On the History of Italian-Russian Academic and Intercultural Relations: Giacomo Lignana’s Connections with the Russian Academy of Sciences and Russian Linguists of the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century

Abstract

The historical case study of G. Lignana represents a new direction in the developing historical study of relations and cooperation in the fields of culture and academic research between Italian and Russian scholars in the second half of the nineteenth century. The Italian linguist G. Lignana can be considered the forefather of Slavic studies at a university level in post-unification Italy. This article attempts to examine Lignana’s close relationship with representatives of the Imperial Academy of Science and two of the most important scholars of the nineteenth century: F.I. Buslaev and Ja.K. Grot.