Urn of marble with its lid 

Giovanni Battista Piranesi made this etching of a marble urn and its lid sometime before 1778. Piranesi was an important figure in the 18th-century rediscovery of classical antiquity, but he wasn't just interested in faithful reproductions. He used his artistic license to reconstruct, and sometimes even fantasize, what ancient Roman structures might have looked like. This image is a record of an actual object that once belonged to a collector named Tommaso Jenkins. But it is also an imaginative interpretation of Roman aesthetics. Piranesi's prints fueled a fascination with Roman grandeur and influenced architecture and design across Europe. The Roman Republic served as an important political symbol during the Enlightenment and the Neoclassical era that followed. By studying Piranesi's etchings alongside historical texts and archeological reports, we can better understand the complex relationship between art, politics, and the enduring allure of antiquity.