For Theobald Oer, the atmosphere, the cool, damp air and the trickling water were more important than the ruins of Emperor Hadrian's villa near Tivoli. The place and date are carved into the paint with a Paintbrush handle at the bottom right. Oil studies like this also served as a reminder, for which the place and time were important. Oer had been deaf since suffering from scarlet fever as a child. Despite the difficulties involved, he studied in Dresden and Düsseldorf. His Italian oil studies show that he would have been a good landscape painter. After his return, however, he mainly focussed on history and genre paintings.