Daniel Webb (1718/19 – 2 August 1798) was an Irish writer on aesthetics whose works enjoyed a considerable vogue for a time.
[1] Webb was born at Maidstown, County Limerick, in 1718 or 1719, the eldest son of Daniel Webb of Maidstown Castle, and his wife Dorothea, daughter and heiress of M. Leake of Castle Leake, County Tipperary.
[1] Following his studies he went to Rome, where he became friendly with the Neoclassical painter Anton Raphael Mengs[1] who painted his portrait.
[3] Winkelmann later accused him of having plagiarised the work from the unpublished manuscript of Mengs' treatise Gedanken über die Schönheit.
Another edition was published for a wider readership in 1795,[6] as Selections from M. Pauw, with Additions by Daniel Webb, Esq..The extracts were randomly ordered, with the additional comments printed in italics to differentiate them from Pauw's text.