JOSEPH SIMON (1687-1768), a Maronite of Mount Lebanon. He was sent to the Maronite college in Rome, and entered the Vatican library. In 1717 he was sent to Egypt and Syria to search for valuable mss., and returned with about 15o very choice ones. The pope again sent him to the East in 1735, and he returned with a still more valuable collection. On his return he was made titular archbishop of Tyre and librarian of the Vatican library.
His two great works are the Bibliotheca Orientalis Clementino Vaticana rec. manuscr. codd. Syr., Arab., Pers., Turc., Hebr., Samarit., Armen., Aethiop., Graec., Aegypt., Iber., et Malab., jussu et munif. •Clem. XI. (1719-28), and Ephraemi Syri opera omnia quae extant, Gr. Syr., et Lat. (1737-46). Of the Bibli otheca the first three vols. only were completed. The work was to have been in four parts but only the first—Syrian and allied mss., Orthodox, Nestorian and Jacobite—was completed. There is a German abridgment by A. F. Pfeiffer.
His brother, JOSEPH ALOYSIUS (c. 1710-82), was professor of oriental languages at Rome, and a nephew, STEPHEN EvoDIUs (1707-82), was assistant to his uncle at the Vatican library, and held various ecclesiastical preferments. His most important work is Bibliothecae mediceo-Laurentianae et Palatinae codd. manuscr. Orientalium Catalogus (Flor. 1742). Another member of the family, SIMON (I 7 5 2-1821) was professor of oriental languages at Padua.