Publisher's Synopsis
From the INTRODUCTION.
In 1762 the young George the Third, two years after he ascended the throne, justified the reputation which he had acquired as a connoisseur of ancient art by purchasing, through the agency of James Adam, the great collection of drawings and prints which had been one of the most precious possessions of the library of Cardinal Albani.' The collection brought about three thousand guineas, and its sale aroused the protests of Winckelmann, who was at that time the Cardinal's librarian. Sold it was, however, and it has ever since formed part of the King's Library at Windsor Castle.
The major portion of this collection consisted of the drawings assembled by the Commendatore Cassiano dal Pozzo, who died in 1657. Part of his drawings came through various hands into the possession of A. W. Franks, but most of them were sold with the Albani Collection to King George, and are preserved ia the first sixteen volumes of this series. Among these are two folio volumes bound in leather and labelled Mosaici Antichi. The name is misleading, for most of the drawings are copies, not of mosaics, but of frescoes and objects of the minor arts of Christian origin. A number of them, moreover, are copies of pagan monuments, which were no doubt taken for Christian by the copyist or the person who gave the drawings their present arrangement. They are mostly done in pen and color or wash, with the addition of gold in the case of copies of mosaics. Occasionally one finds a sketch in chalk or some other medium. The subjects are varied, ranging from the mosaics of the churches of Rome and Ravenna to the fondi d'oro (bottoms of glass goblets enclosing a design in gold leaf) found in the catacombs, and including reliefs of sarcophagi, plans of buildings, etc., and a few nondescript objects whose character is hard to determine.
The date which is to be assigned to the drawings offers an interesting problem. One of them,"' a copy of the inscription on the triumphal arch of St. Paul's-outside-the-Walls, has upon it the note: Nell' arco che scpara la tribuna dal resto della chiesa in S. paolo di mosaico 1592. The "1592" might at first sight be taken for a date, but the other drawings on the same page bear numbers running well up into the hundreds, and as the "1592" is written in different ink from that used in the note, it is altogether likely that it, like the numbers found on the other drawings beside it, is a catalogue indication added subsequently. I have found no other notes on the drawings contained in the Mosaici Antichi which offer any help in the matter of dating.
