LANCIANI, RODOLFO. - Archaeologist, born at Montecelio (Rome) on 1 January 1845, died in Rome on 21 May 1920. He pursued his university studies in the Faculty of Engineering and particularly trained himself in the surveying of ancient monuments.
His first publication was that included by G. B. De Rossi in his Bullettino di archeologia cristiana of 1866 (pp. 100-103) under the title Rapporto del sig. R. L. sulle recenti scoperte dell'edificio riputato lo Xenodochio di Pannachio in Porto. The large-scale building works for the transformation of the city after 1870 attracted him in a special way, and gradually he moved from being an engineer to becoming an archaeologist, methodically completing his historical, philological and artistic preparation. After receiving the royal prize from the Accademia dei Lincei and the publication in the Acts of the same Academy of his fundamental study I commentari di Frontino intorno alle acque e agli acquedotti (vol. IV, 1850), he obtained in 1882 the chair of Roman topography, specially created for him, which he held until the age limit in 1922.
LANCIANI, RODOLFO – Portrait.
His Wandering through Ancient Roman Churches (Boston 1924) completes the works of Armellini and Hülsen on the same subject, while the volume The Golden Days of the Renaissance in Rome (ibid. 1906) is a masterly sketch of the artistic and monumental life of the city in that golden period. Also worthy of special mention are some of his studies on the topography of Christian Rome, namely the monograph L’itinerario di Einsiedeln e l’ordine di Benedetto Canonico, in Monumenti della R. Accademia dei Lincei (I, 1891); and the articles: Delle scoperte fatte nel 1838 e 1850 presso il sepolcro di Paolo Apostolo, in Nuovo bullettino di archeologia cristiana, 23 (1917), pp. 7-27; and La memoria Apostolorum e gli scavi in S. Sebastiano, in Dissertazioni della Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia, 2nd series, 14 (1919), pp. 57-109. To supplement the great map of Rome, he began in 1902 the publication of a Storia degli scavi di Roma, of which only four volumes appeared (IV, 1913), containing valuable information on discoveries made from the year 1000 A.D. to the year 1605. He also wrote many articles in the Acts of the Accademia dei Lincei and of the Pontifical Roman Academy of Archaeology, in the Bollettino archeologico comunale and in the Bullettino and Annali of the Istituto di corrispondenza archeologica.