SPALLANZANI, LAZZARO. - Born on 12 Sept. 1729 at Scandiano (Reggio Emilia), died on 12 Feb. 1799 at Pavia. After studying grammar at Scandiano, he completed his philosophical studies at Reggio under the Jesuits. In 1747 he moved to Bologna to study law, following his father’s wishes.
Meanwhile, he began frequenting the salon of the celebrated Laura Bassi, and, captivated by scientific studies, he obtained his father’s permission to follow his inclination. He did not, however, neglect Italian, Latin, and Greek, so much so that in 1755 (he had by then donned the habit of the Priests of Mary and received major orders, though the exact date is unknown) he went to teach logic, metaphysics, and Greek at the College of Reggio (the former Seminary); in the same city, two years later, he was appointed to the chair of physics and mathematics at the University (founded in 1753). In 1763 he moved to Modena, where he taught Greek and mathematics at the College of S. Carlo and physics and philosophy at the University. In 1769 he was called to the chair of zoology at the University of Pavia, which he held until his death, refusing invitations from other cities, including Padua and Paris.
His most important research lies in animal biology, including the famous *Saggio di osservazioni microscopiche concernenti il sistema dei Signori di Needham e Buffon* (Modena 1765), in which he decisively entered the debate against the theory of spontaneous generation. To this essay he later added new experiences and facts in the *Lettere* (1767) and the *Prolusione* (1770). In 1776, in the first volume of the *Opuscoli di vita animale e vegetale*, he revisited and coordinated the entire question, refuting many opposing arguments. In the second of these essays, he presented a lengthy series of investigations into the spermatozoa of humans and vertebrates, and in the second volume of the *Dissertazioni* he studied fertilization in many animals, the development of the egg, and reported on his experiments in artificial fertilization (which he also achieved in dogs). It is noteworthy that, despite these experiments—through which he proved the necessity of fertilizing sperm for the development of eggs—he remained an ovist preformationist, believing that the future being was already preformed in the egg of animals. He also attempted to study this question in plants, but without significant results. Another field of study for him was regeneration; as early as 1768, in Modena, he published a *Prodromo di un'opera da imprimersi sulle riproduzioni degli animali*, but it was not until 1783 that the *Risultati di esperienze sopra la riproduzione della testa nelle lumache terrestri* appeared, which did not represent the final conclusion of his research, which was never published. Nevertheless, his assertion that snails are capable of regenerating their heads caused a great stir and sparked a flurry of criticisms and counter-criticisms, to the extent that in 1768 the French Academy appointed a special commission that fully confirmed “this new miracle of natural history.” It was then that Spallanzani uttered his famous remark: “Squeezing is everyone’s trade; experimenting and proving has always been and will always be the trade of the few.” He also conducted research on circulation, discovering capillary circulation in both cold-blooded and warm-blooded animals, demonstrating the contractility of the arterial bulb in frogs, the non-existence of air bubbles in circulating blood, and observing white blood cells, though he did not interpret them correctly. Another of his scientific monuments was his research on digestion and respiration, published posthumously by Jean Senebier, a Genevan librarian (*Memorie sulla respirazione*, Milan 1803), which experimentally and brilliantly confirmed Lagrange’s hypothesis and established the doctrine of internal respiration in tissues.
Among his minor works are accounts of his scientific travels: 1781, 1782, and 1783 along the Tyrrhenian and Adriatic coasts, with observations on “plant-animals” or zoophytes (sea pens, madrepores, gorgonians, corals, whose animal nature he upheld) and on geology and paleontology; 1785 in Constantinople, with observations in various branches of science, from mineralogy to meteorology, from zoology to the history of the customs of the peoples he visited; in the Two Sicilies, with descriptions of ascents on Etna and Vesuvius and volcanic phenomena (1788–89); in the Modenese Apennines, where he described the salse of Reggio di Querzola, the fires of Barigazzo, and the petroleum of Monte Zirbino (1792). Also noteworthy are the letters on the suspicion of a new sense in bats (Turin 1794), in which he studied the orientation abilities of these animals even in darkness and in the absence of various senses (sight, smell); his research on the electricity of torpedoes, in which he described the falcate muscle and its nervous connections; on the reproduction of eels, a long-standing problem not fully resolved; and on the revivification of the tiny animals of roof mosses (Rotifers and Tardigrades) after desiccation.
Spallanzani was justly called the “Galileo of biology,” and his writings also reveal a rare grammatical sense and a notable pleasantness of style, making them magnificent examples of scientific inquiry.
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