, nephew to Nicolas Cirillo, a Neapolitan physician of considerable eminence,
, nephew to Nicolas Cirillo, a Neapolitan physician of considerable eminence, was born at
Naples in 1730, and liberally educated. His principal
study was medicine, as a profession but his inclination
led him more particularly to natural history and at the
age of thirty he was appointed botanical professor at Naples. In 1761, he published his “Introductio ad Botanicam,
” which in the then state of botany was considered as
a useful book. In the mean time, his knowledge of the
English language made him be consulted by all visitors
from that nation, and among others by lady Walpole, who
engaged him to accompany her to England, as her travelling physician; and here he attended Dr. Hunter’s, and
probably other medical lectures. On his return he published his “Nosologiae methodicse rudimenta,
” De essentialibus nonnullarum
plantarum characteribus,
” which was followed by other botanical treatises, learned, but badly written, his Latin and
Italian style being both ungrammatical and uncouth. His
most splendid work was an account of the “Papyrus,
”
printed by Bodoni in