Nuova pianta di Roma data in luce da Giambattista Nolli l’anno MDCCXLVII, known as La Pianta Grande di Roma (1748): Art, History and Details

Nuova pianta di Roma data in luce da Giambattista Nolli l’anno MDCCXLVII, known as La Pianta Grande di Roma (1748) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Giovanni Battista Nolli (Italian, 1701–1756); Carlo Nolli (Italian, 1690–1790); Rocco Pozzi (Italian, 1701–1774); Pietro Campana de Soriano (Italian, 1725–c. 1779); Stefano Pozzi (Italian, 1699–1768).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The monumental Pianta Grande di Roma, or Large Plan of Rome, which measures about 5 x 7 feet when its twelve plates are assembled, is a landmark in both cartography and printmaking. The map is considered the first scientific rendering of Rome, establishing new standards of accuracy and thoroughness when it was published in 1748. Devised by the Lombard architect and surveyor Giovanni Battista Nolli (Italian, 1701-56), the creation of the map required over ten years of surveying the city carried out by Nolli and a team of assistants with the help of new measuring devices. In Nolli’s “ichnographic” (also called “ground”) plan, architectural features and the urban infrastructure are reduced to a single horizontal slice, a minutely detailed footprint that conveys dimensions, proportions, and orientations to scale with the utmost clarity.

Object facts

• Title: Nuova pianta di Roma data in luce da Giambattista Nolli l’anno MDCCXLVII, known as La Pianta Grande di Roma
• Date: 1748
• Creator attribution: Giovanni Battista Nolli (Italian, 1701–1756); Carlo Nolli (Italian, 1690–1790); Rocco Pozzi (Italian, 1701–1774); Pietro Campana de Soriano (Italian, 1725–c. 1779); Stefano Pozzi (Italian, 1699–1768)
• Culture: Italy
• Type: Print
• Technique: etching and engraving
• Dimensions: Sheet: 42.1 x 67.8 cm (16 9/16 x 26 11/16 in.)
• Collection: PR - Etching
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 2020.276.16

A detail from the museum

To make this map, Pope Clement XII granted the mapmaker permission to measure courtyards and other interior, inaccessible spaces in monastic communities, even those in nuns’ convents, which was controversial at the time.

Collection credit

Gift of The Print Club of Cleveland

Further reading listed by the museum

• Ehrle, Francesco. Roma al tempo di Benedetto XIV: la pianta di Roma di Giambattista Nolli del 1748, riprodotta da una copia vaticana. Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1932.
• Borsi, Stefano. Roma di Benedetto XIV: la pianta di Giovan Battista Nolli, 1748. Roma: Officina, 1993.
• Bevilacqua, Mario. Roma nel secolo dei lumi: Architettura erudizione scienza nella Pianta di G.B. Nolli “celebre geometra.” Naples: Mondadori Electa, 1997.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.