ROSSINI, LUIGI | ANTICHITÀ ROMANE. 1823

ROSSINI, LUIGI

[LE ANTICHITÀ ROMANE OSSIA RACCOLTA DELLE PIÙ INTERESSANTI VEDUTE DI ROMA. ROME, 1823]

FIRST EDITION, large folio (780 x 545mm.), 101 unnumbered etched plates, nineteenth-century maroon half morocco, marbled boards, UNCUT, lacking title, creases to first and final plate, scattered spotting, one plate with repaired marginal tear, extremities rubbed

ROSSINI'S FIRST MAJOR WORK. 'The plates show, even over the four years of their composition, a clear growth in Rossini's confidence and abilities ... The later plates also bear closer similarities to the work of Piranesi, with Rossini giving many of the images, particularly those of aqueducts and arches, a sense of huge scale by filling in much of the plate with dark masonry seen in perspective from beneath' (BAL RIBA).

The plates in this copy are dated from 1819 to 1823. This work was reprinted in 1829 with numbered plates.