Ordening criteria.

This guide consisting of introductory notes and a selection of maps and works of architecture, is intended to supply basic information to those readers who wish to know the evolution of architectural styles through the history of the islands of Ibiza and Formentera.

The desire to offer the reader the most significant examples of this architecture and the comprehensive and informative nature of the guide are the starting points which serve to explain the uneven quality of the selection, and the considerable space given to local rural dwellings.

For general purposes the works have been classified into two major groups, subject and situation, and then regrouped within these according to either geographical or chronological criteria.

As far as the city of Ibiza and local rural architecture were concerned we decided to adopt the geographical ordering so that the works would be easier to find. In the case of the city we bore in mind the usual routes the visitor would take, and, in the latter case, the uniform distribution and the imprecision of the dates o construction of rural houses suggested this form of grouping.

We adopted the chronological criterion for rural churches and architecture on the island of Formentera, as well as for twentieth-century architecture.

Illustrations of the works which go to form the guide, are preceded by notes introducing the contents of each of the six groups into which they are divided. The guide contains, besides, a summary of the history of the islands to enable the reader to situate the works within this context. This summary takes the form of a chronology of those events we consider most relevant. The guide concludes with an index of authors, and a bibliography.