Italian physician and politician, born at Rome 1830, and died at Rome on the 11th of January 1916. After graduating in medicine at the university of Rome, he was appointed assistant professor of medical jurisprudence in 1856, and some years later became professor of clinical medicine. He soon acquired a great reputation as a practising physician, being especially noted for the accuracy of his diagnosis, and he devoted himself particularly to the pathology of the heart and to malaria; his studies on the latter subject proved of great value for the reclamation of the Roman Campagna and other fever-stricken zones. In 1875 he was elected deputy for the 3rd Division of Rome, which he continued to represent until his death. He was Minister of Education in the Cabinets of Cairoli (1879–81), Depretis (1881–87), Crispi (1893–96), and Gen. Pelloux (1898–99), and of Agriculture under Zanardelli (1901–03); from 1889 to 1893 he was vice-president of the Chamber. A keen classical scholar, he took an active interest in archæological matters, although in some of his projects, such as the famous Passeggiata Archeologica in Rome, he showed more enthusiasm than judgment. His labours for the isolation of the Pantheon and the creation of the Museum of Ancient Art and of the Modern Art Gallery in Rome deserved and met with more general approval.
