The mediated spaces of the archaeological park

This paper considered the history of the archaeological park (the passeggiata archeologica) in Rome as a result not only of changes to the practices of curatorship, archaeology, and preservation, but also of the emergence of a modern information society.

Abstract

It is hard to imagine a time when tourism in the Mediterranean did not include visiting archaeological parks, yet the history of this method of displaying the material past of antiquity is not well known. Originating as a Roman pleasure garden at the beginning of the 19th century, the archaeological park emerged at the start of the 20th century as what amounted to an outdoor museum for displaying the products of scientific archaeology. Accompanying this shift was a growing concern in antiquarian studies for topographic context; sites were no longer seen simply as quarries for spolia but were valued as historical environments to be captured, displayed, and understood whole. While earlier antiquarianism advocated an appreciation of ruins as autonomous works, mid-19th century writers, archaeologists, and tourists understood them as settings for the direct experience of the past. Focusing on Rome, this paper examines the development over the course of the 19th century of the archaeological park as a space of exhibition in the context of an emerging culture of information. It argues that the form of today’s park results from a shift in attitudes toward antiquity, landscape design, and public display prompted by the availability of new information technologies such as photography and statistics. In so doing this paper makes the case for thinking about the public display of ruins beyond discussions of their political and rhetorical function in which Italian archaeology in particular has been mired.

Tags: archaeological parks, landscape, memory environments, museums, preservation/reuse/intervention, Rome