The Temple of Neptune at Paestum

In the final years of his life, Piranesi turned from Rome to Paestum, a Greek colonial city south of Naples whose Doric temples — built centuries before Rome existed as more than a village — had been rediscovered by 18th-century road builders after a millennium buried in coastal scrub. This 1778 plate, from the last series Piranesi completed before his death that same year, shows the so-called Temple of Neptune from a side angle deliberately chosen to show more of the colonnade than his own first plate of the same building had captured. What to notice: Piranesi's late Paestum plates trade the operatic ruin-drama of his Roman Vedute for something closer to architectural record-keeping — tiny figures still populate the scene, but the columns themselves, not the decay around them, carry the whole composition.

Maker

Giovanni Battista Piranesi

Date

1778

Medium of the original

Plate

Original held by

Wikimedia Commons

Credit

Wikimedia Commons

Rights

Public domain, verified

Catalogue number

PA-00300