This is a readable, amiable narrative bursting with information relating to an impressive range of subjects. Minor's laudable determination to relate architecture to the world unfolding around it means that the level of contextual scene-setting goes far beyond what one normally encounters in books of this sort. . . . In the end, her book succeeds at the difficult task ... Read moreof offering both an engaging entry point for scholars new to the topic and a stimulating synthetic interpretation for those already involved with it. -Richard Wittman, CAA Reviews Filled with discussions of taste, doctrine, ecclesiastical history, familial strife, archaeology, and book history. . . . Minor has arrayed a rich feast of information around the architecture of papal Rome in the eighteenth century. She brilliantly resurrects the aspirant ambitions of popes, scholars, and architects that built in order to keep Rome a centre of art and learning. -Robin Thomas, EAHN Newsletter [The Culture of Architecture in Enlightenment Rome] has a very specific subject and is argued with great clarity: it deals with seven architectural commissions ordered by the popes Clement XII Corsini (reg. 1730-40) and Benedict XIV Lambertini (reg. 1740-58), the expression of a cultural flowering that related to the reformist currents of Roman intellectual society of the day. . . . . [Hyde Minor has] introduced new critical boundaries for the understanding of the cultural context of eighteenth-century Roman architecture. -Tommaso Manfredi, The Burlington Magazine This study makes a considerable contribution to our understanding of eighteenth-century architecture in its cultural and intellectual context. -Jeffrey Collins, Bard Graduate Center Show Less