Italiano 
English A "scandalous" woman, Clelia, as the writings of the time report. In reality, a scholar of experimental sciences and liberal arts (mathematics, physics, astronomy, medicine, anatomy, etc.) who would play a fundamental role in the spread of Newtonian theories in Italy.
Clelia was born in Genoa in 1684 to Marcantonio, Duke of Mondragone, and Maria Antonia Imperiali. Her marriage to Count Borromeo, by whom she will have eight children, is long opposed by his father because of the marked autonomy of thought and eccentricity that characterizes all the Grillo sisters and is frowned upon by the Borromeo family.
When Clelia arrived in Milan as a newlywed, she spoke at least eight languages and dabbled in geometry, an unusual knowledge even for a noblewoman of her time. Her interest led her to host in her home not nobles, but intellectuals, naturalists, and scientists from Italy and abroad. Clelia's salon also discussed a topic at the time, unseemly and scandalous: "generation", or the conception and development of the fetus.
The weight of family disagreements and bereavements and poor health would force her to lead a much more reserved life. Death will come in 1777. She will be buried in the chapel of the collegiate church of Santa Maria Podone. It would not be until 1920 that a distant descendant, Prince Giberto Borromeo Arese, would have a plaque affixed there commemorating her: "the agitations and anxieties of politics she knew and proudly suffered".
