MAGNAN, DOMINIQUE. - Minims religious, archaeologist, and numismatist, b. at Reillanne, in Provence, 29 May 1731, d. at Florence, 7 Sept. 1796. In his Order he was professor of theology at Avignon and Marseilles; in 1760 he went to Rome, to the Trinità dei Monti, where he perfected his studies of classical antiquities and numismatics, which he had already pursued with great passion in his native country. He was a member of several academies in Italy and abroad.
His principal works: Dictionnaire portatif de la France (4 vols., Avignon 1770); Problema de anno nativitatis Christi (Rome 1772; basing himself on a medal of Herod Antipas, he places the birth of Jesus in the year 745 from the foundation of Rome); Miscellanea numismatica (4 vols., ibid. 1772); La ville de Rome (4 folio vols., ibid. 1776, with 425 engravings); Elegantiores statuae antiquae (ibid. 1776); La città di Roma (4 vols., ibid. 1777-79, with 385 copperplate prints); Calcografia della colonna Antonina (4 vols., ibid. 1789, 150 plates).