List of Italian geniuses

This is a list of notable Italian geniuses, presented in chronological order by date of birth.

• Thomas Aquinas (1225 – 1274), was a great student and dedicated his life to preaching, study, lecturing and writing. He wrote many commentaries which help our understanding of the Bible and great works which explain something about the unfathomable depths of the Christian faith. He was a genius.

• Dante Alighieri (1265 – 1321), was a genius as a philologist, theologian, philosopher and an amazingly gifted poet. Many scholars consider The Divine Comedy a summary of medieval thought. Critics have praised it not only as magnificent poetry, but also for its wisdom and scholarly learning.

• Filippo Brunelleschi (1377 – 1446), was a polymath, with interests in painting, sculpture, architecture, mathematics, and engineering. He designed and supervised the raising of the dome over the Cathedral of Florence. Furthermore, his interest in mathematics led to his invention of linear perspective, a mathematical system for showing depth on a flat surface. Giorgio Vasari says Brunelleschi was a man of such exalted genius, that "we may truly declare him to have been given to us by Heaven."

• Leon Battista Alberti (1404 – 1472), has been designated the "first universal genius of the Renaissance period" by Jacob Burckhardt. He was a writer, humanist, and architect. Through his theoretical writings on painting, sculpture, and architecture, he raised them from the level of the mechanical arts to that of the liberal arts. In his personality, works, and breadth of learning, Alberti is considered the prototype of the Renaissance "universal man."

• Leonardo da Vinci (1452 – 1519), was one of the greatest painters and perhaps the most versatile genius in history. A prodigy in childhood, he had become a polymath as an adult, handling philosophy and mathematics and a dozen other disciplines with easy familiarity. He designed machines and drew plans for hundreds of inventions. Because Leonardo excelled in such an amazing number of areas of human knowledge, he is often called "the universal genius par excellence" or, as Helen Gardner says "The scope and depth of his interests were without precedent... His mind and personality seem to us superhuman."

• Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463 – 1494), was as much a child prodigy as Michelangelo. In addition to being blessed with great genius, a gift for languages, and an insatiable curiosity, Pico was the scion of a wealthy family of princes. His Oration on the Dignity of Man is better known than any other philosophical text of the 15th century.

• Niccolò Machiavelli (1469 – 1527), was a statesman, writer, patriot, and thinker of genius whom many people consider the father of modern political science. Machiavelli explained most of his ideas in The Prince. It is probably the best-known work in political theory of all time.

• Michelangelo (1475 – 1564), is generally recognized to be one of the greatest artists of all time, a universal genius in all fields of visual creativity — sculpture, painting, and architecture — as well as a widely admired poet and letter writer. He was one of the most famous people of his time and a great leader of the Italian Renaissance.

• Raphael (1483 – 1520), was one of the greatest and most influential painters of the Italian Renaissance. Together with Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo, Raphael personifies the genius of the Renaissance. His graceful figures and skillful compositions influenced artists up to the early 1900s. Raphael was also an architect.

• Gerolamo Cardano (1501 – 1576), was an example of a Renaissance man, working in the fields medicine, philosophy, astronomy, geology, and theology. He was best known for his genius in mathematics, especially for his invention of probability theory. He was also the first to algebraically solve the cubic equation.

• Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (c. 1525 – 1594), was one of the greatest composers of the Italian Renaissance. For the Roman Catholic Church, Palestrina wrote about 250 unaccompanied choral works called motets, and 93 masses. Two of his most famous works are the mass called Missa Papae Marcelli and his setting of the Stabat Mater. "He has been described as the first composer of genius, and he certainly conceived music as a living art, and not as a branch of mathematics."

• Torquato Tasso (1544 – 1595), was a poet of the late Renaissance period. The musicality of his language and his mournful moods are considered unsurpassed. He was a mentally unstable genius whose fame rests largely on two major works: his delightful pastoral drama, Aminta; and his great epic poem, Jerusalem Delivered.

• Paolo Sarpi (1552 – 1623), was one of the most remarkable figures in Europe at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th century. Astronomer, historian, mathematician, linguist, lawyer and theologian, who has been called "The greatest genius of his age," Sarpi is well known to historians of the Reformation for his History of the Council of Trent, but is seldom mentioned in histories of science and medicine. Yet Galileo Galilei described him as "my father and my master" and wrote of him "No man in Europe surpasses Master Paolo Sarpi in his knowledge of the science of mathematics." He carried on an extensive correspondence with the "father of modern algebra" and famous cryptographer, François Viète, and the Scottish mathematician, Alexander Anderson and was called upon to revise their works. He communicated with William Gilbert on the magnet, advised and assisted Sanctorius in his work on the measurement of metabolism. Sir Henry Wotton, the British Ambassador to Venice who knew Sarpi well, commented not only on his mathematical ability, but added that he was "so expert in the history of plants, as if he had never perused any book but nature"; and Robert Sanderson, Bishop of Lincoln, lamented to Isaak Walton his regret at not accompanying Sir Henry as chaplain for he lost the opportunity of meeting "one of the late miracles of general learning, prudence and modesty..."

