Antiquities in Motion - From Excavation Sites to Renaissance Collections

Providing important background to some of the most famous finds in 16th-century Rome, the book paints a detailed picture of the early modern city as a hotbed of discovery, deals, and deception. -- Current World Archaeology One of Times Literary Supplement's Books of the Year for 2019! The book effectively challenges the notion of a civilised antiquarian by revealing the lengths that people would go to ?nd, trade, transport and ultimately own antiquities. Indeed, it is a timely reminder that we should perhaps re?ect on the contemporary trade in antiquities and its social and ethical issues. -- Antiquity Barbara Furlotti's book is essential reading for scholars of sixteenth-century European art history and antiquarianism. Presenting new archival documents on the excavation and collecting of Roman antiquities, Furlotti writes a fascinating account of the mechanisms of the antiquities market in sixteenth-century Rome and its environs. . . . Italian antiquities' dealing in the sixteenth century was rife with forgery and precocious antiquizing creativity, with finders, dealers, and artists collaborating to supply the demand of an insatiable, often gullible market for ancient works of art. It was a secretive trade, and one of several implications of Furlotti's uncovering it is that we need urgently to verify even more closely than before the ancient integrity (or Renaissance ingenuity) of every artifact that entered collections at the time. --Robert W. Gaston, University of Melbourne