Gaspare Gorresio

Gaspare Gorresio (Bagnasco, 18 July 1808 – Turin, 20 May 1891) was an Italian Orientalist and Indologist, best known for his translation of the Valmiki Ramayana, the great Hindu epic.

A Genoese nobleman and scholar Marquis Antonio Brignole-Sale sponsored his subsequent education at Vienna in classical philology.

[1] The introduction to the first volume of Gorresio's series accurately set out the contradictions and interpolations that accrued over the ages in the Ramayana text.

The precision of his critical commentary and the insight of his aesthetic valuation, the charm of expression and the diligence of the translation earned him many accolades, among them appointment to the Accademia della Crusca in 1867.

Many honours were showered upon him, including a fellowship of the Royal Asiatic Society of London, the Société académique indo-chinoise in Paris, and the Accademia dei Lincei in Rome.