Fig. 1: Uniform and coat of arms of the Collegio Poeti.
(Credit: History Archives, Bologna University)

The Collegio Poeti, founded by Captain Teodoro Poeti (1519-1551) to provide accomodation for Bolognese citizens who wanted to attend public school, was housing no more than 4 or 5 scholars per year when Menghini was accepted. He must have been an exceptional student, as his father Domenico had predicted, and in fact he went on to prove it. He graduated in Philosophy and Medicine in 1726. Ten years later he became Reader of Logic and from 1737-38 he was Reader firstly in Theory of Medicine and then Practical Medicine, until 1758-59.

In Menghini’s day, chemistry was only taught in the Faculty of Medicine. At Bologna University, the Chair of Chemistry was held by Jacopo Bartolomeo Beccari (another graduate in Philosophy and Medicine), famous for his research on phosphorescent materials and glutens. The Chair of Chemistry in Bologna (the first in Italy to be supplemented by experimental lessons) had been created at the insistence of Marsili, with the idea of reforming medicine and increasing its social usefulness. Some people say that Menghini also gave chemistry lectures for a year, perhaps in 1758, after Jacopo Bartolomeo Beccari stopped teaching in 1757.

Menghini published his research through the Science Academy of the Institute of Bologna, the prestigious body which welcomed him and elevated him to the rank of "pensionario" when Pope Benedict XIV issued a brief of 22 June 1745, conferring on 24 academics the title of Benedictines, together with an annual allowance. He was Vice President of the Academy in 1747 and President in 1748.

Fig. 3: Prospero Lambertini (Bologna 1675 - Roma 1758), elected Pope in 1740 with the name Benedict XIV. (Credit: Wikipedia.org)