ABSTRACT
G.-B. Piranesi retired to the rural solitude of the district; he lived in a little house behind Monte Cavallo at the place called il Boschetto. The small Via Clementina contains a country house with a garden wall. A noble Latin inscription on the house states that Clement XII had the street constructed. Carts stood everywhere by the house walls, the white oxen lay in the dirt, flies buzzed - the whole scene dominated by the jagged ruins of the imperial palaces up on the Palatine. In contrast to the aristocratic houses discussed, this one is situated on the outskirts of the closely built-up area of Rome, where it changes to become the territory of the large villa gardens, and it has the slope of the Quirinal hill behind. The town house, so aloof and reserved, was his true background and real home for the greater part of the year.
