Their calculations contributed to the popular Ephemerides of Celestial Motion by their brother Eustachio Manfredi, and their translations of poetry and fairy-tales, in collaboration with Teresa and Angiola Zanotti, were significant in establishing conventions for the recording of the Bolognese dialect.
[1] Eustachio credited his sisters with helping with the ephemeris since 1712, and particularly Maddalena with calculating the table of latitudes and longitudes included in the publication.
'[3] The learning of the Manfredi sisters was acknowledged by Pope Benedict XIV and his friend Giovan Nicolò Bandiera,[4] who praised their skill in 'suppositions of analysis, the meridian line, and ephemerides.
In 1740–1, the Manfredi and Zanotti sisters published a three-volume translation of the poem Bertoldo con Bertoldino e Cacasenno from Italian to the Bolognese dialect.
[6] In 1742, they translated part of the Pentamerone by Giambattista Basile, publishing it anonymously as La chiaqlira dla banzola (The Gossip on the Bench), which had gone through six editions by 1883.