When
Luigi Pio Tessitori died in Bikaner on 22 November 1919, his bangla was
immediately locked up. Mr. G.D. Rudkin, revenue member of the State Council
in Bikaner, and Mr. H.G. Rawlins, a friend of his, sorted out all Tessitori’s
property. Those things that were considered to be of value were sent to his
father and the rest was sold at auction for about 2,000 rupees. On 27 May 1920,
Lloyd Triestino advised the magistrate in Udine that six cases with the deceased
Dr. Tessitori’s effects had arrived in Trieste from Bombay. At Udine, while
customs formalities were being completed, it was noted that the seals of the
Consulate in Bombay had been broken. The cases containing books and documents
were full whereas those that had held clothes and personal effects were nearly
empty. After their release by customs, the cases were taken to the family residence,
at Via Cussignacco 3. When Tessitori’s father died on 16 June 1921, the cases
were handed over to Luigi Pio’s sisters Elena and Antonietta. The manuscripts
and remaining books were donated to the "Vincenzo Joppi" Civic Library
in Udine, and the other documents remained in the family home until the deaths
of the sisters. Today all the unpublished documents are kept at Reana del Rojale,
a small village near Udine, in the residence of the Tessitori’s nephew, Dr.
Guido Peano. Over the past two years, the collection, known as the "Archivio
Peano", has been sorted and arranged into seven sections, each organized
in chronological order:
Section I: Florentine period; Section II: Drafts of published works; Section
III: Documents from the Bardic and Historical Survey of Rajputana;
Section IV: Diary; Section
V: Correspondence; Section VI: Photographic plates; Section VII: Unpublished
works.
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