Aldo Mieli
(December 4, 1879 - February 16, 1950) Italy
Science historian
Aldo Mieli was born in Livorno, Italy, and died in the town of Florida, near Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was born in a wealthy Jewish family, and graduated in chemistry at Pisa University. He then lived for a while in Liepsig, Germany. Back to Italy he started his collaboration with scientific publications and in 19O8 became university professor in Rome.
A socialist an pacifist, in 1916 he decided to devote himself also to the theme of love, and started to write a never published work, Il libro dell'amore (The Love Book).
 From 1921 on, he founded and directed the magazine "Rassegna di studi sessuali" and the "Italian Society for Sexual Questions' Study". In 1928 he suddenly emigrated to France to escape Fascist oppression, as he was a Jew, a socialist and a gay man, together with his lover, Angelo Pisani, 20 years his youngher. He took with him his library that he gave to the Paris "Centre de Synthèse", becoming their collaborator.
In 1939, fearing German invasion, he left France and emigrated in Argentina, with his "petit ami" (young lover). Amongst his secretary-lovers ther is one Gino Chiappini .
Although he admired Hirschfeld, Mieli didn't share his idea of gay men as a "third sex". He thought that rather it was an inborn quality depending by an "hormonal" balance.
Source: an article by Giovanni Dall'Orto, in "Babilonia" n. 57, June 1988, pp. 52-54.
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