THE REASONS OF THE VERNACULAR ARCHITECTURE FOR THE REGULATION OF CONTEMPORARY INTERVENTIONS. TWO EXAMPLES OF RURAL ARCHITECTURE ON DANUBE DELTA AND THE VESUVIUS

Abstract. The development and growth of the territory has for centuries been conditioned by the availability of resources on site. The minor architecture which is presented as a vast and varied repertoire of unique architectural forms, perfected over time to meet the needs of living places, is the repository of the formal and cultural testimonies that represent the integration between man and environment, which took place in a constant process of adaptation and enhancement of limits and resources in terms of climate, materials, soil morphology and geology. The “not only formal” result of this growth process is a consolidated iconography that summarizes the profound reasons for building through techniques developed according to the characteristics of the available materials and the needs of life and daily work, an absolute synthesis between form and function that gives rise to the repertoire of the lexicon of the architecture of a place and of the landscape. Starting from these reflections, the proposed study seeks to investigate the reasons for the constructive lexicon of some examples of vernacular architecture related to different contexts, identifying the reasons for the constructive choices in terms of relationships between the function of technical elements and construction characteristics; the purpose of this approach is to regulate constructive interventions in consolidated settlements of vernacular architecture by proposing a study methodology that highlights the rules and reasons for those constructive choices so that purely formal distortions and misunderstandings do not occur in current practices. The selected case studies are the rural settlements of Terzigno, a municipality in the province of Naples (Italy) on the slopes of Vesuvius and some of the rural settlements in the Danube Delta, in Romania.