The Scarith of Scornello

By Ingrid D. Rowland,

Book cover of The Scarith of Scornello: A Tale of Renaissance Forgery

Book description

Bored teenager Curzio Inghirami staged perhaps the most outlandish prank of the seventeenth century when he hatched a wild scheme that preyed on the Italian fixation with ancestry by forging an array of ancient Latin and Etruscan documents. Stashing the counterfeit treasure in scarith (capsules made of hair and mud)…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Scarith of Scornello as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Ingrid Rowland is a fabulous writer, with a wide and frankly unrivalled knowledge of the art, architecture, and archaeology of Italy, from the Etruscans to modern day. She spins this little-known “17th-century caper” about the forgery of “Etruscan” artifacts with great verve, drawing the reader in like a good detective yarn. In her telling, what appears at first like a historical footnote ends up having implications far beyond, implicating—and scandalizing—the Vatican itself and beyond. 

From Sinclair's list on the ancient, “mysterious” Etruscans.

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