Carlo Gallavotti

Carlo Gallavotti (23 January 1909 – 9 February 1992) was an Italian classical scholar and philologist, who taught at the Sapienza University of Rome.

Biography Gallavotti was born in Cesena from Giuseppe and Immacolata, née Lopiano. He graduated from the University of Bologna (advisor: Augusto Rostagni). He became Rostagni's research assistant at the University of Turin, then studied textual criticism, paleography and papyrology at the University of Florence, with Giorgio Pasquali, Enrico Rostagno, and Girolamo Vitelli and Medea Norsa. In 1932–1933 he taught Classical philology in Florence on behalf of Pasquali, who was put on leave for teaching abroad; in the next year he won a scholarship at the Sapienza and began working on the critical edition of Theocritus. In 1934 he was habilitated to high school teaching and taught in Pinerolo, Perugia and Bologna.

In 1939 he won a post at the Officina dei Papiri Ercolanesi and was assigned to teach Ancient Greek literature and Byzantine studies at the University of Naples. In 1945 he moved to teach Greek and Latin grammar, Ancient Greek literature, Latin literature and Papyrology at the University of Bari.

In 1946, Gallavotti was habilitated to university teaching and became Professor in Ancient Greek literature at the University of Catania. In 1947 he moved back to Bari and served as Dean of the Faculties of Humanities, of Magistero and of Foreign Languages. In 1949 he became Professor in Greek and Latin grammar at the Sapienza University of Rome and in 1958 he moved to the chair of Classical philology. From 1962 to 1979 he also taught Ancient Greek literature.

Gallavotti retired in 1979 and died in Rome in 1992. He was the father of Giovanni Gallavotti.

Research activity Gallavotti tied his name most notably to his critical edition of Theocritus and the Greek bucolic poets, which was published in 1946 and re-edited two times in his life. Gallavotti was the first to collate all the almost-180 known manuscripts and his edition was praised by A. S. F. Gow – but not by Pasquali, who approved Gallavotti's study of the transmission, but not his constitutio textus. Focusing on critically editing the texts, Gallavotti published relatively few papers on Theocritus, nonetheless he produced interpretative essays and studied the textual history of his works through the Byzantine times. Regarding the transmission of Classics and Byzantine philology, he is most noted for his ten "Planudea" essays, focused on manuscripts and the philological activity of Maximus Planudes. He also worked on papyri – chiefly literary and Herculaneum papyri – and published critical editions of Sappho and Alcaeus and of Menander's play Dyskolos.

Influenced by Augusto Rostagni, Gallavotti was interested in the ancient aesthetic theories and philosophy and edited Aristotle's Poetics and Empedocles' poem.

He is also credited with pioneering Mycenaean studies in Italy. Anna Morpurgo Davies and Anna Sacconi were his students; with the latter, Gallavotti published the Mycenaean inscriptions of Pyla.

Gallavotti's bibliography was simultaneously and independently collected by the scientific board of Rivista di Cultura Classica e Medievale, that also dedicated the 1994 issue to his memory, and by Silvio M. Medaglia and Camillo Neri (University of Bologna).

Works by Gallavotti (selection)

Books

Articles

Fellowship, Accademia dell'Arcadia (Rome). Fellowship, Accademia delle Scienze di Palermo. Fellowship, Accademia delle Scienze di Torino (1953). Fellowship, Accademia Pugliese delle Scienze (Bari). Fellowship, Istituto di Studi Romani (Rome). Honorary fellowship, Accademia degli Incamminati (Bologna). Honorary fellowship, Ελληνική Ανθρωπιστική Εταιρεία [Hellenic Humanistic Society].