MARSIGLI [MARsiuus], LUIGI FERDINANDO, COUNT , Italian soldier and scientific writer, was born at Bologna on July I 0, 1658. After a course of scientific studies in his native city he travelled through Turkey collecting data on the military organization and natural history. On his return he entered the service of the emperor Leopold (1682) and fought with distinction against the Turks, by whom he was wounded and captured in an action on the river Raab, and sold to a pasha whom he accompanied to the siege of Vienna. His release was pur chased in 1684 and he afterwards took part in the war of the Spanish succession. In 1703 he was appointed second in command under Count Arco in the defence of Alt-Breisach. The fortress surrendered to the duke of Burgundy, and both Arco and Mar sigli were court martialled ; the former was condemned to death and the latter cashiered, although acquitted of blame by public opinion. Marsigli devoted the rest of his life to scientific investi gations, in the pursuit of which he made many journeys through Europe, spending a considerable time at Marseilles to study the nature of the sea. In 1712 he presented his collections to his
native city, where they formed the nucleus of the Bologna Insti tute of Science and Art. He died at Bologna on Nov. 1, 1730. BIBLIOGRAPHY.-A list of his works, over twenty in number, is given in Niceron's Memoirs; his Breve ristretto del saggio fisico intorno alla scoria del mare was published at Venice in 1755, and again at Amster dam (in French) in 5725 ; the Stato militare dell' impero ottomano was published at Amsterdam and the Hague in Italian and French (1732), the Osservazioni intorno al Bosforo Tracio in Rome 0680 and the Danubius pannonico-mysicus, a large work in six volumes containing much valuable historic and scientific information on the Danubian countries, at the Hague (1725). See Fontenelle, "Eloge" in the Mem. de l'acad. des sciences (Paris, 1730) ; Quincy, Memoires sur la vie de M. le comte Marsigli (Zurich, 1741), and Fantuzzi's biography of Marsigli (Bologna, 1770).