(HERCULANEUM) Le Pitture Antiche D'Ercolano E Contorni Incise Con Qualche Spiegazione

THE GREAT EXCAVATION (HERCULANEUM.) Le Pitture Antiche D'Ercolano E Contorni Incise Con Qualche Spiegazione. Volumes 1-3 (of 8). Etched and engraved frontispieces in all volumes, head- and tail-pieces, initials, and 169 plates; Volume 1 additionally contains an engraved half-title, title vignette, portrait of Charles III, and a double-page map of the Gulf of Napoli. Folio, calf, red morocco gilt spine labels, quite rubbed and scuffed; scattered marginal foxing and a bit of dampstaining to bottom margin of first third of Volume 1. Naples: Regia Stamperia 1757-62

first three volumes of the monumental work on the most famous excavation. The mid-18th century was the "heroic period" of excavations at Herculaneum, after being buried since A.D. 62 by a massive earthquake followed by the eruptions of Mount Vesuvius (the last as late as 1631). Created by an enormous team of graphic artists, draftsmen, and engravers, the eight slowly emerging volumes took thirty-five years to complete. Intended only for private circulation and issued separately, the large, lavish volumes were not sold but given as diplomatic gifts or to deserving visitors and courtiers. Harold Acton stated that the work influenced "taste from St. Petersburg to Edinburgh for the next half century, so that hardly any craft of art was unaffected by their publication"--Millard IV, I.