ced his first operas, _Tullo Ostilio_ and _Serse_, at Rome in 1694.
In 1696 he was at the court of Berlin, and between 1700 and 1720 divided
his time between Vienna and Italy. In 1720 he was summoned to London by
the Royal Academy of Music, and produced several operas, enjoying the
protection of the Marlborough family. About 1731 it was discovered that
he had a few years previously palmed off a madrigal by Lotti as his own
work, and after a long correspondence he was obliged to leave the
country. He remained for several years in France, and in 1748 was
summoned to Vienna to compose music in honour of the peace of
Aix-la-Chapelle. He then went to Venice as a composer of operas, and
nothing more is known of his life.

Bononcini's rivalry with Handel will always ensure him immortality, but
he was in himself a musician of considerable merit, and seems to have
influenced the style, not only of Handel but even of Alessandro
Scarlatti. Either he or his brother (our knowledge of the two composers'
lives is at present not sufficient to distinguish their works clearly)
was the inventor of that sharply rhythmical style conspicuous in _Il
Trionfo di Camilla_ (1697), the success of which at Naples probably
induced Scarlatti to adopt a similar type of melody. It is noticeable in
the once popular air of Bononcini, _L'esperto nocchiero_, and in the air
_Vado ben spesso_, long attributed to Salvator Rosa, but really by
Bononcini.

BONONIA (mod. _Bologna_), the chief town of ancient Aemilia (see
AEMILIA, VIA), in Italy. It was said by classical writers to be of
Etruscan origin, and to have been founded, under the name Felsina, from
Perusia by Aucnus or Ocnus. Excavations of recent years have, however,
led to the discovery of some 600 ancient Italic (Ligurian?) huts, and of
cemeteries of the same and the succeeding (Umbrian) periods (800-600?
B.C.), of which the latter immediately preceded the Etruscan
civilization (c. 600-400 B.C.). An extensive Etruscan necropolis, too,
was discovered on the site of the modern cemetery (A. Zannoni, _Scavi
della Certosa_, Bologna, 1876), and others in the public garden and on
the Arnoaldi Veli property (_Notizie degli Scavi, indice_ 1876-1900,
s.v. "Bologna"). In 196 B.C., when the town first appears in history,
it was already in the possession of the Boii, and had probably by this
time changed its name, and in 189 B.C. it became a Roman colony. After
the conquest of the mountain tribes, its impor