Giovanni Branca

Giovanni Branca (22 April 1571 – 24 January 1645) was an Italian engineer and architect, chiefly remembered today for what some commentators have taken to be an early steam turbine.

[2] The work contains 63 engravings with descriptions in Italian and Latin and was an example of the Theater of machines genre which had appeared in the 16th century, named after Jacques Besson's Theatrum Instrumentorum of 1571.

In the words of historian Alex Keller, his machines "look like armchair inventions which seldom ever had any three-dimensional working counterparts".

[4] Branca's Manuale d’Architettura, published in 1629, was a practical guide for planning and construction and is considered the first "pocket" architectural handbook.

Branca's experience as an architect was due to his posting as superintendent of works of the Sacra Casa in Loreto, to which he was appointed by the Duke of Urbino.