(J. F.-K.)
CAMPOBASSO, a city of Molise, Italy, the capital of the province of Campobasso, 172 m. E.S.E. of Rome by rail, situated 2132 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1901) town 11,273; commune 14,491. The town itself contains no buildings of antiquarian interest, but it has some fine modern edifices. Its chief industry is the manufacture of arms and cutlery. Above the town are the picturesque ruins of a castle of the 15th century. The date of the foundation of Campobasso is unknown. The town, with the territory surrounding it, was under the feudal rule of counts until 1739, when it passed to the Neapolitan crown, in consideration of a payment of 108,000 ducats.
CAMPODEA, a small whitish wingless insect with long flexible antennae and a pair of elongated caudal appendages. The best-known species (Campodea staphylinus) has a wide distribution and is equally at home in the warm valleys of south Europe, in the subarctic conditions of mountain tops, in caves and in woods and gardens in England. It lives in damp places under stones, fallen trees or in rotten wood and leaves. Although blind, it immediately crawls away on exposure to the light into the nearest crevice or other sheltered spot, feeling the way with its antennae. Its action is characteristically serpentine, recalling that of a centipede. Campodea is one of the bristle-tailed or thysanurous insects of the order Aptera (q.v.).
CAMPOMANES, PEDRO RODRIGUEZ, Conde de (1723-1802), Spanish statesman and writer, was born at Santa Eulalia de Sorribia, in Asturias, on the 1st of July 1723. From 1788 to 1793 he was president of the council of Castile; but on the accession of Charles IV. he was removed from his office, and retired from public life, regretted by the true friends of his country. His first literary work was Antiquidad maritima de la republica de Cartago, with an appendix containing a translation of the Voyage of Hanno the Carthaginian, with curious notes. This appeared in a quarto volume in 1756. His principal works are two admirable essays, Discurso sobre el fomento de la industria popular, 1774, and Discurso sobre la educacion popular de los artesanos y su fomento, 1775. As a supplement to the last, he published four appendices, each considerably larger than the original essay. The first contains reflections on the origin of the decay of arts and manufactures in Spain during the last century. The second points out the steps necessary for improving or re-establishing the old manufactures, and contains a curious collection of royal ordinances and rescripts regarding the encouragement of arts and manufactures, and the introduction of foreign raw materials. The third treats of the gild laws of artisans, contrasted with the results of Spanish legislation and the municipal ordinances of towns. The fourth contains eight essays of Francisco Martinez de Mata on national commerce, with some observations adapted to present circumstances. These were all printed at Madrid in 1774 and 1777, in five volumes. Count Campomanes died on the 3rd of February 1802.
Don A. Rodriguez Villa has placed a biographical notice of Campomanes as an introduction to the first edition of his Cartas politico-economicas, published in 1878.