Il serapeo della Villa Adriana

Villa Adriana is studded with pavilions designed to astonish the guests admitted into the presence of the emperor: nature and architecture create a close dialogue appearing as an ideal context for the exhibition of power through evocative scenery, highlighted by precious works of art and refined effects using water games. Leonardo, architect, engineer, but also a skilled scenographer, was fascinated by the so-called Serapeum during his visit in 1501, which appeared to him as an obscure, ancestral place of wonder. It was the probable inspiration for the scenography of Angelo Poliziano’s Orfeo, in the form of a hollow mountain.