Gregorio Mariani ( Ascoli Piceno, 24 August 1833 –

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

, 23 January 1902) was an Italian painter, mainly of genre and costume genre subjects in oil and watercolor, in addition to portraits. He is now best known for his engravings about Roman antiquities.

Biography

He studied at the

Accademia di San Luca The Accademia di San Luca (the "Academy of Saint Luke") is an Italian academy of artists in Rome. The establishment of the Accademia de i Pittori e Scultori di Roma was approved by papal brief in 1577, and in 1593 Federico Zuccari became its fi ...

. He was commissioned by the Prussian Archaeological Institute to illustrate using

chromolithography Chromolithography is a method for making multi-colour prints. This type of colour printing stemmed from the process of lithography, and includes all types of lithography that are printed in colour. When chromolithography is used to reproduce ph ...

the antiquities of Rome and the Lazio. He made plates depicting the

Tombs of Via Latina The Tombs of the Via Latina ( it, Tombe di Via Latina) are Roman tombs, mainly from the 2nd century AD, that are found along a short stretch of the Via Latina, an ancient Roman road close to Rome, Italy. They are now part of an archaeological pa ...

, outside Porta San Giovanni; the frescoes from the palazzo dei Cesari, and those found in Corneto Tarquinia. He spent months in the

Catacomb of Callixtus The Catacomb(s) of Callixtus (also known as the Cemetery of Callixtus) is one of the Catacombs of Rome on the Appian Way, most notable for containing the Crypt of the Popes ( Italian: ''Cappella dei Papi''), which once contained the tombs of sev ...

, outside of Porta San Sebastiano, working under candle-light and drawing sepulchral inscriptions and murals of the first Christians. Many of these drawings made it into the publication on the illustrated book on the Catacombs by the Christian archeologist

Giovanni Battista de Rossi Giovanni Battista (Carlo) de Rossi (23 February 1822 – 20 September 1894) was an Italian archaeologist, famous even outside his field for rediscovering early Christian catacombs. Life and works Born in Rome, he was the son of Commendatore C ...

. Mariani also made many lithographic designs for the Bulletin of the Roman Archeological Commission.''Dizionario degli Artisti Italiani Viventi: pittori, scultori, e Architetti''
by

Angelo de Gubernatis Count Angelo De Gubernatis (1840–26 February 1913), Italian man of letters, was born in Turin and educated there and at Berlin, where he studied philology. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature fourteen times. Life In 1862 he w ...

. Tipe dei Successori Le Monnier, 1889, page 280-281.

References

1833 births 1902 deaths People from Ascoli Piceno 19th-century Italian painters Italian male painters Italian engravers 19th-century Italian male artists {{Italy-engraver-stub