 He studied classical art under Johann Joachim Winckelmann and history with Francisco Pérez Bayer.He settled in Rome and visited Naples in 1759 to view the newly discovered ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum.In 1773 he was elected scholar of history and in 1776 Secretary of the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando was also a fellow of the Royal Basque Economic Society and the Economic society of Madrid, among other distinctions.