Prolegomena to a theoretical course in urban morphology based upon the relationships between the shape of the city and the shape of the map

The aim of the paper is describing the contents (and the critical approach) of a theoretical course held in Spring Term 2022 between Politecnico di Torino (PhD Program in Architecture. History and Project) and Southeast University Nanjing (Master Program in Architecture). The course introduced the main open questions of urban morphology through 10 cities, 10 maps and the approaches of 10 scholars, designers, cartographers. The archaeological map of Pompei by William Bernard Clarke (1831-1840), in the comparison with the new topography of Rome by Giovanni Battista Nolli (1748), show the methodologic instruments of maps for studies on urban form. The map of Venice by Saverio Muratori (1959), the map of Como by Gianfranco Caniggia (1963) and the map of Torino by Augusto Cavallari Murat (1968), in their differences and at the same time in their deep relationship with the idea of urban dynamics in time, can be considered the main epistemological basis for Italian studies on urban morphology (whose excellent outcome can be represented by the plan of Palermo’s historical center by Pier Luigi Cervellati in 1992). The Plan Voisin by Le Corbusier (1925) and the representation of Boston by Kevin Lynch (1960) represent two modern ways to look at the form of the cities, while the London portrayed by Space Syntax (2012) and the studies by Fumihiko Maki towards the possible morphologic map of Tokyo (1980-2018) introduce relevant topics (digital representation, the nature of Asian cities) in the contemporary debate about urban morphology. The paper, written in the framework of the debate about the teaching urban morphology, will face the topic of collecting conceptual and functional tools able to help in describing the transitional changes in urban form.