Ancient Rome’s Portico of Octavia, built by Emperor Augustus in 23 BC, gradually fell into ruin and became a fish market in the twelfth century. When Albert Bierstadt traveled to Italy in 1857, Rome was defined largely by its historical roles in the Roman Empire and the Italian Renaissance. It was also the most important destination for wealthy tourists who made the Grand Tour of Europe to view the roots of Western civilization.

Americans like the man clutching his Rome guidebook and his wary wife considered themselves the heirs of ancient Greek and Roman ideals, emulating their democracies and architecture. Yet Bierstadt’s painting documents the decline and fall of ancient Rome’s monuments, while two famous antique statues, the Sleeping Endymion and the Barberini Faun, are reincarnated in a sleeping man and a street sweeper. The fish-scale and scallop-shell frame motifs offer a playful pun on Bierstadt’s subject.