[History of psychiatry: Cesare Lombroso and the born criminal]

In the first part of this paper there is a short abstract of the biography of the famous professor of psychiatry from Torino. The second part consists of a summary of the most fundamental ideas and the most important results of his extensive research, setting the base of his widest-known work, 'l'uomo delinquente'. At last, a number of contemporary and recent comments concerning his theories are quoted, and some criminologically relevant findings of modern genetics are mentioned.