JOHANN JOACHIM, was born at Stendal, in the old Marche of Brandenburg, in 1717. He was the son of a shoemaker. Though destined by his birth to occupy an humble position in an obscure town of Germany, yet he raised himself to the office of president of antiquities in the Vatican. His course of study appears to have been very desultory, but he contrived to spend two years in the university of Halle. After having been seven years rector of the school of Seehausen, near Salswedel, he went into Saxony, where he resided seven years more, and was librarian to Count Bunau at Nöthenitz. When he left this place in 1754, he went to Dresden, where he formed an acquaintance with the ablest artists, and particularly with Oeser, an excellent painter, and one of the best draughtsmen of the age. Among other acquaintances formed by Winckelmann at this time was Monsignor Archinto, pope's nuncio, who, on learning the great acquirements and the obscure position of the lad, proposed to him to become a proselyte to the Roman faith, on condition that the pope's representative should obtain for him a situation in the Vatican library. Winckelmann wandered about like one in a dream, weighing, in proportion to his light, the different aspects of the question thus opened up Winckelmann carried with him into Italy a sense of beauty and art, which led him instantly to admire the masterpieces of the Vatican. He soon increased his knowledge; and it was not till after he had thus purified his taste that he began to think of the explanation of other monuments, in which his great learning could not fail to distinguish him. In 1756 he planned his Restoration of Ancient Statues, and a larger work on the Taste of the Greek Artists; and he designed an account of the galleries of Rome and Italy, beginning with a volume on the Belvidere statues, in the manner of Richardson, who, he says, only ran over Rome. He also intended a history of the corruption of taste in art, the restoration of statues, and an illustration of the obscure points of mythology. All these different essays led him to his History of Ancient Art, published in 1764, and his Monumenti Antichi Inediti, in 1766. It must however be confessed, that the first of these works has not all the clearness and precision that might be expected in its general plan and division of its parts and objects; but it has enlarged and extended the ideas both of antiquaries and collectors. The description of the gems and sculptures of the Stosch cabinet contributed not a little to extend Winckelmann's knowledge. Few persons have opportunities of contemplating such vast collections. Winckelmann's Monumenti Antichi Inediti, of which he had begun the third volume in 1767, secured him the high esteem of antiquaries. Had he lived, we should have had a work long wished for; a complete collection of the bas-reliefs discovered from the time of Bartoli, the greater part of which were in the possession of Cardinal Albani.

When Cardinal Albani succeeded to the place of librarian of the Vatican, he endeavoured to procure a place in the Hebrew department for Winckelmann, who refused a canonry because he would not take the tonsure. In 1761 the Elector of Saxony gave him, unsolicited, the place of Counsellor Richter, the direction of the royal cabinet of medals and antiquities at Dresden. Upon the death of Venuti, 1762, he was appointed president of the antiquities of the apostolic chamber, with power over all discoveries and exports of antiquities and pictures. This is a post of honour, with an income of 160 scudi per annum. He had a prospect of the place of president of antiquities in the Vatican, about to be created, at sixteen scudi per month, and was named corresponding member of the Academy of Inscriptions. The King of Prussia offered him, by Col. Quintus Icilius, the place of librarian and director of his cabinet of medals and antiquities, vacant by the death of Gautier de la Croze, with a handsome appointment. He made no scruple of accepting the offer; but when it came to the pope's ears, he added an appointment out of his own purse, and retained him at Rome.

In April 1768, he left Rome to travel with the sculptor Cavaceppi over Germany and Switzerland. When he came to Vienna, he was so pleased with the reception he met with, that he made a longer stay there than he had intended. But being suddenly seized with an extraordinary desire to return to Rome, he set out for Italy, deferring his visits to his friends in Germany to a future opportunity. As he passed through Trieste, he was assassinated, June 8, 1786, by a wretch named Arcangeli, a native of Campiglio, a town in the territory of Pistoia, with whom he had formed an acquaintance on the road.

Perhaps the celebrity of Winckelmann is rather that of a pioneer in the history of ancient art than as an original recorder of ancient art treasures. Previous to the time of Goethe, who wrote a masterly dissertation on the genius and writings of Winckelmann in 1805, the reputation of the art-historian was limited to the learned; but now the name of Winckelmann is known in every corner of the civilized world.