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“A WORK OF ENORMOUS MAGNITUDE… DISTINGUISHED BY REAL GENIUS”: PIRANESI’S MAGNIFICENT ELEPHANT FOLIO ARCHITECTURAL ETCHINGS OF THE RUINS OF ROME

PIRANESI, Giovanni Battista. Le Antichità Romane. Rome, 1784. Four volumes in two. Elephant folio (21 by 15 inches), early 19th-century full dark blue straight grain morocco rebacked with elaborately gilt-decorated spines laid down, raised bands, gilt cover borders, all edges marbled.

Splendid second edition of this famous tour de force of Roman antiquity, “a work of enormous magnitude,” complete with engraved frontispiece portrait in Volume I, striking engraved title page, and 220 full-page plates (some double images, mostly large double-page images, including plans) drawn by Giovanni Battista Piranesi and engraved by himself and Jean Barbault. “Etchings of unfathomable grandeur.” Beautifully bound in early morocco-gilt with fine fresh impressions. A magnificent work.

Piranesi contributed to 18th-century neoclassicism by his enthusiastic renderings of ancient Roman monuments, which included both accurate portrayals of existing ruins and imaginary reconstructions of ancient buildings in which alterations of scale and juxtaposition of elements enhance their sense of grandeur. “Educated as an architect, Piranesi devoted himself almost entirely to engraving the great monuments of Rome of Antiquity and the Renaissance, achieving a work of enormous magnitude, a triumph of diligence distinguished by real genius” (Hind, 229). First published in 1756, “the four volumes of the Antichità Romane mark Piranesi’s transition, at age 35, from the world of veduta [views] to that of reconstructive archeology. Many antiquarians before him… had tried to piece together an image of ancient Rome… But the results were a jumble of fantastic reconstructions and repetitive infill without any clear sense of spatial planning. Piranesi had one incalculable advantage over his predecessors, namely the accurate plan of modern Rome prepared by Nolli and published in 1748… [This gave him the] impression of a city ‘more clogged than adorned by splendid buildings… One of the most impressive plates of Volume I is the magnificent Tavola degli acquedotti, which traces for the first time the tortuous course of all the aqueducts through the city… The plates of Volumes II and III dwell on sepulchral monuments, especially those along the Via Appia, which is reconstructed in the fantastic frontispiece to Volume II… Volume IV deals with public architecture, bridges, theaters and porticos. Here, in etchings of unforgettable grandeur, Piranesi shows the structure and substructures of the Tiber bridges, Castel S. Angelo and the Theater of Marcellus… Nero’s dining room with its famous rotating vault is shown with the incredible diameter of 400 palmi, equal to the length of the Basilica of Maxentius. Three flights of stairs, so big that a public street can pass under them, connect the Colosseum with the Domus Aurea and the Palatine with the Capitol” (Avery, 55-56). “It has always been known that Piranesi was a very special artist, that his nostalgia for Roman antiquity expressed itself in ceaseless artistic labor… His feeling for the remains of ancient Rome endows his projects with an intensity of articulation, a taste for grandeur, and a wealth of personalized ornamentation” (Dorothea Nyberg). Accompanying letterpress text in Italian, embellished with splendid headpieces and initial letters. Early printing, but issued after the etchings were excluded from the dedication pages. The dedicatory epistle praising Lord Charlemont, who reneged on his promise to compensate Piranesi, was removed entirely from later issues. This copy retains the dedication pages, but devoid of Chalemont’s engraved coat-of-arms. Avery 71 (calling for only 218 plates). Hind, 83-84 (1756 edition; 218 plates). Giesecke 12-12a (1756 edition; 216 plates). Focillon 144-395. Armorial bookplates of Edward Shipperdson of Pittington-Hall-Garth and the Royal Order of the Garter. A beautiful copy, finely bound and with unusually fresh plates.