Count Carlo Ottavio Castiglioni (1784–1849) was an Italian

philologist Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources. It is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics with strong ties to etymology. Philology is also defined as the study of ...

and

numismatist A numismatist is a specialist, researcher, and/or well-informed collector of numismatics, numismatics/coins ("of coins"; from Late Latin , genitive of ). Numismatists can include collectors, specialist dealers, and scholar-researchers who use coi ...

Life

He was born of an ancient family at

Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

, in 1784. He was descended from Baldassare Castiglione, the author of '' Il Cortegiano''. Early in life he displayed a great aptitude for languages and numismatics and quickly acquired a mastery of almost all the

Indo-European The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...

and Semitic languages. He died at Genoa on the 10th of April 1849. His ''Life'', by Biondelli, appeared at Milan in 1856.

Works

In 1819, he published a description of the Kufic coins in the Gabinetto of Brera at

, under the title, ''Monete cufiche del museo di Milano'' (Milan, 1819). His principal work was done in connection with the

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

and other

Semitic languages The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. They include Arabic, Amharic, Tigrinya language, Tigrinya, Aramaic, Hebrew language, Hebrew, Maltese language, Maltese, Modern South Arabian language ...

, but he also performed good service in several other departments. His principal work in Oriental literature is entitled ''Mémoire géographique et numismatique sur la partie orientale de la Barbarie appelée Afrikia par les Arabes, suivi de recherches sur les Berbères atlantiques'' (Milan, 1826). In this work, which established his reputation, he endeavours to ascertain the origin and the history of the towns in Barbary whose names are found on Arabic coins. Outside of Italy he is perhaps best known by his edition, begun in 1819, of some fragments of the Gothic translation of the

Bible The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...

by Ulfilas, which had been discovered in 1817 by Cardinal Mai among the palimpsests of the Ambrosian Library. At first Castiglioni brought out some specimens in conjunction with the cardinal, but later at various times he published by himself a number of fragments of the ''Epistles'' of St. Paul. In 1829 he published by himself the Gothic version of the '' Second Epistle to the Corinthians''; and this was followed by the Gothic version of the ''

Epistle to the Romans The Epistle to the Romans is the sixth book in the New Testament, and the longest of the thirteen Pauline epistles. Biblical scholars agree that it was composed by Paul the Apostle to explain that Salvation (Christianity), salvation is offered ...

'', the ''

First Epistle to the Corinthians The First Epistle to the Corinthians () is one of the Pauline epistles, part of the New Testament of the Christian Bible. The epistle is attributed to Paul the Apostle and a co-author, Sosthenes, and is addressed to the Christian church i ...

'', and the ''

Epistle to the Ephesians The Epistle to the Ephesians is the tenth book of the New Testament. Traditionally believed to have been written by the Paul the Apostle, Apostle Paul around AD 62 during his imprisonment in Rome, the Epistle to the Ephesians closely rese ...

'' in 1834, by ''

Epistle to the Galatians The Epistle to the Galatians is the ninth book of the New Testament. It is a letter from Paul the Apostle to a number of Early Christian communities in Galatia. Scholars have suggested that this is either the Galatia (Roman province), Roman pro ...

'', '' Philippians'', and '' 1 Thessalonians'' in 1835, and by '' 2 Thessalonians'' in 1839. Besides these he wrote numerous unpublished works on linguistics.

References

Attribution: * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Castiglioni, Count Carlo Ottavio Italian philologists Italian numismatists 1784 births 1849 deaths