Antonio Lebolo (died 19 February 1830?) was an

Italia Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the Italy (geographical region) ...

n antiquities excavator and adventurer, best remembered for having stolen the

Joseph Smith Papyri The Joseph Smith Papyri (JSP) are Egyptian funerary papyrus fragments from ancient Thebes dated between 300 to 100 BC which, along with four mummies, were once owned by Joseph Smith, the founder of the Latter Day Saint movement. Smith said that ...

, a collection of documents he took from a burial site in Egypt.

Biography

Born in

Castellamonte Castellamonte is a '' comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Turin in the Italian region Piedmont, located about north of Turin. It is located in the Canavese, at the feet of a hill surmounted by a 14th-century castle, hence the n ...

in the kingdom of

Piedmont-Sardinia The Kingdom of Sardinia,The name of the state was originally Latin: , or when the kingdom was still considered to include Corsica. In Italian it is , in French , in Sardinian , and in Piedmontese . also referred to as the Kingdom of Savoy-S ...

, Lebolo became a ''

gendarme Wrong info! --> A gendarmerie () is a military force with law enforcement duties among the civilian population. The term ''gendarme'' () is derived from the medieval French expression ', which translates to " men-at-arms" (literally, ...

'' during the Napoleonic occupation of Italy; after the Restauration he fled to

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...

where he became an agent of

Bernardino Drovetti Bernardino Michele Maria Drovetti (January 7, 1776 – March 5, 1852) was an Italian antiquities collector, diplomat, and politician. He is best remembered for having acquired the Turin Royal Canon and for his questionable behavior in colle ...

, who was the French

Consul-General A consul is an official representative of the government of one state in the territory of another, normally acting to assist and protect the citizens of the consul's own country, as well as to facilitate trade and friendship between the people ...

of Egypt as well as an ardent antiquities collector. Lebolo oversaw many excavations mainly in the zone of

Luxor Luxor ( ar, الأقصر, al-ʾuqṣur, lit=the palaces) is a modern city in Upper (southern) Egypt which includes the site of the Ancient Egyptian city of ''Thebes''. Luxor has frequently been characterized as the "world's greatest open-a ...

, usually on behalf of Drovetti and sometimes for himself. He apparently was as ruthless as his boss Drovetti, as

Giovanni Battista Belzoni Giovanni Battista Belzoni (; 5 November 1778 – 3 December 1823), sometimes known as The Great Belzoni, was a prolific Italian explorer and pioneer archaeologist of Egyptian antiquities. He is known for his removal to England of the seven-ton ...

reported during one of his excavations at

Karnak The Karnak Temple Complex, commonly known as Karnak (, which was originally derived from ar, خورنق ''Khurnaq'' "fortified village"), comprises a vast mix of decayed temples, pylons, chapels, and other buildings near Luxor, Egypt. Constr ...

in 1818 and later: along with another Piedmontese agent named Rosignani, Lebolo harassed and maybe even tried to murder Belzoni, and later managed to steal some of his finds excavated at

Philae ; ar, فيلة; cop, ⲡⲓⲗⲁⲕ , alternate_name = , image = File:File, Asuán, Egipto, 2022-04-01, DD 93.jpg , alt = , caption = The temple of Isis from Philae at its current location on Agilkia Island in Lake Nasse ...

., p. 166 Between 1817 and 1821 Lebolo found a

mummy A mummy is a dead human or an animal whose soft tissues and organs have been preserved by either intentional or accidental exposure to chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air, so that the recovered body does not decay fu ...

cache in a

shaft tomb A shaft tomb or shaft grave is a type of deep rectangular burial structure, similar in shape to the much shallower cist grave, containing a floor of pebbles, walls of rubble masonry, and a roof constructed of wooden planks. Practice The practi ...

Sheikh Abd el-Qurna The necropolis of Sheikh Abd el-Qurna ( ar, شيخ عبدالقرنة) is located on the West Bank at Thebes in Upper Egypt. It is part of the archaeological area of Deir el-Bahari, and named after the domed tomb of the local saint. This is the m ...

. The finest mummies were given to Drovetti and are now in the

Egyptian Museum of Berlin The Egyptian Museum of Berlin (german: Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung) is home to one of the world's most important collections of ancient Egyptian artefacts, including the iconic Nefertiti Bust. Since 1855, the collection is a part of t ...

(no. 504, 505), others were sold to Heinrich Menu von Minutoli,

Giovanni Anastasi Giovani Anastasi ( Senigallia, 20 March 1653 - Macerata, 13 March 1704) was an Italian painter, mainly of religious and history paintings. References He painted portraits in Senigallia of Cardinal legates Giacomo Cantelmo (1690) and Altieri (169 ...

, Frédéric Cailliaud and Henry Salt; Salt placed the objects he bought in the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

(no. 6705, 6706, 6708 and likely 6950). Lebolo kept the remaining mummies for himself. Lebolo died some years after these events, possibly on February 19, 1830 in Castellamonte or in an unknown date in

Trieste Trieste ( , ; sl, Trst ; german: Triest ) is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is the capital city, and largest city, of the autonomous region of Friuli Venezia Giulia, one of two autonomous regions which are not subdivided into prov ...

Joseph Smith Papyri

A few years later, a man named Michael H. Chandler claimed to be Lebolo's nephew and demanded Lebolo's goods in inheritance. In 1833 he obtained the inheritance and took the mummies and some accompanying papyri to the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

, selling them during his travels. In 1835, Chandler met

Joseph Smith Joseph Smith Jr. (December 23, 1805June 27, 1844) was an American religious leader and founder of Mormonism and the Latter Day Saint movement. When he was 24, Smith published the Book of Mormon. By the time of his death, 14 years later, ...

, the founder of

Mormonism Mormonism is the religious tradition and theology of the Latter Day Saint movement of Restorationist Christianity started by Joseph Smith in Western New York in the 1820s and 1830s. As a label, Mormonism has been applied to various aspects of ...

, and some of his affiliates. Since Smith claimed to be able to translate

Egyptian hieroglyphs Egyptian hieroglyphs (, ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt, used for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with some 1,000 distinct characters.There were about 1, ...

, Chandler showed him the papyri. Smith purchased the mummies and papyri, and interpreted some of the writings and scenes as some life events of the two patriarchs

Abraham Abraham, ; ar, , , name=, group= (originally Abram) is the common Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In Judaism, he is the founding father of the special relationship between the Je ...

and

Joseph Joseph is a common male given name, derived from the Hebrew Yosef (יוֹסֵף). "Joseph" is used, along with "Josef", mostly in English, French and partially German languages. This spelling is also found as a variant in the languages of the mo ...

. The papyri were soon called the ''Joseph Smith Papyri'' and formed the core of Smith's

Book of Abraham The Book of Abraham is a collection of writings claimed to be from several Egyptian scrolls discovered in the early 19th century during an archeological expedition by Antonio Lebolo. Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints pu ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lebolo, Antonio 1830 deaths Explorers of Africa Italian explorers 19th-century Italian people History of the Latter Day Saint movement Pearl of Great Price (Mormonism) People from the Province of Turin Book of Abraham