Napoleone Pini was born into an aristocratic family.
He was also a member of the Società Malacologica Italiana (1875-1895).
He wrote 17 works of malacology, in addition to a report on the Phylloxera, the description of Cychrus cylindricollis, Acme elegantissima and the collection of specimen for anatomical studies on Limax doriae.
Pini's mollusc collections were destroyed when Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Milano was damaged in 1943 by Allied bombings.
His Coleoptera collections are held by Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Genova, while a collection of 100 series of molluscs from southern Italy is held by Natural History Museum of Bern.