The Popularization of Economics through the Biblioteca dell’Economista: analysing Amari’s translation of the High Prise of Bullion (1810) by D. Ricardo

Abstract

Between 1850 and 1868, the Sicilian economist Francesco Ferrara edited the first two series of the Biblioteca dell’Economista (BE). This is a collection of economic treatises that were translated from English, French and German into Italian by Ferrara and his assistants (among whom was the scholar Emerico Amari) to popularize the international economic science in the Italian peninsula. The paper deals with Amari’s translation of the High Price of Bullion (David Ricardo 1810) entitled Dell’alto prezzo dei metalli preziosi and published in BE II vol. VI (1857). An analysis of the lexical and stylistic differences between source and target text (Malmkjaer 2004) points out the translation strategies used by Amari to introduce Ricardo’s theories among non-specialist Italian readers.