The Paper Museum of Cassiano dal Pozzo. Series A: Antiquities and Architecture

The 'Museo Cartaceo' ('Paper Museum') is a collection of some 10,000 watercolours, drawings and prints, assembled during the seventeenth century by the Roman patron and collector Cassiano dal Pozzo and his brother Carlo Antonio. It represents one of the most significant attempts before the age of photography to embrace human knowledge in visual form. The drawings depict ancient art and material culture, architecture, zoology, botany, geology and natural curiosities; the prints cover topography and architecture, military maps, ceremonies and processions, costumes, portraits and genre. The collection provides us with a major tool for understanding the intellectual concerns of a period during which the foundations of our own scientific methods were established.

The catalogue raisonné, in 37 volumes, gives unprecedented access to this major source of reference for the intellectual, cultural, artistic and scientific history of seventeenth-century Europe. The drawings are illustrated as full page colour plates and catalogued in two series: Series A covers Antiquities and Architecture, Series B Natural History. A third series is dedicated to the Prints: Series C.

Series A: Antiquities and Architecture
https://www.brepols.net/series/HMPMA

Series B: Natural History
https://www.brepols.net/series/HMPMB

Series C: Prints
https://www.brepols.net/series/HMPMC