The majority of this image is dominated by the inscribed bulk of the Porta Maggiore, a gate incorporated into Rome’s Aurelian wall (built 271-5 CE), which also carried the course of two first-century CE aqueducts, the Aqua Claudia and Aqua Anio Novus. The clarity of the inscription and its neat rows are perhaps the most striking aspect of the main image. It is startling in its legibility and accuracy, the text of the dedication still surviving today on the gate and looking almost exactly as Piranesi has rendered it here. Placed as it is within the light, the inscription draws the gaze, but the text is enhanced above what might be possible to see in reality. Triangular engaged pediments break up the rustic blocks of masonry on the lower, arched section, while the water ran behind the straight upper layers (channels labelled A and B) into the city.  
  
The viewer is placed within the city, looking sideways at what appear to be residential structures with animals tied up outside, crenelated defensive walls (perhaps from the tower constructed by Honorius around the late fourth or early fifth century), and a more recent, tidier building. These structures, and the angle of vision, obscure any view between the arches that would show other , still-extant Roman remains, including the grand tomb of Eurysaces the baker (from the first century BCE), which append the exterior of the gateway. Today, the arched entranceway and this tomb are preserved, while these other buildings were removed in the nineteenth century to restore the pristine aspect of the gate. But for Piranesi, it is crucial that ancient is juxtaposed with modern, residential with monumental, stone with thatch and other lighter materials. 
  
As if the structure and the image are not already cluttered enough, Piranesi layers more information on top of his veduta, adding in the top left corner a plan that shows the junction of the Claudian aqueduct with the Neronian-era extension. Right angles are emphasized here, mirroring the angles in the main image, but the paper’s curled edges render another dimension again, and through this detail the plan is at once embedded into and extracted from the main view. Confusion reigns: it is not immediately clear to which of the channels the plan refers, and the annotation with letter “E” is not explained anywhere on this page. The Index to the Map of Rome, though, points to this image as a demonstration in plan form, at “E,” of the convergence of the Fountainhead of the Acqua Claudia with arches that directed water to various locations. Even as the image positions us within the city’s mingling of ancient and modern, Piranesi’s cross-reference and trompe-l’œil detail shatter this illusion, calling attention to his antiquarianism and artistry in equal measure, as such illusions often do in antiquarian prints (Lolla). (PC)