Red board Binding with cream wall painted figure and title.

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Hardcover. Condition: Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Good. Illustrated by Photography By Leonard Von Matt (illustrator). First Edition. An excellent copy of this colorful book, with text in Italian and English. The text shows no signs of use.

Note: the influence of Alfonso De Franciscis (born 7 November 1915 in Naples ; died 18 February 1989) on this book. He was an Italian classical archaeologist .

De Franciscis studied under Pirro Marconi at the University of Naples and in 1937 wrote his thesis on Roman portraits in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples . During his studies he met Mario Napoli , who would later marry his sister. In 1938, under Marconi’s guidance, De Franciscis gained his first excavation experience in Albania , and at the same time he built an archaeological museum from scratch in Butrint . From 1939 to 1940 he was at the Scuola Archeologica Italiana di Atene , where he met Alessandro Della Seta, who was soon dismissed due to the fascist racial laws .

In 1950 he became a lecturer at the University of Salerno , and in the same year also an inspector at the Soprintendenza di Napoli . In 1954 he became head of the Soprintendenza di Reggio Calabria , and in 1955 university obligations were added to his position and he had to teach archaeology and ancient art history at the University of Messina . The years up to 1960 were dominated by the reorganization of the archaeological museum in Reggio Calabria on the one hand, and by the initiation and organization of numerous excavations on the other: in Croton , in Rhegion and the extremely productive excavations in Lokroi Epizephyrioi with the uncovering of the Ionic temple dedicated to Zeus from the early 5th century BC. During the excavation of the temple, one of the two marble statues of an early classical group of Dioscuri was found, which had served as acrotera of the temple pediment and which De Franciscis has reconstructed in the Museo Nazionale della Magna Grecia .

In 1961, De Franciscis succeeded Amedeo Maiuri as head of the Soprintendenza di Napoli , a position he held until 1976. In Naples, too, teaching was part of the job of a soprintendenza . In addition, his research and activities focused on excavations and investigations in Capua , on Capri , the Villa of the Poppeae in Oplontis , the underwater archaeological investigations in Baiae and the research into the sanctuary of the Augustales in Misenum . From 1976 to 1987, Franciscis worked as a full professor of Greek and Roman archaeology and art history at the University of Naples, covering a broad spectrum of archaeological and classical studies fields.