In his highly acclaimed reference work, David Watkin traces the history of western architecture from the earliest times in Mesopotamia and Egypt to the dramatic impact of CAD (computer-aided design) on architectural practice at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Adopting an approach that sees architectural history as a living continuity rather than a museum of neatly labelled styles, the author emphasizes the ongoing vitality of the classical language of architecture, underlining the continuity between, say, the work of Ictinus in fifth-century BC Athens and that of McKim, Mead and White in twentieth-century New York. Authoritative, comprehensive and highly illustrated, this fourth edition has been expanded to bring the story of western architecture right up to date.