Alberto Guglielmotti (3 February 1812 - 31 October 1893) was a

Dominican order The Order of Preachers (, abbreviated OP), commonly known as the Dominican Order, is a Catholic Church, Catholic mendicant order of pontifical right that was founded in France by a Castilians, Castilian priest named Saint Dominic, Dominic de Gu ...

priest and writer. He was best recognized for his histories about the naval battles and exploits of seamen from the Italian peninsula. He was born in

Civitavecchia Civitavecchia (, meaning "ancient town") is a city and major Port, sea port on the Tyrrhenian Sea west-northwest of Rome. Its legal status is a ''comune'' (municipality) of Metropolitan City of Rome Capital, Rome, Lazio. The harbour is formed by ...

, baptized ''al secolo'' as Francesco Maria Guglielmotti. he father was an officer of the Marine, who served as councillor in

Ragusa, Sicily Ragusa (; ; ) is a city and ''comune'' in southern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Ragusa, on the island of Sicily, with 73,778 inhabitants as of 2025. It is built on a wide limestone hill between two deep valleys, Cava San Leonardo ...

and Civitavecchia. After attending seminary in Rome, he served as professor of physics and mathematics at the Minerva school. He later became librarian of the

Biblioteca Casanatense The Biblioteca Casanatense is a large historic library in Rome, Italy, named in honour of Cardinal Girolamo Casanate (1620–1700) whose private library is at its roots. History The library was established in 1701 by Antonin Cloche, the Ma ...

. He soon dedicated himself to writing mainly about naval history. Including ''I Bastioni d' Antonio di Sangallo per fortificare Civitavecchia'' (1860). His first major book was ''

Marcantonio Colonna Marcantonio II Colonna (sometimes spelled Marc'Antonio; 1535 – August 1, 1584), Duke of Tagliacozzo and Duke and Prince of Paliano, was an Italian aristocrat who served as Viceroy of Sicily in the service of the Spanish Crown, general of ...

alla Battaglia di Lepanto'' (1862). Ten years later, he published ''Storia della Marina Pontificia nel medievo''; by 1893, this had expanded to the history to ten volumes chronicling from ''dal principio a noi''. He published ''La guerra dei pirati e la Marina pontificia del 1500-1560'' (1876) which detailed the predations by

Barbary pirates The Barbary corsairs, Barbary pirates, Ottoman corsairs, or naval mujahideen (in Muslim sources) were mainly Muslim corsairs and privateers who operated from the largely independent Barbary states. This area was known in Europe as the Barba ...

and the response of the Papal navies. A monument in his honor was erected in Civitavecchia and two submarines of the Italian navy was named after him. He served as a correspondent of the

Accademia della Crusca The (; ), generally abbreviated as La Crusca, is a Florence-based society of scholars of Italian linguistics and philology. It is one of the most important research institutions of the Italian language, as well as the oldest Academy#Linguisti ...

and the Lincei. Elenco dei corrispondenti dell'Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei

References

1812 births 1893 deaths 19th-century Italian historians 19th-century Italian writers {{Italy-writer-stub