Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0
Author-Name: Daniela Giaconi
Author-Email:
Author-Workplace-Name: Università di Macerata - Dipartimento di Istituzioni Economiche e Finanziarie
Title: La biblioteca Pantaleoni e le fonti dei «Principii di economia pura» 
(the private book collection of Maffeo Pantaleoni and the sources of Principii di economia pura)
Abstract: According to Pantaleoni’s will, his private book collection should have been entrusted to the Municipality
of Macerata. The present essay delineates the vicissitudes of this collection, describing how the
testamentary dispositions were not executed, the several attempts made to bring the collection back
to its natural seat and the impossibility to examine it because of the judicial dispute between Pantaleoni’s
heirs and the Treasury Ministry to which the collection was temporarily entrusted in 1925. Only
in January 2000, the collection was open to the public in the communal library of Macerata. Pantaleoni’s
book collection, which consists of 7.603 volumes, had been examined up to that date only by
Gangemi in 1939. The latter studied the notes written by Pantaleoni in some of his books, and pointed
out the variations the economist wished to make to the second edition of Principii di economia pura
(Principles of pure economics). Our essay moves from Gangemi’s analysis and enlarges the research
about the notes to the volumes cited in the bibliography of Principii. It examines Pantaleoni’s approach
to texts, his outlook on scientific research and the ways in which he transposed into his manual
the notions he had apprehended. Starting from the bibliography of Principii, we have tried to verify
whether the economist had all the volumes cited, how he had acquired them and the personal
impressions he drew from them. Without going into the contents of Principles, our study centres on
the development of Pantaleoni’s work, in order to highlight the special alchemy of a book that deeply
affected Italian economic studies, even though it was written hastily and disregarding cleanness of text
and accuracy of form. 
Classification-JEL: B31
Keywords: Maffeo Pantaloni; pensiero economico italiano tra Otto e Novecento; formazione e circolazione delle idee economiche; biblioteche degli economisti; manuali di economia politica
(Maffeo Pantaleoni; Italian economic thought between the 19th and the 20th century; genesis and spread of economic ideas; book collections of economists; economics handbooks)
Journal: Il Pensiero Economico Italiano
Pages: 63-100
Volume: 14
Issue: 2
Year: 2006
File-URL: https://www.libraweb.net/articoli.php?chiave=200606302&rivista=63
Handle: RePEc:pei:journl:v:14:y:2006:2:3:p:63-100