Rome. Circa 1790. Binding: No binding., Notes: Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720 – 1778) was a prominent Italian Classical archaeologist, architect, and artist, famous for his etchings of Rome. Although he was the son of a stonemason and studied structural and hydraulic engineering, Piranesi is best remembered for his monumental etchings, which demonstrate this lifelong interest in architecture and design. As passionate about architecture was, he also about Rome and Roman culture, particularly in defending the superiority of Roman art and architecture over Greek; in Piranesi: The Complete Etchings, John Wilton-Ely notes that Antichità di Cora formed one of Piranesi’s contributions on this ongoing debate regarding to Graeco-Roman controversy (728). Piranesi focused on the city of Cori, concentrating in particular on the “massive cyclopean town walls of the 6th century B.C. and on the so-called Temple of Hercules” (Wilton-Ely, 728). “This latter structure occupies most of the book, since Piranesi considered that its surviving portico represented an especially early example of the Doric or Tuscan order, uninfluenced by Greece” (Wilton-Ely, 728). The plates detail the “idiosyncrasies in the entablature of this temple,” which Piranesi intended to illustrate as evidence of the evolution of the Order (Wilton-Ely, 728).

Missing
- Half title
- All text save for first page
Plates
- 1st plate before Tav 1: Dimostrazione dell’economica usata dagli antichi nella copertura el tempio d’Ercole di cora
- 2: rovine del Tempio de’ Castori
- 4: rovine del Tempio supposto di Ercole
- 5: veduta del present stato dell’interno del Pronao

, Size: Folio (570x 415 mm), Illustration: Containing plates only, 9 in total, including engraved title and headpiece found on first page of text (rest of text not present in this copy). Lacking 4. Plates are clean and crisp. Including 1fold-out plate and 3 double-page., References: John Wilton-Ely, Piranesi: The Complete Etchings, vol. 2, pp. 728-742., Category: Book Europe Italy; Book Art, Architecture & Design;. A very good example of this collection of plates illustrating numerous views, diagrams, details, and plans of Cori, one of the most ancient settlements in Italy. Item #B6752

Price: $5,000.00