LIBRI-CARRUCCI, GUILIAT:ME BRUTUS TIMOLEON, Count, French mathe matician and bibliographer, son of an Italian refugee, who was condemned at Lyons in 1816 for forgery, was b. at Florence Jan. 2, 1803. Having early devoted himself to the study of mathematics, he became professor in the university of Pisa, where he con tributed to the transactions of scientific societies a number of remarkable papers on The Theory of .Numbers (1820); Some Points of Analysis (1823); The General Resolution of Indeterminate Equations of the First Degree (1826); etc.
After 1830, having been compromised in the political movements, he was obliged to leave Tuscany, and went to France as refugee. He there found a patron in Arago (whom he afterwards attacked in the most spiteful manner); was naturalized, and in a short time elected member of the academy of sciences, professor of analytics at the Sorbonne, chief inspector of public instruction, and superintendent of the state libraries. He was decorated with the legion of honor, and appointed editor of the Journal des Savants, etc. Libri-Carrucci's works at this period are varied and numerous. In par ticular may be mentioned his IThdory of _Mathematical Science in Italy from the Renaissance to the End of the 17th Century (1838-41, 4 vols. Svo), in which he displayed much acuteness and erudition. He was besides a most determined bibliomaniac, and found means of collecting a library for himself which contained such a rich stock of incu nabula of all kinds, and of the greatest typographical curiosities, that several public sales, which he got up for his own benefit and of which each realized from £4,000 to £5,000, did not in the least degree diminish his collection. In consequence of the remarkable
phenomenon of a library remaining complete in spite of repeated sales. Libri-Carrucci began to be suspected of making use of his special position to abstract books and valuable MSS. from the public libraries. A report had even been secretly prepared on the subject by the public procurator, and communicated to M. Guizot to await his decision. The objects abstracted between 1842 and 1847 were approNimately valued at £20,000. This document was dated Feb. 4, 1848, and was found in the foreign office when the revolution broke out in that month. The case was immediately taken up by the courts, and after a long and careful examination, the accused, who, in the mean time, had fled to England, was condemned June. 1850, to ten years' imprisonment, to degradation, and the loss of his employments. The process created a great sensation, and gave rise to an immense deal of writing for and against the condemned. The most important is an article by P. Merimee, Le Proch Libri, in the Revue des _Deux Mondes (1852), for which the writer was imprisoned, as having, in defense of a " book-stealer," slandered and insulted the French judicature.
Lihri-Carrucei continued for two or three years to address letters and pamphlets to persons in France exclaiming against his condemnation in the highest tones of injured innocence. The efforts of M. Merimee in behalf of Libri-Carrueci, and a petition in his favor, addressed to the senate in 1861. only had the effect of bringing out still more damuatory facts regarding both him and his family. He died Sept. 28, 1869.