NIBBY, ANTONIO. - Archaeologist and topographer, b. in Rome on 14 Oct. 1792, d. there on 29 Dec. 1839. Still a youth, he founded among his fellow pupils a small Academy which he entitled Hellenic, intended to promote the study of Greek and Latin letters; from it there broke away in 1814 the Tiberina Academy, which had a long and glorious life. In 1812 N. was appointed as writer for the Greek language at the Vatican Library. In 1820 he received the chair of archaeology at the Roman Archiginnasio, which he also taught at the Academy of France.
As early as 1817 he published a translation of Pausanias with a praised essay of critical, geographical and antiquarian observations, published by the Pontifical Roman Academy of Archaeology: he then annotated and glossed the new edition of Nardini's Roma antica, with particular regard to the ancient consular roads. There followed: Viaggio antiquario nei dintorni di Roma (1819); Viaggio antiquario alla villa di Orazio, a Subiaco, a Trevi e presso la sorgente dell'Aniene (1826); Viaggio antiquario ad Ostia (1829); Analisi storico-topografico-antiquaria della carta dei dintorni di Roma (3 vols., 1837; 2nd posthumous ed. 1848-49); Roma nell'anno 1838 (4 vols., 1838-41). He also wrote a long series of essays, most of them in the Dissertazioni dell'Accademia romana di archeologia, among which mention should be made of those on the temple of Peace and the basilica of Constantine, on the Roman Forum, on the Via Sacra, the Flavian amphitheatre, the statue of the Dying Gladiator, Hadrian's villa, etc.
N.'s particular merit was that he gave direction to the studies of the topography of ancient Rome, of the roads and monuments of the Roman countryside.
Bibliography2 works
Gioacchino Mancini