The paper wants to pick out one of the probable sources of the passion for
Numismatics of Simone Assemani. His great granduncle, Giuseppe Simonio
Assemani is likely to have excited this passion on him.
Giuseppe Simonio Assemani became famous as great scholar of manuscripts of
many oriental languages: Coptic, Etiopic, Arabic, Persian, Turkish and, above
all, Syrian. He was dispatched by the Pope Clement XI to Egypt and to the
neighbouring countries in order to search those manuscripts. For his reputation,
he became Prefect of the Vatican Library in 1739. Generally, we know
nothing about his particular interest for ancient Numismatics, interest arisen
during his prefecture at the Vatican Library. In those year, in fact, very famous
collections of coins and medals entered the Library: 328 Greek and Roman
Medallions of the collection owned by the cardinal Alessandro Albani, the
collection of medallions, coins and medals of the cardinal Gaspare Carpegna,
with 4.000 pieces; the famous collection of 6.666 casts in sulphur of cameos and
carvings of Pier Leone Ghezzi, the extraordinary collection of more than 5.000
pieces of papal coins of Saverio Scilla. Giuseppe Simonio Assemani was
responsible for arranging and ordering a catalogue of those big collections:
When he died, a great number of Greek and Roman coins was found in his
apartment, together with medals and carvings, collection that shows his private
interest for Numismatics. For these reason, probably he passed this interest on
his great grandchild Simone Assemani, when he was still a child.
