Giovanni Battista De Rossi
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Giovanni Battista (Carlo) de Rossi (23 February 1822 – 20 September 1894) was an
Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...
archaeologist Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
, famous even outside his field for rediscovering early Christian
catacomb Catacombs are man-made subterranean passageways for religious practice. Any chamber used as a burial place is a catacomb, although the word is most commonly associated with the Roman Empire. Etymology and history The first place to be referred ...
s.


Life and works

Born in
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 ...
, he was the son of Commendatore Camillo Luigi De Rossi and Marianna Marchesa Bruti, his wife, who had two sons, Giovanni and Michele Stefano. Two days after birth Giovanni was baptized in the parish church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva. De Rossi showed an early interest in Christian antiquity. In 1838, in company with his parents, he visited
Tuscany Tuscany ( ; it, Toscana ) is a Regions of Italy, region in central Italy with an area of about and a population of about 3.8 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence (''Firenze''). Tuscany is known for its landscapes, history, art ...
, where the innumerable treasures of art completely absorbed his attention. He studied philosophy the
Collegio Romano The Roman College ( la, Collegium Romanum, it, Collegio Romano) was a school established by St. Ignatius of Loyola in 1551, just 11 years after he founded the Society of Jesus (Jesuits). It quickly grew to include classes from elementary school t ...
from 1838 to 1840. He then studied jurisprudence from 1840 to 1844 at the
Sapienza The Sapienza University of Rome ( it, Sapienza – Università di Roma), also called simply Sapienza or the University of Rome, and formally the Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza", is a public research university located in Rome, Ita ...
, where he was graduated with the degree of
doctor utriusque juris A doctor of both laws, from the Latin ''doctor utriusque juris'', or ''juris utriusque doctor'', or ''doctor juris utriusque'' ("doctor of both laws") (abbreviations include: JUD, IUD, DUJ, JUDr., DUI, DJU, Dr.iur.utr., Dr.jur.utr., DIU, UJD a ...
''ad honorem''.Baumgarten, Paul Maria. "Giovanni Battista de Rossi." The Catholic Encyclopedia
Vol. 4. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908. 30 November 2022
In 1841, notwithstanding the protests of his anxious father, he visited, for the first time, under the guidance of the Jesuit Giuseppe Marchi, one of the then much neglected catacombs. After this De Rossi and Marchi pursued their archaeological studies together, so that they were known as the inseparable friends", though the difference in years was great. In 1843, he developed a plan for a systematic and critical collection of all Christian inscriptions. During the summers of 1844-50 he visited the territory of the ancient Hernici in Latium and also Naples; in this way the knowledge he attained of the period of the Roman Republic was not purely theoretical. As soon as he had finished his studies De Rossi was appointed scriptor at the Vatican Library and bore this modest but honourable title, in which he took especial pride, all his life. Great credit is due him for his careful cataloguing of hundreds of Vatican manuscripts. The free use of the treasures of the Vatican Library and archives was a rich source of development for his intellectual powers, especially in the sense of breadth of interest. His official duties were not heavy, and he was able to carry on his private studies without hindrance. He applied the sciences of
archaeology Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
and
epigraphy Epigraphy () is the study of inscriptions, or epigraphs, as writing; it is the science of identifying graphemes, clarifying their meanings, classifying their uses according to dates and cultural contexts, and drawing conclusions about the wr ...
, and leveraged his thorough knowledge of the
topography Topography is the study of the forms and features of land surfaces. The topography of an area may refer to the land forms and features themselves, or a description or depiction in maps. Topography is a field of geoscience and planetary sci ...
of Rome, not to mention the resources of the
Vatican Library The Vatican Apostolic Library ( la, Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana, it, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana), more commonly known as the Vatican Library or informally as the Vat, is the library of the Holy See, located in Vatican City. Formally es ...
, where he was employed cataloguing manuscripts. These skills he brought to Early Christian sites and guided the development of a new field, Christian archaeology. He travelled widely, knew all the museum collections intimately and was at the center of a network of professional friendships with all the European scholars of his fields. In 1849 he rediscovered the lost
Catacombs 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 seve ...
along the
Via Appia Antica The Appian Way (Latin and Italian: ''Via Appia'') is one of the earliest and strategically most important Roman roads of the ancient republic. It connected Rome to Brindisi, in southeast Italy. Its importance is indicated by its common name, r ...
, with Alexander de Richemont. The catacombs were opened in the early 3rd century, as the principal Christian cemetery in Rome, where nine 3rd-century popes were buried. He published illustrations by
Gregorio Mariani Gregorio Mariani ( Ascoli Piceno, 24 August 1833 – Rome, 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 ...
. Around that time, De Rossi made the acquaintance of
James Spencer Northcote James Spencer Northcote (born at Fenton Court, Devonshire, 26 May 1821; d. at Stoke-upon-Trent, Staffordshire, 3 March 1907) was an English Catholic priest and writer. He served as president of St Mary's College, Oscott for seventeen years. Lif ...
, who had a keen interest in the archaeology of Christian Rome. Northcote and William Brownlow, would later publish an English translation of De Rossi's ''Roma Sotterranea''.Owen, W.B., ''Dictionary of National Biography, Supplement'', Macmillan, 1920, p.26
/ref> In 1873, he was elected as a member to the
American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
. In 1877 he became foreign member of the
Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...
. In 1882, he was elected a member of the
American Antiquarian Society The American Antiquarian Society (AAS), located in Worcester, Massachusetts, is both a learned society and a national research library of pre-twentieth-century American history and culture. Founded in 1812, it is the oldest historical society in ...
.American Antiquarian Society Members Directory
/ref> In 1888 de Rossi discovered that the
Codex Amiatinus The Codex Amiatinus (also known as the Jarrow Codex) is considered the best-preserved manuscript of the Latin Vulgate versionBruce M. Metzger, ''The Text of the New Testament'' (Oxford University Press 2005), p. 106. of the Christian Bible. It w ...
, the earliest surviving manuscript of the complete Bible in the
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
Vulgate The Vulgate (; also called (Bible in common tongue), ) is a late-4th-century Latin translation of the Bible. The Vulgate is largely the work of Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels u ...
version, was related to the Bibles mentioned by
Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom o ...
. It was also established that the Codex Amiatinus was related to the ''Greenleaf'' Bible fragment in the
British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
. For a thousand years the Codex Amiatinus was believed to be Italian in origin. It was only at that time that de Rossi discovered that the original inscription was that of Ceolfrith of the English. He died at Castel Gandolfo.


