Pellegrino Ernetti

Pellegrino Ernetti (16 October 1925 – 8 April 1994) was an Italian Catholic Benedictine priest, musicologist and physicist. He later attracted international attention for claims regarding a device he called the Chronovisor, which he alleged was capable of observing past events. These claims, however, have been widely regarded as unsubstantiated.

Ernetti asserted that he had used the Chronovisor to observe the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ, to view a performance of the lost Latin tragedy Thyestes by Quintus Ennius and to listen to a speech of the Roman politician and orator Cicero. He presented a photograph that he claimed depicted Jesus Christ during the Crucifixion, as well as a text he said reproduced the lost play. The photograph was later identified as an image of a sculpture of Christ, while the text claimed to be Thyestes by Ennius is generally regarded by scholars as a modern composition, likely created by Ernetti himself rather than recovered from antiquity. No independently verifiable technical documentation or physical evidence for the Chronovisor has ever been produced, and the claims are generally regarded as pseudoscientific or legendary.^[1][2][3]

Pallegrino Ernetti was born on October 13, 1925. He entered the Benedictine Abbey of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice in 1941. Ernetti undertook a traditional monastic education that included theology, philosophy, church history, and classical languages such as Latin and Greek, alongside musical training consistent with Benedictine liturgical traditions. He was ordained a priest on 14 August 1949.^[4]

Ernetti developed a reputation as a specialist in Gregorian chant and archaic music. As an active figure in the study and performance of archaic music, he directed the choir of the Benedictine Abbey of San Giorgio Maggiore, as well as several other choirs, with a particular emphasis on Gregorian chant. Numerous recordings were made under his direction. Ernetti was appointed as a full-time lecturer in archaic music at the Benedetto Marcello Conservatory of Music in Venice in 1960. Beginning in 1958, he published the multi-volume Trattato generale di canto gregoriano (Gregorian Chant: A General Treatise) under the auspices of the Cini Foundation’s Institute for Cultural Collaboration. The series systematize the historical, theoretical, and practical dimensions of the chant tradition.^[5][6]

In the early 1950s, he collaborated with the Franciscan physician Agostino Gemelli, founder of the Catholic University of Milan, on research related to music and acoustics. Their work took place in a physics laboratory equipped with oscilloscopes, filtering systems, and other electronic instruments, and focused on improving the clarity of sung vocal sounds. Ernetti authored several works on music, including Principi filosofici e teologici della musica (Philosophical and Theological Principles of Music) and Parola, Musica, Ritmo (Words, Music, Rhythm), focusing on the theoretical, philosophical, and practical aspects of music and its performance.^[7]

In the 1970s, Ernetti took an active interest in Patriarchal chant.^[8] He analyzed the Patriarchal chant of Venice and argued that it is an original liturgical musical tradition, independent of Gregorian, Ambrosian, or Aquileian chant. He limited the term patriarchal to the Venetian oral tradition, while ethnomusicologists have applied it more broadly to Carnic and Friulian repertoires.^[9]

According to Italian newspaper, Il Gazzettino, in an interview by Vincenzo Maddaloni, published in Italian magazine La Domenica del Corriere on May 2, 1972, Ernetti claimed that he had created a time machine capable of observing and recording past events. He stated that the device was developed through the joint collaboration of twelve scientists, three of whom he identified by name: himself, Agostino Gemelli, and Wernher von Braun.^[10]

Austrian author Peter Krassa details the story of Chronovisor in his book, Father Ernetti’s Chronovisor: The Creation and Disappearance of the World’s First Time Machine. According to the story, on September 15, 1952, Ernetti was working with Agostino Gemelli on a tape recorder, which frequently broke. Gemelli had, for years, silently addressed his deceased father for guidance during difficult moments, though he believed he had never received a conscious reply. Frustrated, Gemelli called out to his father for help. When the recording was replayed after repair, both men claimed to hear a voice they identified as Gemelli’s father saying, “Of course I shall help you. I’m always with you.” The experience astonished and unsettled them. Gemelli showed signs of distress, while Ernetti continued the experiment. Upon repeating the procedure, the recorder allegedly captured a clearer voice saying, “But, Zucchini, it is clear, don’t you know it is I?”—using a childhood nickname known only to Gemelli and his father. Gemelli recognized both the voice and the nickname, leading him to believe he was hearing his deceased father.

According to Krassa's account, the two men eventually brought the matter to Pope Pius XII in Rome who reassured that their discovery was purely scientific and could one day form the basis for studies reinforcing people's belief in an afterlife. The story circulated publicly decades later and is considered part of the narrative surrounding early accounts of anomalous voice phenomena.

Ernetti alleged that he collaborated with a group of twelve scientists over several years and developed a time machine he called the Chronovisor.^[11][12][13] He said that the device allowed him to observe historical events and figures, including performance of the lost tragedy Thyestes by Quintus Ennius, and Crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

The Chronovisor claims were met with skepticism from journalists and scholars. It was revealed that the photograph was a postcard depicting the face of Christ on the cross, taken from a wooden sculpture displayed at the Sanctuary of Merciful Love (Sanctuaire de l’Amour Miséricordieux) near Todi, in the province of Perugia, Italy and sold at the sanctuary’s gift shop. The sculpture was the work of the Spanish sculptor Coullaut Valera. The texts that Ernetti claimed to have originated from the distant past are considered by scholars to be compilations created by Ernetti himself rather than authentic historical documents.^[14]

Although Ernetti gained wider recognition due to the controversy surrounding the Chronovisor, he remains recognized as a scholar of archaic music for his contributions to musicology and sacred music performance. He authored numerous books on archaic music and is regarded as one of the prominent figures involved in historically informed performance and in the revival of early music in Italy.^[5][15]

According to an account attributed to one of his relatives, shortly before his death Ernetti made a deathbed confession in which he stated that the text he had claimed to originate from antiquity was in fact a modern composition assembled by himself using fragments preserved in the works of various ancient authors. He also reportedly admitted that the image of Christ was fabricated. He explained his actions by stating:

“I was hopeful that my Chronovisor would work. I was always so optimistic.” ^[16]

Ernetti died in Venice, Italy, on 8 April 1994.