WINCKELMANN, Joiwt JOACHIM, well known as the critical expounder and histo rian of ancient classical art, was born of poor parents in the year 1717, at Stendal, in Prussia. He very early showed an eager desire for knowledge, and being seat to the free school of the place, became so special a favorite with the rector of it, that be was taken into the rector's house as a companion, when age and blindness made some assist ance necessary to him. After studying for a time in Berlin, he went, in 1738, to the university of Halle, where he remained two years engaged in the study of theology, -which, however, lie found so distasteful that, at the end of that time, he relinquished it, accepting a situation as tutor in a private family at Osterburg. In 1743, he became a schoolmaster at Seehausen—a wretched position, from which he was rescued by the count von Btinau, who employed him as secretary in his library at Notbeuitz. Here he remained some years. Being in the vicinity of Dresden, be had frequent opportunities of inspecting the famous treasures of art accumulated there. He also made the acquaint mice of some artists of eminence, among others, the well-known Oeser; and the enthu siasm was awakened which determined his subsequent career. To the theory and history of art he now resolved to devote himself; and on being thrown into the society of the pope's nuncio, cardinal Archinto, he was induced, after some hesitation, to become a Roman Catholic, on a promise of a pension being procured for Lim, to enable him to proceed to Rome. Thither he repaired in 1755, having previously published at Dresden a treatise, entitled Gedanken fiber die Nadialtmung der Grieek Werke, etc. (Reflections on the Imitation of the Antique, 1754). Of this work he issued, in 1756, a new and enlarged edition. At Rome he prosecuted his studies with the utmost ardor, and every facility was afforded him. In 1758, he visited Naples, to ex amine the celebrated remains of Herculaneum, Pompeii, and Ptestum; and went also to Florence, for the purpose of cataloguing the famous collection of antique gems belong ing to baron de Stosch, a labor which occupied him for nine months. Soon after, the
cardinal Allxini appointed him his librarian, and the salary attached to this post, with the pension continued from Dresden, in itself a somewhat meager pittance, enabled him to prosecute his studies in comfort. The first-fruit of these appeared in his treatise, entitled Anmerkungen fiber die Baukunst der Alten (Remarks on the Architecture of the Ancients), which was printed in Germany in 1762; and two years afterward, the great work of his life, on which he had been long engaged, the celebrated GesehOW der Kunst des Alterthums (History of Ancient Art), was issued from the press of Dresden. In 1767 a supplement to it was added. He also gave to the world the result of his re searches at Herculaneum; and in 1766, his Monumenti Antiehi Inediti, an elaborate work with plates.
In 1768, Winckelmann, by this time famous throughout Europe, set out to revisit Germany. His destination was Berlin; but on the way, a strange yearning seized him for the Italy he had left; on his reaching Munich, it was no longer to be resisted; and lie started thence on his return to Rome. He went by Vienna, where the most Haltering attentions were paid him; proceeding thence to Trieste, where he came by his tragic end at the hands of a fellow-traveler, by name Francesco Arcangeli, who murdered him in order to plunder his effects. In this he did not succeed, being scared almost in the act, and presently caught and executed.
Wincitelmann was the forerunner of a great movement; and his influence has been deeply felt in all the subsequent literature of the subject to which he devoted himself. Even at this day, when a good deal of it is regarded as obsolete, his great History remains as a work not to bo neglected by any one seriously concerning himself with the study of this branch of aesthetics. The most complete edition of Winckehnann's works is Fernow, Dreyer, and Schultz's (8 vols. new ed. 1828). See the life of Winckelmann by 'Intl (1866-73).