As for its location, if you insist on pressing me, I have not quite decided. It may be in the Unknown Southern Land: there is room enough, for as far as I know neither that hungry Spaniard nor Mercurius Britannicus has yet discovered half of it. Or it may be one of those floating islands in the South Sea, which, like the Cyanean Isles in the Black Sea, change their position and can be reached only at certain times, and by only a few people.

Or one of the Fortunate Isles, for who yet knows where or which they are? There is room enough in the interior of America and on the northern coasts of Asia. But I will choose a site at 45 degrees latitude—I will not trouble about the minutes—in the middle of the temperate zone; or perhaps on the equator, that paradise of the world, “where the laurel is always green,” and so forth, where spring is perpetual. For certain reasons I will conceal the longitude.

Yet let all men know by this declaration that if any honest gentleman will send as much money as Cardan allows an astrologer for casting a birth horoscope, he shall have a share: I will acquaint him with my project. Or if any worthy man seeks a civil or ecclesiastical office or dignity—for, as someone said of his archbishopric of Utopia, it is “holy ambition,” and may properly be sought—it shall be given freely, without anyone’s intercession, bribes, letters of recommendation, or the like. His own merit shall be his best advocate.

And because we shall allow neither deputies nor rights of patronage over appointments, if he is sufficiently qualified, and as able as he is willing to perform the duties himself, he shall take possession immediately.

It shall be divided into twelve or thirteen provinces, precisely bounded by hills, rivers, roads, or other conspicuous landmarks. Each province shall have a capital, placed roughly at the centre of a circle, with the other cities at equal distances, about twelve Italian miles apart,

and in them all the necessities of human life shall be sold at appointed hours and on appointed days. There shall be no market towns, markets, or fairs, since they only impoverish cities; no village shall be more than six, seven, or eight miles from a city. The exceptions shall be the great trading centres by the sea, general depots and marts such as Antwerp, Venice, Bergen in former times, London, and so on.

Most cities shall stand on navigable rivers or lakes, creeks, or harbours. Their shape shall be regular: circular, square, or rectangular, with handsome, broad, straight streets and uniform houses of brick and stone, like Bruges, Brussels, Reggio Emilia, Bern in Switzerland, Milan, Mantua, Crema, Cambalu in Tartary as described by Marco Polo, or the Venetian town of Palma.

I will allow very few suburbs, or none, and any there are shall have humbler buildings, with walls sufficient only to keep out people and horses. The exceptions shall be certain frontier towns and coastal towns, fortified according to the latest methods and situated at suitable harbours or other advantageous places.

In every city built in this way, I will have suitable churches and separate burial grounds, away from churchyards; a citadel in some cities, though not all, to command them; prisons for offenders; conveniently placed markets of every kind, for grain, meat, livestock, fuel, fish, and so on; well-appointed courts of justice; public halls for all associations; exchanges; meeting places; and armouries in which equipment for putting out fires shall be kept,

grounds for military exercises, public walks, theatres, and spacious fields set aside for physical exercise, sports, and wholesome recreation; institutions of every kind for children, orphans, old people, the sick, the mad, and soldiers; plague hospitals, and so on. These shall not be built by begging, or by gouty benefactors who have spent their lives extorting money by fraud and plunder and oppressing whole provinces and communities, then give something to charitable uses, building an almshouse, school, or bridge to make amends at the end of their lives, or perhaps a little earlier.

This is simply to steal a goose and leave a feather behind, to rob a thousand people to relieve ten. These institutions shall be built and maintained, not by collections, charitable contributions, or gifts for a fixed number of people, as ours are—so many and no more, at a specified allowance—but for everyone in need, however many or few. They shall be funded from the public treasury and continually maintained from it: we are not born for ourselves alone, and so on.

I will have conduits supplying fresh, wholesome water, suitably placed in every town; public granaries, as at Dresden in Meissen, Stettin in Pomerania, Nuremberg, and elsewhere; and colleges of mathematicians, musicians, and actors, as in ancient times at Lebedus in Ionia, as well as alchemists, physicians, practitioners of the arts, and philosophers, so that every art and science may be brought to perfection sooner and learned more thoroughly;

and public historians, as among the ancient Persians, who entered in their records whatever happened that was worth remembering. They shall be supplied with information and appointed by the state to record all notable deeds, instead of leaving this to every incompetent scribbler and biased or parasitical pedant, as we do today.

I will provide public schools of every kind, for singing, dancing, fencing, and so on, especially for grammar and languages. These shall be taught through practice, example, and conversation, as travellers learn abroad and nurses teach their children, instead of the tedious rules ordinarily used. Just as I will provide all these institutions, I will appoint public administrators and suitable officers for each: treasurers, aediles, quaestors, guardians of wards and widows’ property, and overseers of all public establishments, and so on.

Once a year they shall render exact accounts of every receipt and expense, to prevent disorder; and in this way they will not spend sums they would be ashamed to disclose, as Pliny says to Trajan. They shall answer to the higher officers and governors of each city. These shall be noblemen and gentlemen, rather than poor tradesmen and lowly craftsmen, and shall be required to reside in the towns nearest their homes at specified times and seasons;

for I see no reason, as Hippolitus also complains, why it should be less honourable for noblemen to govern a city than the countryside, or less fitting for them to live there now than in former times. I will have no bogs, fens, marshes, vast forests, wastelands, heaths, or commons: everything shall be enclosed, though the inhabitants must not be driven out—take care not to misunderstand me here. For what is common property, belonging to everyone, belongs to no one;