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Annio da Viterbo

Annius of Viterbo (Latin: Joannes Annius Viterb(i)ensis; c. 1432 – 13 November 1502) was an Italian Dominican
friar, scholar, and historian, born Giovanni Nanni (Nenni) in Viterbo. He is now remembered for his fabrications.

He entered the Dominican Order early in life. He obtained the degree of Master of Theology from the studium generale at
Santa Maria sopra Minerva, the forerunner of the College of Saint Thomas and the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas
Aquinas, Angelicum. He served as lector at the studium sometime before 1466.[1]

He was highly esteemed by Sixtus IV and Alexander VI; the latter made him Master of the Sacred Palace in 1499.

As a linguist, he spuriously claimed to be skilled in the Oriental languages. Walter Stephens[2] says: "His expertise in
Semitic philology, once celebrated even by otherwise sober ecclesiastical historians, was entirely fictive." Annius also
claimed to be able to read Etruscan.

In perhaps his most elaborate pseudo-archeological charade, in the autumn of 1493 he undertook a well-publicized dig at
Viterbo, during which marble statues of some of the most dramatic of the mythical figures associated with the city's
legendarium appeared to be unearthed; they had all been "salted" in the site beforehand.[3]

Contents
Works
Detection of his forgeries
Viterbiae historiae epitoma
See also
Notes
References
External links

Works
He is best known for his Antiquitatum Variarum, originally titled the Commentaria super opera diversorum auctorum
de antiquitatibus loquentium[4] (Commentaries on the Works of Various Authors Discussing Antiquity) and often known
as the Antiquities of Annius. In this work, he published alleged writings and fragments of several pre-Christian Greek and
Latin profane authors, destined to throw an entirely new light on ancient history. He claimed to have discovered them at
Mantua.

Among his numerous other writings were De futuris Christianorum triumphis in Turcos et Saracenos (Future Triumphs
of the Christians over the Turks and the Saracens), a commentary on the Apocalypse, dedicated to Sixtus IV, to Christian
kings, princes, and governments,[5] and Tractatus de imperio Turcorum[6] (The Empire of the Turks). The author claims
that Mohammad is the Antichrist, and that the end of the world will take place when the Christians will have overcome the
Jews and the Muslims, an event which did not appear to him to be far distant.
One influential suggestion he made was that the genealogy of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew applied to Joseph, while that
in the Gospel of Luke was Mary's.

The more important of his unpublished works are:

Volumen libris septuaginta distinctum de antiquitatibus et gestis Etruscorum;


De correctione typographica chronicorum;
De dignitate officii Magistri Sacri Palatii (On the Esteem of the Office of the Master of the Sacred Palace); and lastly,
The Chronologia Nova, in which he undertakes to correct the anachronisms in the writings of Eusebius of Caesarea.
He was notorious for his text depicting the history and topography of ancient Rome from the "most ancient" authors. His
Auctores vetustissimi printed at Rome, 1498, was an anthology of seventeen purportedly classical texts, all of which he
had written himself, with which he embarks in the gigantic attempt to write a universal history of the post-diluvian West
civilization, where the Etruscan people and the town of Viterbo/Etruria, custodian of the original knowledge of divine
nature, takes on the leading role in the march of the Man towards the future. Annio's map of Rome as founded by
Romulus is a loose interpretation of one of his own forgeries. It prominently features Vicus Tuscus, the home of the
Etruscans, whom Annio and his fellow Viterbans claimed as their ancestors. Part of the forgeries were motivated by a
desire to prove that Viterbo was the site of the Etruscan Fanum Voltumnae.

In a defense of the papal lending institution, the Monte di Pietà, published c. 1495 under the title Pro Monte Pietatis,
Annio contributed the essay Questiones due disputate super mutuo iudaico & ciuili & diuino, arguing against the usury of
the Jews.[7]

Detection of his forgeries


The Antiquities met at once both with believers and with severe critics who accused him of willful interpolation, or even
fabrication. The content was falsely attributed to Berosus, Fabius Pictor, Cato, Manetho and others. The spurious
character of these "historians" of Annio, which he published both with and without commentaries, has long been
admitted.[8] The demolition of the forgeries owed much to Joseph Justus Scaliger.

