Details
DU PERAC, Etienne (1525-1604). I vestigi dell'antichità di Roma. Rome: Lorenzo della Vaccheria (Laurent de la Vacherie), 1575.
Oblong 2° (260 x 420mm). Engraved throughout, title in its first state and 35 plates by Du Perac, 4 folding. (Some marginal browning and old light dampstaining or soiling, occasional repairs.) Modern mottled sheep-backed boards.
FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE, without the four lines of dedication to Giacomo Buoncompagni on title, or dedicatory letter from du Pérac. Du Pérac was a French architect, painter, garden-designer and topographer who studied engraving under Antonio Lafreri, for whom he engraved a number of plates for his Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae (see lot 302).
This, his own work on the ruins of Rome 'is a key source for the state of the Roman monuments as they existed in the sixteenth century. It was reprinted in innumerable editions as late as 1773. The etchings of Du Pérac represent as no other work does the lively renewal and interest in the monuments of classical antiquity which reached its climax in sixteenth century Rome.' (Builders and Humanists: the Renaissance Popes as Patrons of the Arts, University of St. Thomas, Houston, Texas,1966, p. 308); Olschki 16857.
Oblong 2° (260 x 420mm). Engraved throughout, title in its first state and 35 plates by Du Perac, 4 folding. (Some marginal browning and old light dampstaining or soiling, occasional repairs.) Modern mottled sheep-backed boards.
FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE, without the four lines of dedication to Giacomo Buoncompagni on title, or dedicatory letter from du Pérac. Du Pérac was a French architect, painter, garden-designer and topographer who studied engraving under Antonio Lafreri, for whom he engraved a number of plates for his Speculum Romanae Magnificentiae (see lot 302).
This, his own work on the ruins of Rome 'is a key source for the state of the Roman monuments as they existed in the sixteenth century. It was reprinted in innumerable editions as late as 1773. The etchings of Du Pérac represent as no other work does the lively renewal and interest in the monuments of classical antiquity which reached its climax in sixteenth century Rome.' (Builders and Humanists: the Renaissance Popes as Patrons of the Arts, University of St. Thomas, Houston, Texas,1966, p. 308); Olschki 16857.
Provenance
19th century bibliographical note, in an unidentified hand, on front pastedown.