Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T23:07:45.926Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

I Introduction: Surveying the Scene

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 December 2010

Get access

Extract

What is landscape? Was there a concept of landscape in ancient Rome? Analysing the cityscape is now an established trend in the study of Rome and, since the 1990s, scholarship has explored the idea that thinking about the topography of the city of Rome encourages a more wide-ranging exploration of what being Roman was all about. Taking a broader approach, this Survey tackles the semiotics of a set of described, depicted, and three-dimensional landscapes where the emphasis is on a collaboration between nature and humankind. The timeframe is the late Roman Republic and early Principate, an era of change and reconstitution, when defining what being Roman meant was high on many agendas. This is also an era that offers the best possible scope for exploring a fascinating and diverse range of emblematic natural and manmade environments, taking in some of the most famous (but also some more unexpected) scenes in Roman literature, art, and architecture, closing with Hadrian's out-of-town landscaped villa near Tibur.

Type
Introduction
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2010 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)