Observations Upon the Antiquities of the Town of Herculaneum, Discovered at the Foot of Mount Vesuvius. With some Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Ancients. And a short Description of the Antiquities in the Neighbourhood of Naples.

COCHIN, Charles; Jerome Bellicard.

$1,250.00

Item Number: 134550

London: Printed for D. Wilson and T. Durham, 1756.

Second edition of the first illustrated account of the discoveries made in the excavation of Herculaneum. Octavo, bound in full calf with gilt ruled raised bands to the spine, double gilt ruling to the front and rear panels, profusely illustrated with 42 engraved plates. In good condition. Ownership stamp.

Located in the modern-day comune of Ercolano, Campania, Italy, the ancient town of Herculaneum was buried under volcanic ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. Like the nearby city of Pompeii, Herculaneum is famous as one of the few ancient cities to be preserved more or less intact as the ash that blanketed the town also protected it against looting and the elements. Although less well known today than Pompeii, it was the first, and for a long time the only, buried Vesuvian city to be found (in 1709), while Pompeii was only revealed from 1748 and identified in 1763. In 1750–1751, Charles Cochin and Jerome Bellicard visited the excavations at Herculaneum, and they subsequently produced the first illustrated account of the discoveries there. The first edition of the work in English was published in 1753, and the second edition in 1756.