Vitruvius, advising proportions of an architrave should vary depending on how high they are relative to the ground (De Architectura 3.5):
Quo altius enim scandit oculi species, non facile persecat aëris crebritatem, dilapsa itaque altitudinis spatio et viribus, exstructam incertam modulorum renuntiat sensibus quantitatem.
For, given how high the eye’s view is rising, it’s not easy for it to cut through the density of the air, and so, having been dissipated by the height’s strength and distance, it may return to the senses an unreliable estimate of the measurements it gathered.
I still do not have a clear idea of the full range of the word quantitas. It looks like ‘quantity’ in this instance wouldn’t work at all.
[For quantitas.]
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