Annio's forgeries began to unravel by the mid-16th century. In 1565–66, the humanist Girolamo Mei was engaged in a
historiographical argument with Vincenzo Borghini, who presented a claim, for the occasion of the marriage of Francesco I
de' Medici and Giovanna of Austria, that Florence was founded by Augustus. He based his claim on inscriptions reported
by Annio da Viterbo. Mei, no friend to the Medici, challenged this opinion and questioned the authenticity of Annio's
materials, in a brief Latin treatise (De origine urbis Florentiae).

Viterbiae historiae epitoma


The volume Annio da Viterbo, Documenti e ricerche (Rome: Multigrafica Editrice for CNR, 1981) presents an unpublished
work written by Annio: the Viterbiae historiae epitoma in the critical text edited by Giovanni Baffioni. The text is based on
the manuscript Codex Vaticanus Latinus 6263 and represents the seventh and only extant book of the former work of
Annius' Viterbia Historia, composed of seven books in which the viterbian theologian writes the history of his municipal
town ranging from its mythological origins (newly reinvented by Annius himself) until the times of pope Innocent VIII.
The second part of the book, edited by Paola Mattiangeli, deals with his influence on High Renaissance myth and allegory.
In particular, it refers to Annio's esoteric interests and his influence over a number of painted frescoes in the city of
Viterbo characterized by Egyptian imagery.

See also
Codex Nanianus

Notes
1. Riccardo Fubini, NANNI, Giovanni (http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giovanni-nanni_(Dizionario_Biografico)/)
Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani - Volume 77 (2012)
2. in Giants in Those Days (1989), p. 131.
3. Roberto Weiss, The Renaissance Discovery of Classical Antiquity (1969:114).
4. First published in Rome: Eucharius Silber, 1498. The pages of this edition can be accessed in the Biblioteca Virtual
de Andalucía (http://www.bibliotecavirtualdeandalucia.es/catalogo/catalogo_imagenes/grupo.cmd?path=10025).
5. Genoa, 1480
6. Published in Genoa, 1480
7. dated from Viterbo, 8 May 1492 (Rhodes)
8. Colbert left to the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris a manuscript of the thirteenth century, supposed to contain
fragments of the writings of two of these writers, i.e. Berosus and Megasthenes.

References
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Schroeder, Jos. (1913). "Annius of Viterbo".
In Herbermann, Charles. Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton.

External links
Pseudo-Berossus (https://books.google.com/books?id=G8a5QPUR3gIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false)
– original Latin text
Berosi sacerdotis chaldaici Antiquitatum libri quinque (https://www.academia.edu/4865078/Berosi_sacerdotis_chaldai
ci_Antiquitatum_libri_quinque_recognovit_Roberto_Borgia_2013)
Benjamin Anderson, curator. The invention of Antiquity: "The landscape of ancient Rome" (http://www.brynmawr.edu/li
brary/exhibits/antiquity/use4.htm) Bryn Mawr exhibition, 2004

Auctores vetustissimi 1498 (http://www.brynmawr.edu/library/exhibits/antiquity/use4c.htm) Woodcut of Rome


illustrated in Bryn Mawr's copy
Schroeder, Jos. (1913). "Annius of Viterbo". In Herbermann, Charles. Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert
Appleton Company. ("It would appear that he was too credulous, and really believed the texts to be authentic.")
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Viterbo". Encyclopædia Britannica. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
pp. 147–148.
Dennis E. Rhodes, "Four Italian Judaica incunabula: Pro Monte Pietatis" (http://cf.uba.uva.nl/nl/publicaties/treasures/t
ext/t06d.html)
Guy Shaked, "Girolamo Mei's biography" (http://www.geocities.com/Vienna/Choir/4792/opera20.html) (Archived (http
s://www.webcitation.org/5kn7wsBYE?url=http://www.geocities.com/Vienna/Choir/4792/opera20.html) 2009-10-25)
"L'appartamento Borgia in Vaticano" (https://web.archive.org/web/20060219051905/http://www.italica.rai.it/rinasciment
o/parole_chiave/schede/borgia.htm)
Nicholas Temple, "Heritage and Forgery: Annio da Viterbo and the Quest for the Authentic”, Public Archaeology
(Vol.II/3), 2002

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