Descrizione

The Vatican Library in Rome. Paris, Jacques Chereau, 18th cent.

Copperplate (dim. 293 x 439 mm.), signed at bottom right: “de Pally sculp”, with publisher’s address at bottom centre: “A Paris chez Jacques Chereau rue St. Jacques au dessus de la Fontaine St. Severin aux 2 Colonnes No 257”, numbered 34 at top left, with engraved captions in French, the title in upper margin, and text in lower margin (some light oxidation), in very good condition. This plate was engraved by a member of the de Poilly family, and according to Ruysschaert’s article quoted below, it did work to edit the 2nd issue of the 3rd print with this subject. We include a later, damaged impression of the plate.

A very rare copperplate prepared to print the optical view of the new gallery of the Vatican Library decorated with Etruscan vases, and commissioned by Pope Clement XII (1652-1740), who from 1732 definitively allowed the game of lotto in Rome and throughout the Papal State; even though it was said that the proceeds were to be given to charities, however, the revenues were also used for the expansion of the Vatican Library.
J. Ruysschaert, “L’ameublement du ‘Braccio nuovo’ de la Bibliothèque vaticane en 1732. Vues d’optique et document d’archives”, in: Monumenti Musei e Gallerie Pontificie 7 (1987), pp. 95-114.