Ruins as Architecture: Architecture as Ruins (Publication / American Philosophical Society Library)

Thomas J. McCormick, a noted scholar of the century of Enlightenment, examines the phenomenon of the creation of man-made ruins as an architectural form. Picturesque grottos, Gothic Temples and “ruins to be inhabited by a hermit” are the focus of McCormick’s study as he looks at these frequently playful yet melancholy monuments.