Manfredo Settala

Manfredo Settala (; 1600–1680), son of the physician Ludovico Settala (1552–1633), was an Italian cleric and scientist. A friend of Cassiano dal Pozzo, he created in Milan the Settala Museum – one of the world's earliest natural history museums.

Biography Manfredo Settala studied at the universities of Pisa and Siena, where he befriended Fabio Chigi (the future Pope Alexander VII). This appointment enabled him to spend the rest of his life studying various scientific subjects.

Manfredo Settala was Henry Oldenburg's Milanese correspondent. Settala also corresponded with Antonio Magliabechi and Francesco Redi. On 3 October 1667 it was proposed that he should be elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, but a decision was deferred until the next meeting, at which, however, the question was not raised again. Visitors such as the German physicist Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus, one of the pioneers of porcelain manufacture in Europe, traveled to Milan specifically to meet Settala and discuss his inventions with him.

Manfredo bequeathed his collection of objects of natural history, instruments of various sorts, and pictures, to the Ambrosian Library. This will, however, was not carried out ipso facto, for the Canon had many nephews and nieces who had their own views on the matter, one of them in particular, Maria Settala, who had married one of the Crevenna family, refusing to give up what she considered her rights and was only satisfied when she had removed some of the pictures. It was not till 1751 that Canon Manfredo's legacy was confirmed by a decree of the Senate of Milan, which consigned the collection to the Ambrosian Library, and where 70 years after the testator's death it was duly installed. The Settala collection was destroyed during World War II. Some objects from Settala’s collection, however, still survive in various Italian museums.

Manfredo Settala's collection was cataloged and described by the Italian physicist and philosopher Paolo Maria Terzago (1610–1695). Terzago's catalogue was published in Latin in 1664 and in Italian translation in 1666; another Italian edition appeared in 1677. The Ambrosian Library preserves an original manuscript inventory of the collection. The collection was composed by museum, workshop, library and art gallery. The library was tightly connected with Settala's interests: optics, mathematics, ethnography, and travels. The art gallery included several works by prominent Renaissance artists, such as Fede Galizia, Raphael, Brueghel, and Leonardo da Vinci. The museum consisted of about 3000 pieces, including scientific instruments, objects made from glass and metal, cameos, medals, and various chemical preparations. It contained a full range of natural and man-made items: zoological and mineral specimens; products of the vegetable kingdom; objects from America, Asia, and Africa: silver from Potosí, porcelain from China, Chinese and Japanese texts written in ideograms and Egyptian mummies; weapons; musical instruments; and a significant number of archeological materials and ancient coins. Figured stones and skeletons were on display, as were automata, burning glasses and perpetual-motion devices.