Nicola Onorati who sometimes wrote under the pseudonym Columella (26 August 1764-11 January 1822) was an Italian agronomist and naturalist.
He was born Gaetano Niccola Bartolomeo Onorati in
Craco
Craco is a ghost town and ''comune'' in the province of Matera, in the southern Italian region of Basilicata. It was abandoned towards the end of the 20th century, due to faulty pipe work that was thought to have failed, causing the town to be ab ...
in
Lucania
Lucania was a historical region of Southern Italy. It was the land of the Lucani, an Oscan people. It extended from the Tyrrhenian Sea to the Gulf of Taranto.
It bordered with Samnium and Campania in the north, Apulia in the east, and Brutti ...
(province of
Basilicata
it, Lucano (man) it, Lucana (woman)
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) to a family of limited means. His intelligence garnered him an education and by age 20 he had entered the
Franciscan order
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, caption = A cross, Christ's arm and Saint Francis's arm, a universal symbol of the Franciscans
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of observant minorites in Principato, and was sent as a novitiate to a seminary of Bologna. There he took classes under
Ireneo Affo, with whom he kept a lifelong friendship. At age 26, he was a teacher in philosophy at
Bologna
Bologna (, , ; egl, label= Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nat ...
, and received a position in his native town to teach theology. He was affiliated by 1786 with the Monastery of Montuoro. Dedicated to agriculture, by 1788 he was appointed to a professorship of agronomy for ten years at the
University of Salerno
The University of Salerno ( it, Università degli Studi di Salerno, UNISA) is a university located in Fisciano and in Baronissi, Italy. Its main campus is located in Fisciano while the Faculty of Medicine is located in Baronissi. It is organize ...
. Subsequently, he had a position of teacher at the military academy of the
Nunziatella
The Nunziatella Military School of Naples, Italy, founded November 18, 1787 under the name of ''Royal Military Academy'' (it.: ''Reale Accademia Militare''), is the oldest Italian institution of military education among those still operating. Its b ...
in
Naples
Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...
, and professor of agriculture at the
University of Naples
The University of Naples Federico II ( it, Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II) is a public university in Naples, Italy. Founded in 1224, it is the oldest public non-sectarian university in the world, and is now organized into 26 depar ...
. In 1798, he was named rector of the church of the
San Diego all'Ospedaletto, and later director of its botanical garden. He was murdered by two of his domestic workers, intent on robbing him.
Continuazione al Nuovo dizionario istorico degli uomini che si sono renduti piu celebri...
Tomo VI; Gioacchino M. Olivier-Poli, Published by R. Marotta and Vanspandoch, Naples (1825); page 328-330.
Works
*''Delle cose rustiche'' (1791, Naples)
*''Memorie sopra l'agricoltura, che fanno seguito alle cose rustiche'' (1791, Naples)
*''Dell'agricoltura pratica, dlla pastorizia e di molte altre dottrine che riguardano la medicina veterinaria e l'economia domestica'' (1813, Milan)
*''Opuscoli Georgici'' (1820, Naples)
*''Memorie sul miglioramento de' vini naploetani''
*''Memorie sopra in vinacciuoli e sul modo d'estrarne l'olio''
*''Saggio di economia campestre e domestica per i dodici mesi dell'anno, ad uso degli agricoltori, de'pastori e di altra gente industriosa (1816, Milan)
*''Delle patate, loro coltura, uso economico e maniera di farne il pane''
*''Dell'educazione de'bachi da seta''
*''Dell'arte di governare i bachi da seta''
*''Dizionario di voci dubbie italiane''
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Onorati, Niccola Columella
1764 births
1822 deaths
Italian agronomists
Italian naturalists
19th-century Italian writers