Cumae with Lake Avernus and Lake Fusaro, Antique Italian View, circa 1850

This is a view of the country around Cumae near Naples, an original antique steel engraving, uncolored, circa 1850. The caption reads Die GEGEND von CUMA mit LAGO D'AVERNO und LAGO DE FUSSARO with (Der Acheron der Alten) beneath it, German for the region of Cumae with Lake Avernus and Lake Fusaro (the Acheron of the ancients).

A crater lake ringed by a pale rim lies at the left, with a second stretch of water and a low headland beyond it and the open sea dotted with sails behind. A wooded hill with a square tower on its summit and a bare cliff face rises at the center right. Leafy bushes and broad leaved plants fill the lower left, and at the lower right a group of four men, one standing and three seated, talk among the rocks near a small white house.

A faint engraver's signature at the lower right below the image is too worn to transcribe. Below the caption the plate carries the house imprint, Aus d. Kunstanst. d. Bibl. Instit. in Hildbh. at the lower left and Eigenthum d. Verleger at the lower right. The first is the art works of the Bibliographisches Institut in Hildburghausen, the second reads "property of the publishers." The plate number DCXXXV is engraved at the top right.

The sheet comes from a dealer's album rather than from a bound set. Its imprint is that of Meyer's Universum, a serial collection of engraved views with descriptive text, published by Joseph Meyer's Bibliographisches Institut at Hildburghausen from 1833, its plates engraved on steel. Cumae was an early Greek colony on the coast west of Naples and the seat of the Cumaean Sibyl.

Handling soiling along the bottom, right and top edges. A few small foxing spots in the margin. Corners and edges are not shown by this scan. Clean, even paper tone in the margin. Several larger brown marks.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed.