MORCELLI, STEFANO ANTONIO. - Archaeologist and epigrapher, b. at Chiari (Brescia) on 17 January 1737, d. there on 1 January 1822. Having entered the Jesuits in 1753, he taught literary subjects in the Colleges of Arezzo, Ragusa, Fermo and in the Collegio Romano, where he established an Academy of archaeology in the Kircherian Museum. After the suppression of the Society of Jesus (1773), he was librarian to Cardinal Albani and in 1791 provost of Chiari, after having refused the bishopric of Ragusa. When the Society was re-established (1814), he was readmitted to it, remaining with the permission of Pius VII in his office at Chiari.
He knew how to acquire great fame as an epigrapher through his broad classical culture and his pure Latin style, even in treating of modern matters, with a series of important works: De stylo inscriptionum latinarum (Rome 1781), which made him the founder of epigraphic science; it is served as a commentary by: Inscriptiones commentariis subiectae (ibid. 1783), in which the most notable feature is the attempt to set out the fasti of the various Christian centuries, written in the manner of the Capitoline fasti (published separately as Fasti christiani, Turin 1868). To these works, in the 2nd enlarged edition in 4 vols. (Padua 1818-23, edited by F. Caldani, G. Furlanetto, F. Federici), he added a fifth published before the others: Πάρεργον inscriptionum novissimarum (ibid. 1818). To these must be added two special lexicons: P. Schiano, Lexicon epigraphicum morcellianum (3 vols., Bologna 1835-38); A. Gambarini, Lexicon epigraphicum morcellianum vocibus italicus digestum (ibid. 1843).
He also wrote: Μηνολόγιον τῶν εὐαγγελίων ἑορταστικόν, sive Kalendarium Ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae (2 vols., Rome 1788); Africa christiana (3 vols., Brescia 1816-17); Opuscoli ascetici (3 vols., Brescia 1819; 2nd ed. 1823).
Bibliography3 works
Celestino Testore