GUADAGNOLO, FILIPPO. – A learned Orientalist of the Congregation of Clerics Regular Minor, b. at Magliano (Abruzzi) ca. 1596; he taught Arabic at the University of Rome, where he d. on 27 March 1656.
He sought to make known the language that he studied most assiduously by publishing: Breves institutiones arabicae linguae (Rome 1642) and preparing a Thesaurus seu Dictionarius arabicum (manuscript); and to introduce Catholicism into the Arab world through two apologetic works: Apologia pro Christiana religione (Rome 1631, in Arabic there 1637), Considerazioni contro la religione maumettana (in Arabic, there 1649), and by contributing to the translation of the Biblia arabica (there 1671).
BIBL.: L. Allatius, Apes urbanae, Rome 1632, p. 228; Sommervogel, VIII, pp. 1337–39. Agostino Amaroli