Antonio Bosio

Antonio Bosio (* around 1575 in Malta ; † September 6, 1629 in Rome ) was an Italian pioneer of Christian archaeologists .

Life

Born in Malta around 1575, Antonio Bosio came to Rome at a young age to live with his uncle, the historian of the Order of St. John , Giacomo Bosio. He later studied literature , law and philosophy in Rome and was subsequently employed as a lawyer in the Order of St. John. In 1593 he began - initially with the support of Pompeo Ugonio - to explore the catacombs in Rome ; the first catacombs explored were the Domitilla catacombs . He studied them for 36 years and discovered several. At the same time, he was interested in martyrs , the works of the church fathers and councils , which he made useful to discover other catacombs in Rome. In 1629 Bosio died in Rome, leaving no written works.

The Oratory Giovanni Severano were three years after Bosio's death whose life's work under the title Roma Sotterranea out. This work and further research by Giovanni Battista de Rossi form the basis of the catacomb research and are still in use today. Bosio is one of the founders of catacomb exploration and is known as the Columbus of the Catacombs .

literature

• Antonio Valeri: Cenni biografici di Antonio Bosio. Tip. dell'Unione cooperativa editrice, Rome 1900 full text
• Friedrich Wilhelm Bautz :  Bosio, Antonio. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 1, Bautz, Hamm 1975. 2nd, unchanged edition Hamm 1990, ISBN 3-88309-013-1 , Sp. 711-712.
• Ekkart Sauser :  Bosio, Antonio. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 16, Bautz, Herzberg 1999, ISBN 3-88309-079-4 , Sp. 202-203.
• Stefan Heid , Giuseppe Grande: Antonio Bosio. In: Stefan Heid, Martin Dennert (Hrsg.): Personal Lexicon for Christian Archeology. Researchers and personalities from the 16th to the 21st century . Vol. 1. Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-7954-2620-0 , pp. 215-219.