Roman Epigraphy

By Erik SchmittThis publication documents a visual exploration of epigraphy in Rome, undertaken by designer Erik Schmitt during a visiting artist residency at The American Academy in Rome in 2022. Across the city's roads and piazzas, Schmitt photographed and geotagged more than 320 examples of letterforms, marks, and symbols. Each selection was made based on its cultural significance and was then carefully drawn following traditional epigraphic methods. While at the Academy, Schmitt consulted with historians, librarians, and scholars. Their guidance validated a shift from the conventional focus on ancient inscriptions to a broader documentation of the city's contemporary epigraphic landscape. This project captures an evolving layer of communication on Rome’s surfaces in 2022, encompassing a range of letterforms, from ancient Roman typography on imperial structures to 19th- and 20th-century hand-crafted signage, and finally to the graffiti and tagging prevalent in the twenty-first centu