From Naples to Philadelphia: Cirillo, Filangieri, and the Transatlantic Enlightenment

The lecture examined the intellectual exchanges between Naples and Philadelphia in the late eighteenth century, focusing on Domenico Cirillo and Gaetano Filangieri. It reconstructed Cirillo’s scientific ties with the American Philosophical Society and the Philadelphia medical community, before turning to Filangieri’s correspondence with Benjamin Franklin and to the circulation of ideas on legislative reform, public happiness, and constitutional improvement across the Atlantic.