• Galileo Galilei (1564 – 1642), scientist and philosopher. He was a "true Renaissance man, excelling at many different endeavors, including lute playing and painting." By his investigation of natural laws he laid foundations for modern experimental science. In physics, Galileo discovered the properties of the pendulum, invented the thermometer, and formulated the laws that govern the motion of falling bodies. In astronomy, Galileo was the first to use the telescope to make observations of the moon, sun, planets, and stars. Of Galileo's genius, Fray Paolo Sarpi, a Venetian polymath, said, "God and nature have joined hands and created the intellect of Galileo."

• Tommaso Campanella (1568 – 1639), was a philosopher and writer who sought to reconcile Renaissance humanism with Roman Catholic theology. His best-known work is the utopian treatise The City of the Sun; but, in reality, his thought was extremely complex and engaged with all fields of learning. Henry Hallam says "The strength of Campanella's genius lay in his imagination."

• Cardinal Mazarin (1602 – 1661), a priest, later cardinal, and political genius in the service of the Pope, who sent him to France to negotiate with Cardinal Richelieu in 1630. He became prime minister of France after Richelieu's death in 1642.

• Metastasio (1698 – 1782), was a poet and great theatrical genius of his time, whose original name was Pietro Trapassi. A prodigy at poetic improvisation, he became court poet at Vienna in 1729. He wrote melodious lyric verse; a masque, Gli orti esperidi; and librettos of many operas, including Didone abbandonata, Artaserse, La clemenza di Tito, and Il re pastore. His melodrama Attilio Regolo is generally considered his masterpiece.

• Joseph-Louis Lagrange (1736 – 1813), has been described as "perhaps the greatest mathematical genius since Archimedes." He wrote on algebra, calculus, and number theory. His most famous work, Analytical mechanics, is a purely algebraic study of forces and motions, including the orbits of planets, the flow of liquids, and the vibration of strings.

• Vittorio Alfieri (1749 – 1803), was a playwright and poet. Through his lyrics and dramas he helped to revive the national spirit of Italy and so earned the title of precursor of the Risorgimento. His best works include Filippo (1775), Oreste (1786), and Mirra (1786). Alfieri wrote many poems, a treatise in defense of liberty, and a lively two-part Autobiography (1790, 1803). He was a genius.

• Antonio Canova (1757 – 1822), was the greatest genius of the neoclassicist movement in sculpture. An admirer of Napoleon, Canova executed a bust of the emperor from life and several other portraits, including two where Napoleon is represented nude in the guise of a Roman emperor. Canova's greatness lies in his ability to fill these forms from another time with a distinct grace and vitality. His ability to carve pure white Italian marble has seldom been equaled.

• Gioacchino Rossini (1792 – 1868), was the most popular musical genius in his day. His talent was so extraordinary to be called "The Italian Mozart." The Barber of Seville is probably the greatest comic opera ever written. His other successes included L'italiana in Algeri, La Cenerentola, and Semiramide.

• Giacomo Leopardi (1798 – 1837), Italy's first and greatest modern poet, was also an essayist, philosopher, and philologist. He was sickly and physically deformed, and felt lonely and unloved despite the brilliance of his career. Leopardi's genius, his frustrated hopes, and his pain found their best outlet in his poetry, which is admired for its brilliance, intensity, and effortless musicality. Leopardi's verse collections include Idylls (1825) and Songs (1836). His other important work is Le operette morali (Moral Essays, 1824-1832).

• Giuseppe Verdi (1813 – 1901), was a composer of operas. He was a genius and led the way toward a new era of music in Italy. Between 1851 and 1871, Verdi produced a remarkable series of masterpieces, including Rigoletto, Il trovatore, La traviata, Les vêpres siciliennes, Simon Boccanegra, Un ballo in maschera, La forza del destino, Don Carlos, and Aida. Among other compositions are several sacred choral works, including the Requiem.

• Vilfredo Pareto (1848 – 1923), was a sociologist and economist known chiefly for his theories on political behavior. Pareto also developed new ways to apply mathematics to economic problems. He has been described as "A man of genius, of the Latin, or better, of the classical, genius, for his thought turned back to Athens more willingly than to Rome."

• Maria Montessori (1870 – 1952), was a physician and professor of anthropology, used her genius for observing children as they naturally learn. Her educational approach became known as the Montessori method. Montessori schools exist worldwide.

• Guglielmo Marconi (1874 – 1937), was a genius physicist who designed and constructed the first wireless telegraph, or radio. For this work he received a Nobel Prize.

• Enrico Fermi (1901 – 1954), has been called "the last universal physicist in the tradition of the great men of the 19th century," and "the last person who knew all of the physics of his day." In 1942, he built the world's first nuclear reactor and produced the first controlled, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction. At Los Alamos, Fermi worked on the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1938.

• Ettore Majorana (1906 – 1938), was the youngest child prodigy of all time. At the age of four he could multiply two three-digit numbers and get correct result in seconds. In time he became one of the greatest physicists of the first half of the last century. Enrico Fermi himself had so good an opinion of Majorana that, in a private conversation, he referred to him as a real genius at the same level as Galilei and Newton, such that he could most probably have been, if he only had had a longer life to dedicate to physics.

See also

• List of Italian polymaths

Others articles of the Topic Biography : List of pneumonia deaths, BigWalkDog, Trippie Redd, Icewear Vezzo, PewPew, List of Mensans, Donald Trump (born 1946)

Others articles of the Topic Italy : Spaghetti Western

References

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