Major works

* ''Inscriptiones christianae Urbis Romae septimo saeculo antiquiores'' (vol. I, Rome, 1861; part I of vol. II, Rome, 1888). His original plan was for a compendium of Christian inscriptions in the city of Rome of the first seven centuries. The series was continued after his death. * ''La Roma Sotterranea Cristiana'' (vol. I with an atlas of forty plates, Rome, 1864; vol. II with an atlas of sixty-two and A, B, C, D plates, Rome, 1867; vol. III with an atlas of fifty-two plates, Rome, 1877). The plates for the fourth volume were already at the printer when De Rossi died. A Christian counterpart to an early classic of archaeology, Antonio Bosio's ''La Roma Sotterranea''. * ''Bullettino di archeologia cristiana''. Six series of monographs and communications, which appeared monthly (1863–69), then quarterly (1870–75), (1876–81), then annually (1882–89), (1889–94), each series meticulously indexed. * ''Musaici delle chiese di Roma anteriori al secolo XV'' (Rome, 1872), a series of coloured lithographs with text in French and Italian illustrating the Late Antique and medieval mosaics of Rome.
''Codicum latinorum bibliothecae Vaticanae''
Rossi's manuscript indexes of the Latin codices are used as reference books in the
Vatican Library The Vatican Apostolic Library ( la, Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana, it, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana), more commonly known as the Vatican Library or informally as the Vat, is the library of the Holy See, located in Vatican City. Formally es ...
. * ''Inscriptiones Urbis Romae latinae'' volume VI of ''Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum'' (Berlin) of which Rossi was one of the leading editors. * ''
Martyrologium Hieronymianum The ''Martyrologium Hieronymianum'' (meaning "martyrology of Jerome") or ''Martyrologium sancti Hieronymi'' (meaning "martyrology of Saint Jerome") is an ancient martyrology or list of Christian martyrs in calendar order, one of the most used a ...
'', edited with
Louis Duchesne Louis Marie Olivier Duchesne (; 13 September 1843 – 21 April 1922) was a French priest, philologist, teacher and a critical historian of Christianity and Roman Catholic liturgy and institutions. Life Descended from a family of Breton sailors, ...
in vol. 1, November, of the
Bollandists The Bollandist Society ( la, Societas Bollandistarum french: Société des Bollandistes) are an association of scholars, philologists, and historians (originally all Jesuits, but now including non-Jesuits) who since the early seventeenth century ...
' ''Acta Sanctorum''. (Brussels, 1894).


References


External links


Chris Nyborg: "Catacombe di San Callisto"
{{DEFAULTSORT:De Rossi, Giovanni Battista 1822 births 1894 deaths Epigraphers Archaeologists from Rome Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Members of the American Antiquarian Society Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)