If the chevalier Gioeni had read Linneus and Dezallier d’Argenville
The scientific hoax of Giuseppe Gioeni and the new species of Sicilian shells
Abstract
It has recently accumulated a number of informative papers and quotations from scientific literature referring to the judgement of the mathematician Charles Babbage on the scientific fraud committed by Giuseppe Gioeni in 1783. A recent blog post (July 2021) and a short extract from a celebratory biography of that person appeared in 1842 are trying to restore the reputation of a naturalist supposed fraudulent about the discovery of a new species of mollusk found on the shore line near Catania, already known as Scaphander lignarus o Bulla lignaria Linnei. An overview of informed comments on the subject is presented. On the cultural ups and downs and on the struggle for Gioeni’s private and public life we can find the origin of a scientific mistake never recognized by the Author, as it appears on the documents in the historical archives known today. Furthermore, another not recognized malacological mistake charged to the chemist Carmelo Maravigna and some approvals of Sicilian mollusk taxonomy adopted in the 19th century by the zoologist Andrea Aradas are reported.
