ABSTRACT
The definition of emulation begins not with imitation, but with competition. Imitation may be the means, but emulation's end is surpassing a model. Although emulation is distinct from imitation, in Renaissance literature the two were intimately related, and sometimes conflated. The idea of the type, or genre, was critical to emulative thinking. Individual images could be rivaled, but they also incurred suspicions of too overt dependence, or worse, plagiarism. The models that artists and architects emulated were either direct or indirect. At the same time, emulation presumes progress: progress in an emulative culture is almost inevitable. Progress perforce depends on an ideal to which one aspires and the presumption is that the ideal is less than perfectly manifested in the works being emulated. Emulation was a means to achieve Beauty; fame, status, or reward was secondary or tertiary consequences of that achievement.
