Storia delle arti del disegno presso gli antichi
This is a 1779 Milan edition of Johann Joachim Winckelmann's history of ancient art, printed at the Imperial Monastery of S. Ambrogio Maggiore and aimed at scholars and collectors of antiquities. Its plates are engraved line drawings of Roman marble busts, a standing statue and a carved oval gem, drawn with fine parallel hatching that shows the stone's modelling. A designer could borrow the tight cross-hatching, the oval vignette framing and the plain numbered plate layout as a classical reference style.
