BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY, OF 3000 COTEMPORARY PUBLIC CHARACTERS, BRITISH AND FOREIGN, 1 OF ALL RANKS AND PROFESSIONS. SECOND EDITION. VOL. II. PART I. LONDON: PRINTED FOR GEO. B. WHITTAKER, AVE-MARIA LANE. PUBLIC MEN OF ALL COUNTRIES. COUNT FORTIA D'URBAN. THIS nobleman is of a family originally from Catalonia, but was born at Avignon, in 1756. He was educated at the college of La Flèche and the military school of Paris; and entered as second lieutenant into the king's regiment of infantry. Some years after this he went to Rome, and the Pope appointed him colonel of the infantry militia of the Comtat Venaissin. In 1811 he was made a knight of the legion of honour. M. Fortia d'Urban is a member of ten literary academies, and has written five-and-twenty works, which are said to be full of erudition; but, occasionally, paradoxical. The latter will be easily believed, when it is related that one of them is intended to prove the authenticity of Berosus and the veracity of Annius of Viterbo. Among his principal productions, are an excellent "Treatise on Arithmetic""Principles and Questions of Natural Mora. ;""A Life of Xenophon;""An Introduction to the Study of Ancient History," in 10 volumes; "Plan of a Portable Historical Atlas," 6 vols. ; "Historical and Geographical Picture of the World, from its Creation till the Age of Alexander," 4 vols.; "A Life of Petrarch;"" Principles of the Mathematical Sciences;" Project of a New Roman History," which was read by the author to a society at Rome, and obtained the gold medal; " A Discourse on the Saturnean or Cyclo lity;" * |