From salvage to archaeology -- The humanist salvor -- The humanist intermediary -- The humanist commentator -- Quattrocento humanist archaeology -- Cinquecento engineers and a diving bell -- The social world -- The proprietor cardinal -- Dependent workers -- Inventive profession…
Sometime around 1446 A.D., Cardinal Prospero Colonna commissioned engineer Battista Alberti to raise two immense Roman vessels from the bottom of the lago di Nemi, just south of Rome. By that time, local fishermen had been fouling their nets and occasionally recovering stray obj…