Since Couperus and publisher L.J. Veen were unable to agree on the payment of Couperus, Couperus then published "Schimmen van schoonheid" and "Antiek Toerisme" with publisher Van Holkema en Warendorf. In Rome Couperus visited Museo Barracco di Scultura Antica, San Saba, the Villa Madama and the Colosseum (among other things). He also paid a visit to the Borgia Apartment and wrote a number of sketches about Lucrezia and Pinturicchio, who had painted her. In 1911 he wrote in "Groot Nederland" a sketch about Siena and Ostia Antica. He read Gaston Boissier's "Promenades archéologiques" and made long walks through the ancient ruins of Rome. He also visited the exhibition in the Belle Arti in Florence, where also Dutch painters exhibited their work. Here he met Willem Steelink and Arnold Marc Gorter, who gave him a warm welcome. Couperus wrote about the travelling he and his wife constantly did: "your living or not living, what hast thou found, O thou poor seekers, O thou poor vagabonds, rich in suitcases?" Couperus spend the winter of 1911–1912 in Florence; meanwhile the Greco-Turkish War broke out and influenced life in Florence as well. Couperus wrote a sketch called "De jonge held" ("The Young Hero") about the son of friends in Italy who returned wounded from the front. In December Couperus and his wife left for Sicily but spent some time in Orvieto, where they stayed in the same hotel that Bertel Thorvaldsen had once visited. Hereafter they travelled to Naples, where Couperus admired the Farnese Hercules, which inspired him to start writing his next novel, "Herakles".