Houses and Monuments of Pompeii: The Work of Fausto and Felice Niccolini

by Stefano de Caro (Preface by), Roberto Cassanelli (Commentaries by), Pier Luigi Ciapparelli (Commentaries by), Enrico Colle (Commentaries by), Massimiliano David (Commentaries by)

Overview

The discovery of and excavations at Pompeii in the second half of the eighteenth century not only provided historians with a trove of information about ancient Roman civilization but also fired artists' imaginations and inaugurated the vogue for the "Pompeian style" that so influenced the West in the nineteenth century.

This book reproduces, along with commentary, Le case i monumenti di Pompeii (1854) of Fausto and Felice Niccolini, the first work to present completely and systematically all the public and private buildings so far excavated in Pompeii. It features the wondrous watercolors the Niccolinis created to document Pompeii and is thus a beautiful and essential tool in understanding the excavated remains themselves and how the modern archaeologists perceived and recorded the ancient world.

These magnificently reproduced drawings of the excavations are accompanied by texts that explain the documents by the Niccolinis, as well as the evolution of the Pompeian style in Europe, the pictorial representation of Pompeii in the nineteenth century from engravings to photographs, and the evolving styles of archaeological documentation.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780892366842
Publisher:	Getty Publications
Publication date:	12/19/2002
Series:	Getty Trust Publications: J. Paul Getty Museum Series
Edition description:	1
Pages:	224
Sales rank:	564,608
Product dimensions:	10.50(w) x 14.25(h) x 1.10(d)

Editorial Reviews

Published only gradually throughout the second half of the 19th century, the Niccolinis' lavishly illustrated magnum opus played a significant role in disseminating images of ancient Pompeii. The almost 200 reproductions derived from this edifying archaeological project are, in fact, this volume's almost entire raison d' tre. The images consist of watercolors and drawings of Pompeii's houses and monuments as they were excavated at the time. It is unfortunate that these fascinating, if somewhat archaic, visual documents are so inadequately served by their attendant modern scholarship. Aside from an insufficiently coherent attempt to describe and historically situate the Niccolini project, the discussions of "Pompeian taste" and the ruins' impact on painting and photography are little more than trivial enumerations of examples. The essays by Italian art historians are further marred by translation infelicities. The reproductions may have some value for collections concerned with classical archaeology. Similarly problematic in its discursive scholarship and yet much more impressive in the visual material is the reproduction of a magnificent selection of drawings of ancient Roman architecture executed by winners of the Prix de Rome while resident in the city from 1786 to 1924. Aside from relating the process by which French architectural students were chosen for this career-establishing prize, the introductory essays offer little sense of the city's artistic or cultural life; nor do they adequately suggest how the pensioners' archaeologically grounded studies affected their subsequent professional lives. The essence of this work, edited by archaeology scholar David, is again a superb selection of architectural drawings accompanied by imperfectly edited but useful brief commentaries. Academic libraries with interest in either ancient Rome or the architecture of the 18th and 19th centuries will wish to acquire this outstanding gathering of exactingly executed plans and reconstructions. Both of these slipcased, oversized volumes would be appropriate for large academic collections only.-Robert Cahn, Fashion Inst. of Technology, New York Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

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