“Pertosa”
Date
1857
Creator
Alphonse Bernoud (1820 - 1889, French) , Photographer
Object type
Archive reference number
Material
Technique
Dimensions
height (print): 69mm
width (print): 133mm
height (mount): 81mm
width (mount): 173mm
width (print): 133mm
height (mount): 81mm
width (mount): 173mm
Subject
Content object
Description
Stereoscopic view of earthquake damage to Pertosa, Italy. Landscape study showing an overthrown house with the side wall missing and the interior exposed, a ladder is leaning against the wall. Timber beams are piled up at the foot of the building and a house to the right is propped with wooden poles.
Titled “Pertosa” and numbered “151” left-hand margin, front mount. Inscribed verso “Pertosa. Page 251, p.II.”
This illustration was reproduced as a lithograph, and in a simplified form, in Great Neapolitan Earthquake of 1857: The first principles of observational seismology as developed in the report to the Royal Society..., by Robert Mallet, 2 vols., (London, Chapman and Hall, 1862), pp.274-275. Numbered ‘Photo pl.151’ and mentioned on page 274 to “give a tolerable notion of such portion of the town, as present measurable elements of the direction of the shock.”
Titled “Pertosa” and numbered “151” left-hand margin, front mount. Inscribed verso “Pertosa. Page 251, p.II.”
This illustration was reproduced as a lithograph, and in a simplified form, in Great Neapolitan Earthquake of 1857: The first principles of observational seismology as developed in the report to the Royal Society..., by Robert Mallet, 2 vols., (London, Chapman and Hall, 1862), pp.274-275. Numbered ‘Photo pl.151’ and mentioned on page 274 to “give a tolerable notion of such portion of the town, as present measurable elements of the direction of the shock.”
Object history
With the support of the Royal Society, Mallet undertook a survey of the damage caused by the 1857 earthquake in Basilicata, in the Kingdom of Naples, to advance his theories of seismic waves. Two French photographers, Alphonse Bernoud and an unidentified man known as Grellier, were employed to photograph the affected region. For a description of Mallet's expedition and the circumstances and attributions of the photographs, see Graziano Ferrari and Anita McConnell, "Robert Mallet and the 'Great Neapolitan Earthquake' of 1857", Notes and Records of the Royal Society 59 (1) (2005), pp. 45–64.
Associated place