Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Don José Nicholas d'Azara

AZARA, DON JOSE NICHOLAS D , the elder brother of the naturalist, born in 1731, was appointed in 1765 Spanish agent and procurator-general, and in 1785, ambassador at Rome. During his long residence there he distinguished himself as a collector of Italian antiquities and as a patron of art. He was also an able and active diplomatist, took a leading share in the difficult and hazardous task of the expulsion of the Jesuits from Spain, and was instrumental in securing the election of Pius VI. He withdrew to Florence when the French took possession of Rome in 1798. He was afterwards Spanish ambassador at Paris; was three times deprived of, and restored to his office; and was finally preparing to return to his antiquarian studies in Italy when he was seized with a fatal illness, and died at Paris in January 1804.