Giuseppe Moretti (archaeologist)

Giuseppe Moretti (born June 6, 1876 in San Severino Marche ; died July 20, 1945 in Rome ) was an Italian classical archaeologist .

Giuseppe Moretti was the son of Ermete Giuseppi and his wife Vincenza Bartolomei. After attending grammar school, Giuseppe Moretti moved to Rome to study in 1894, where he also worked as a private tutor. Even before he was laured , he joined the Musei, Gallerie e Scavi di Antichità , the Italian antiquity administration, as an archaeologist in 1902 , and remained an employee of the Ministero della pubblica istruzione until his retirement in 1942 . In October 1902 he received his laureate .

As part of his employment, his path first led him to the Museo Nazionale Romano , which was established in 1889 , where he rose to inspector in 1908. For years he was busy organizing the archaeological material housed in the museum and revising around 39,000 index cards for the objects. He acquired the entire breadth of systematic archaeological work: from the excavation of an object to its inventory and conservation to public presentation, scientific investigation and publication.

At the invitation of Ernesto Schiaparelli , he went to Piedmont in 1910 , where he carried out excavations in Libarna and on the Little Saint Bernard . In 1912 he returned to Rome. From 1913 to 1919 he supported his friend and peer Roberto Paribeni in running the Museo Nazionale Romano. They alternately ran the museum and took part in the Italian Archaeological Mission in Antalya , Turkey . In 1914 Moretti took over the leadership of the second expedition from Biagio Pace and stayed in Turkey until the outbreak of the First World War . Pneumonia that he had contracted there forced him to stay in hospital for an extended period in 1915. He then returned to Rome and supported Paribeni and Guido Calza , who both did military service, in the management of the Museo Nazionale and the excavations in Ostia . With the occupation of part of Turkey by Italy as a result of the war, Moretti returned to southwestern Turkey in 1919. Here, among other things, he was responsible for the archaeological monuments and especially the restoration of Hadrian's Gate in Antalya.

In 1920 he became inspector at the Soprintendenza archeologica delle Marche and director of the National Museum in Ancona , and in 1923 he was finally soprintendent of the Marche . He completely redesigned the museum and developed a previously unseen image of ancient everyday culture in the Marche. In 1927 the new exhibition was opened in the presence of King Victor Emmanuel III. opened. In 1930 the ministry appointed him soprintendent of the Antiquities of Lazio and director of the Museo Nazionale Romano. He was also an extremely active excavator during this period and worked tirelessly to reorganize the museum.

One of his most important works was the reconstruction of the Ara Pacis , which he began in 1937 and whose completion on schedule was requested by the Italian fascists as an outstanding part of the exhibition Mostra Augustea della Romanità for the Bimillenario Augusteo , the 2000th birthday of the Roman Emperor Augustus . For this, new excavations had to be carried out at the site with great challenges. Under the existing development of the area by the Palazzo Peretti , frozen earth walls were used to dig for missing parts of the macaw in order to prevent the above-ground structure from collapsing. Further fragments from various collections have been brought together. Plaster casts of the fragments were obtained where the originals could not be made available. The reconstruction was opened to the public in 1938 in a light-flooded pavilion in the Piazza Augusto Imperatore , framed by buildings of contemporary Razionalismo . The final publication of the results, the reconstruction drawings of which came from Guglielmo Gatti , could only take place in 1948.

On reaching the age limit, Moretti, who had alienated himself from the fascist regime to which he had adhered since 1932, was dismissed from civil service. The Museo archeologico di San Severino Marche bears his name after Moretti : Museo Archeologico "Giuseppe Moretti" . Moretti's son was the archaeologist Mario Moretti .

Publications (selection)

• Il Guerriero italico di Capestrano. Istituto poligrafico dello Stato, Rome 1936 (see Warriors of Capestrano ).
• L'Ara Pacis Augustae (= Itinerari dei Musei e Monumenti d'Italia. 67) Libreria dello Stato, Rome 1938 (German edition last: Die Ara Pacis Augustae (= guide to the museums, galleries and monuments of Italy. 67). Libreria dello Stato, Rome 1976).
• Il Museo delle navi romane di Nemi. (= Itinerari dei Musei e Monumenti d'Italia. 72) Libreria dello Stato, Rome 1940.
• Ara Pacis Augustae. Text and chalkboard. Libreria dello Stato, Rome 1948.

literature

• Roberto Paribeni: Commemorazione del socio Giuseppe Moretti In: Atti della Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia. Rendiconti. Volume 22, 1946-47, pp. 17-22.
• Ermete Moretti: Giuseppe Moretti. L'archeologo dell'Ara Pacis. Ed. Wage, Rome 1976.
• Elena Cagiano de Azevedo : Moretti, Giuseppe. In: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani . Volume 76. Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome 2012 (Italian).

Remarks

1. ↑ Maurizio Landolfi: Giuseppe Moretti e gli esordi dell'archeologia italiana in Anatolia. In: Bollettino dell'Associazione Iasos di Caria. Vol. 8, 2002, pp. 37-39.