Raphael Fabretti (1618 – 7 January 1700) was an Italian antiquarian. Born at

Urbino Urbino ( ; ; Romagnol: ''Urbìn'') is a walled city in the Marche region of Italy, south-west of Pesaro, a World Heritage Site notable for a remarkable historical legacy of independent Renaissance culture, especially under the patronage of F ...

in the Marche, he studied

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...

Cagli Cagli is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Pesaro e Urbino, Marche, central Italy. It c. south of Urbino. The Burano flows near the town. History Cagli occupies the site of an ancient village on the Via Flaminia, which seems to have bo ...

and Urbino, where he took his doctorate at the age of eighteen. While in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

he attracted the notice of Cardinal Lorenzo Imperiali, who employed him successively as treasurer and auditor of the papal legation in Spain, where he remained thirteen years. Meanwhile, his favourite classical and antiquarian studies were not neglected; and on his return journey he made important observations of the relics and monuments of

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

, and Italy. At Rome he was appointed judge of appellation of the Capitol, but left to be auditor of the legation at Urbino. After three years he returned to Rome, on the invitation of Cardinal

Gaspare Carpegna Gaspare Carpegna (8 April 1625 – 6 May 1714) was an Italian Catholic Cardinal. Early life Gaspare was born in 1625 in Rome. His mother was from the Spada family. He was a relative of the Cardinal Ulderico Carpegna of the Holy Roman Cathol ...

, vicar of Pope Innocent XI, and devoted himself to antiquarian research, examining with minute care the monuments and inscriptions of the

Campagna Campagna (Italian: ) is a small town and ''comune'' of the province of Salerno, in the Campania region of Southern Italy. Its population is 17,148. Its old Latin name was Civitas Campaniae (City of Campagna). Campagna is located in one of the ...

. He always rode a horse which his friends nicknamed " Marco Polo", after the Venetian traveller.

Pope Innocent XII Pope Innocent XII ( la, Innocentius XII; it, Innocenzo XII; 13 March 1615 – 27 September 1700), born Antonio Pignatelli, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 12 July 1691 to his death in September 1700. He ...

made him keeper of the archives of the Castel Sant'Angelo, a charge he retained until his death. His collection of inscriptions and monuments was purchased by Cardinal Giovanni Francesco Stoppani, and placed in the ducal palace at Urbino, where they may still be seen. His work ''De Aquis et Aquaeductibus veteris Romae'' (1680), three dissertations on the

topography Topography is the study of the forms and features of land surfaces. The topography of an area may refer to the land forms and features themselves, or a description or depiction in maps. Topography is a field of geoscience and planetary sc ...

of ancient

Latium Latium ( , ; ) is the region of central western Italy in which the city of Rome was founded and grew to be the capital city of the Roman Empire. Definition Latium was originally a small triangle of fertile, volcanic soil ( Old Latium) on w ...

, is inserted in

Graevius Johann Georg Graevius (originally Grava or Greffe; 29 January 1632 – 11 January 1703) was a German classical scholar and critic. He was born in Naumburg, in the Electorate of Saxony. Life Graevius was originally intended for the law, but made ...

's ''Thesaurus'', iv (1677). His interpretation of certain passages in

Livy Titus Livius (; 59 BC – AD 17), known in English as Livy ( ), was a Roman historian. He wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people, titled , covering the period from the earliest legends of Rome before the traditional founding in ...

and other classical authors involved him in a dispute with Gronovius, which bore a strong resemblance to that between John Milton and

Claudius Salmasius Claude Saumaise (15 April 1588 – 3 September 1653), also known by the Latin name Claudius Salmasius, was a French classical scholar. Life Salmasius was born at Semur-en-Auxois in Burgundy. His father, a counsellor of the parlement of Dijon, se ...

, Gronovius addressing Fabretti as Faber Rusticus, and the latter, in reply, speaking of Gronovius and his "'' titivilitia''". In this controversy Fabretti used the pseudonym "Iasitheus", which he afterwards took as his pastoral name in the Academy of the Arcadians. His other works, ''De Columna Trajani Syntagma'' (1683), and ''Inscriptionum Antiquarum Explicatio'' (1699), throw much light on Roman antiquity. In the former is to be found his explication of an early Imperial Roman

bas-relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term '' relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...

, with inscriptions, now in the Capitol at Rome, representing the war and taking of

Troy Troy ( el, Τροία and Latin: Troia, Hittite: 𒋫𒊒𒄿𒊭 ''Truwiša'') or Ilion ( el, Ίλιον and Latin: Ilium, Hittite: 𒃾𒇻𒊭 ''Wiluša'') was an ancient city located at Hisarlik in present-day Turkey, south-west of Ç ...

, one of the '' Tabulae Iliacae''. Letters and other shorter works of Fabretti are to be found in publications of the time, such as the ''Journal des Savants''.

Sources

*H. B. Evans ''Aqueduct Hunting in the Seventeenth Century. Raffaello Fabretti’s De aquis et aquaeductibus veteris Romae''. Pp. xvi + 309, maps, ills. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002. .

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fabretti, Raphael 1618 births 1700 deaths 17th-century Latin-language writers People from Urbino Italian classical scholars