Full Name: Brizio, Edoardo
Gender: male
Date Born: 1846
Date Died: 1907
Place Born: Turin, Piedmony, Italy
Place Died: Bologna, Emilia-Romagna, Italy
Home Country/ies: Italy
Subject Area(s): ancient, archaeology, Etruscan (culture or style), and prehistoric
Overview
Archaeologist and art historian of Etruscan and prehistory. Brizio studied and excavated at the sites of Pompeii and the Roman Forum (Forum Romanum) in Rome. His association with Enrico Brunn at the German Archaeological Institute (DAI) taught him formal analysis of Greek art, the basis for his later art history. He traveled to Greece in 1874. In 1876 he was named chair at the University of Bologna for archaeology and numismatics. His lectures exposed his students to the German stylistic analysis. At this time, be began a life’s passion: the question about populations in prehistoric Italy. His theory about Etruscans put him at odds with many in the archaeological community. Count Giovanni Gozzadini (1810-1887) had postulated that the Etruscans had come from the Villanova, but Brizio insisted that Etruscans had come from the east after the Villanovan period. He also chided Gozzadini for his failure to recognize Marzabotto as a city, rather than the necropolis which Gozzadini claimed. His bitterest feuds came against Antonio Zannoni (1833-1910) regarding the objects of Certosa and against Wolfgang Helbig, who insisted that Etruscans had come from the north instead of eastern regions. As an archaeologist and ex officio director of the Museo Civico in Bologna, he oversaw the timely excavation reports on the sites of Verucchio, Montefortino, Marzabotto and Bologna.
Selected Bibliography
Pitture e sepolcri scoperti sull’Esquilino dalla Compagnia fondiaria italiana nell’anno 1875. Rome: Tipografia Elzeviriana, 1876; Una Pompei etrusca a Marzabotto nel Bolognese. Bologna: Stabilimenti Poligrafici Riuniti, 1928; Monumenti archeologici della provincia di Bologna descritti da Edoardo Brizio. Bologna: Fava e Garagnani, 1881; and Bertolini, F. Epoca preistorica. Milan: F. Vallardi, 1897; Sulla Nuova situla di bronzo figurata trovata in Bologna. Modena: G.T. Vicenzi e Nipoti, 1884.
Sources
“Brizio, Edoardo.” Encyclopedia of the History of Classical Archaeology. Nancy Thomson de Grummond, ed. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1996, vol. 1, p. 198.
Archives
- Archivio Edoardo Brizio, Biblioteca comunale dell’Archiginnasio di Bologna. http://dati.san.beniculturali.it/SAN/complarc_IT-ER-IBC_san.cat.complArch.87421 , IT-ER-IBC-037006-003-034.
Contributors: Emily Crockett and Lee Sorensen