Rossini (Luigi)

depicting some of the classial Roman substructure of the Aventine Hill, the southernmost of the Rome’s seven hills, which includes a view of the famous pyramid tomb of Caius Cestius in the middle distance. This is one of 101 plates produced by Rossini (1790-1857) for his great work ‘Le Antichitá Romane’ (1819-1829), which followed very much in the tradition established by his 18th century predecessor, Giovanni Battista Piranesi, in recording the increasingly rediscovered remnants of ancient Rome being unearthed by archaeologists in amongst the grandeur of later baroque Rome. Rossini’s plates are distinguished by the greater presence of contemporary figures going about their daily lives at all levels of society,

engraving on wove paper, 360 x 505 mm. (14 1/8 x 19 7/8 in), sheet edges a little frayed and with some damp-staining in the outer parts of the very wide margins, well away from the plate,