the St. Apostles, while in the north-western and north-eastern corners there is nothing at all.

            It may be that any number of the churches of old Bucharest (and there is plenty of them) can be shown to follow all sorts of more or less ideal geometrical patterns we deem significant; which is not to say that this means anything,other than a feel of the game. This is why the author?s interpretation seems to have been completed a posteriori: first the patterns, then the attempt to find a justification. Otherwise, the sole argument in favor of the comparison with Filarete would be (and this is a paraphrase) that a Latin translation of his treatise was found at Matei Corvin?s court, and another copy in Russia. The author concludes, in a too venturesome statement, that ?these ideas were largely circulated over the whole Europe, and therefore in the Eastern-European space as well.? Is not the argument too easily explained, especially when we deal with an epoch that witnessed a far more restrained circulation of books than there is today? And how does the hypothetical presence of a book in a princely library relate with the?real-life? situation of the masons? guilds?