Giovanni Bernardo De Rossi (1742–1831), Italian Christian Hebraist, was born in Castelnuovo d'Ivrea, Aosta. He became a priest in 1766 and graduated in theology in Turin. He had a profound knowledge of Hebrew language and medieval Jewish literature, and held the chair of oriental languages at Parma University from 1769 to 1821. De' Rossi's library of Jewish literature, one of the most valuable that has ever been brought together, comprised 1,432 manuscripts (some illuminated), and 1,442 printed books including many incunabula, some unique. It was purchased for 100,000 francs in 1816 by Marie Louise, duchess of Parma, who presented it to the Palatine library at Parma, where it still is. De' Rossi compiled a catalogue of his collection, and wrote valuable works on Jewish incunabula and 16th-century typography, as well as on other subjects of Jewish interest, including studies of variant biblical texts and polemical literature.