By contrast to both the technical images in this volume (many of which are likely the work of his workshop assistants) and the dramatic images collected in the Vedute di Roma, this plate combines a close attention to the texture and decay of ancient building materials with the shadows and overgrowth common in his more commercial depictions of ruins. Along the eastern edge of the city, where the Janiculum Hill meets the Aurelian Wall, and just to the left of the compass rose in this volume’s Map of Rome, Piranesi notes in the map’s index that remains of the foundations of the Aqua Alsietina, demonstrated in this image, are visible (Index to the Map of Rome, no. 56). Surrounded by deep, shadowed gashes and topped with protruding branches, opus reticulatum occupies most of the plate, as the close-ups below demonstrate.  

[images here]  

The index to the map also notes that a current excavation (during the 1750s) was yielding remnants of opus reticulatum at the location of the former emissarium, or outlet, of the Alsietina Aqueduct (Index to the Map of Rome, no. 156). As opus reticulatum, which was used between the first century BCE and the first century CE, was phased out in the following century, its presence can serve as evidence in determining dates of ancient structures.  

This construction method also relates to Piranesi’s etching technique. The representation of ancient ruins in the medium of copperplate etching is, Susan Stewart has argued, appropriate: because each pressing of a copper plate can erode the malleable metal, “[p]rintmaking is indeed,” she notes, itself “a process of ruination” (122). The diagonal net-like pattern of opus reticulatum resembles cross-hatching, a technique Piranesi avoided precisely because it could, after multiple pressings, lead to larger pools of ink on the page (Yourcenar). Although Piranesi here renders the blocks of opus reticulatum with techniques other than cross-hatching, this correlation nevertheless suggests one way that Piranesi’s approach to his medium enabled him to, as he says of the ancient remains being threatened by further damage and loss, he wants to “conservarli col mezzo delle stampe” (Preface to Scholars of Roman Antiquities). (JB)