Minerva with lamp and shield facing female figure with open book and laurel wreath; between them an owl on a globe. Around, *SOLI CUI FAS VIDISSE MINERVAM*; on listel, - ANT - LAZARI - FEC - .
Object Description
170 LAURA MARIA CATERINA BASSI, professor of philosophy at the University of Bologna 1732
Obv. Bust to left, laureate. Around, LAVRA MAR . CATH . BASSI BON . PHIL . DOCT . COLLEG . LECT . PVB . | INST . SCIEN . SOC . AN . XX . MDCCXXXII
Rev. Minerva with lamp and shield facing female figure with open book and laurel wreath; between them an owl on a globe. Around, * SOLI CUI FAS VIDISSE MINERVAM * ; on listel, . ANT . LAZARI . FEC .
Gilt bronze, struck, 70 mm. Ring attached at top
Brescia calls the woman on the reverse Laura Bassi; Houston calls her Philosophy. The medal commemorates Bassi's completion of her laureate, appointment to the faculty of the University of Bologna and acceptance into the Society of Science and Letters, all at the age of twenty.
Bibl.: Houston, no. 306; Forrer 3, p. 350; Brescia i, p. 165, no. 1103; MM. 2, p. 413, pl. 202, 2; Michelangelo Gualandi, "Medaglia e ricordi dell' antico reggimento in Lode di Laura Bassi," Almanacco Bolognese, num. 13 (1842); C. Johnson, "Tre medaglie e tre donne 'colte' nell'Italia settecentesca," in Medaglia, anno. 3, no. 6 (1973), pp. 29-39 (at pp. 29-34), fig. 19.
