The Anatomy of Melancholy

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,