‹‹‹ Vitr. 1.4.1 | Table of Contents | Vitr. 1.4.3 ›››
2Hence the constitutions of the inhabitants of such places, from such continual and excessive changes of the air, would be much vitiated. This effect is likewise produced on inanimate bodies: nobody would think of lighting his wine-cellar from the south or the west, but from the north, an aspect not liable to these violent changes. In granaries whose aspects are south of the east or west, the stores are soon ruined; and provisions, as well as fruits, cannot be long preserved unless kept in apartments whose aspects are north of the east or west.
2These variations in heat and the subsequent cooling off are harmful to the people living on such sites. The same conclusion may be reached in the case of inanimate things. For instance, nobody draws the light for covered wine rooms from the south or west, but rather from the north, since that quarter is never subject to change but is always constant and unshifting. So it is with granaries: grain exposed to the sun’s course soon loses its good quality, and provisions and fruit, unless stored in a place unexposed to the sun’s course, do not keep long.