L’INCOMPIUTO NEL MONDO ANTICO TRA ARCHEOLOGIA E LETTERATURA: UN’INTRODUZIONE

Abstract

This volume, entitled Opus imperfectum, is dedicated to the many variations on and reasons for incompleteness
in the ancient world in their specific historical, socio-economic and cultural conditions – with some
mention of their reception in the modern age –, according to paths that traverse the centuries up to Late
Antiquity and concerning architecture, figurative productions, epigraphy and literature. The article, therefore,
aims to give an overview of the many issues related to the unfinished, examining above all two famous
pieces in the Naturalis historia of Pliny the Elder, the unfinished works of writers and ancient painters and
sculptors together with a nod to buildings characterized by construction sites that lasted for several generations
- and sometimes remained endless.