Samuel Romanelli

Samuel Romanelli (born at Mantua Sept. 19, 1757; died at Casale Monferrato Oct. 17, 1814) was an Italian-born Jewish maskil and Hebrew poet.[1] A man of great gifts but unsteady in his habits, Romanelli began to travel early in life. He went first to Morocco, where he spent four years. He has described his experiences there in a work which has become very popular (see below). Returning to Europe, he lived successively in Berlin (1791), Vienna (1793), London (1799), and Lille (France), going back to his native country about 1800. The last years of his life were spent in Casale, where he died suddenly of apoplexy.

Romanelli supported himself by teaching and by writing Hebrew and Italian poems for weddings, patriotic feasts, and similar occasions; but, being erratic and a scoffer of religion, he made very many enemies, and always lived in great poverty. Besides his Hebrew poems, he wrote translations, especially of the prayer-book, from Hebrew into Italian and from Italian into Hebrew. Notable among his translations from Italian are those of Metastasio's melodrama "Themistocles" and Maffei's tragedy "Merope"; the latter has been edited by Weikert, a Benedictine monk (Rome, 1903, 2d ed. 1904), while the former is still in manuscript. For the names in the original Romanelli gives Hebrew substitutes, as Merab for Merope, Palti for Polifonte, etc. The Hebrew version, while not literally following the original, is not only poetical, but also a faithful rendering.