Amari

Amari, Michele, an Italian author and revolutionary politician, born at Palermo, 1807. His father narrowly escaped death as a penalty for taking part in Carbonari movements, but the son adhered to progressive principles. In 1842 he produced a history of the war of the Sicilian Vespers, which gave such offence to the Government that he was compelled to seek refuge in France, where he became an Oriental scholar. At the outbreak of revolution in 1848 he returned and held office for a year, but on the breakdown of the constitution he again escaped to Paris and wrote a history of the Mussulmans in Sicily. In 1860 the expulsion of the Bourbons restored him once more to his native country, where he became Minister of Education and for a time of Foreign Affairs under Garibaldi. Many other distinctions were showered upon him, and in 1878 he presided over the Congress of Orientalists at Florence. He died in 1889.