At the time of the Roman Empire, the Bay of Baiae near Naples was a highly desirable resort and popular with the very rich and famous. It subsequently fell prey first to marauding Saracens in the 8th century and then to malaria in the late 15th; it was deserted until the industrial spread of Naples overran it in the late 19th century. Joseph Pennell (1857-1926), well known for his grand studies of industrial buildings, was also keenly aware of the darker implications of industrialisation, and records the desecration of this once beautiful place in a melancholic mood.