20 February: 70th anniversary of Francesco Saverio Nitti's death

Francesco Saverio Nitti (Melfi 1868-Roma 1953), whose archive (11,000 documents) and library (7,500 monographs) are held by the Einaudi Foundation, was a liberal politician, economist and journalist.

Nitti started out as a publicist, collaborating among others with the 'Corriere di Napoli', the 'Pungolo' and the 'Mattino'. Professor of Political Economy at the University of Naples from 1892, he founded 'La Riforma Sociale' in 1894 together with Luigi Roux. In 1904 he was elected as an MP and in 1906 was a member of the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the conditions of peasants in the southern provinces. From 1911 to 1914 he was Minister of Agriculture and from 1917 to 1919 Minister of the Treasury; finally, from June 1919 to June 1920, he served as Prime Minister. Following the Matteotti murder he left Italy and took refuge in Zurich until the end of 1925, then moved to Paris with his family until 1943. Imprisoned by the Germans in Tyrol from September 1943, he returned to Italy in July 1945 and was a member of the Constituent Assembly.

In 1971, the Nitti family donated Francesco Saverio Nitti's entire scientific library to the Foundation, and with it that part of Giampaolo Nitti's library which is most closely related to his grandfather's collection, totalling about 7,500 volumes and pamphlets. Since 1972, the Einaudi Foundation has also held Francesco Saverio Nitti's archive, which includes about 11,000 letters and documents, equal to 66 dossiers and 13 albums of photographs (totally about 10 linear metres).