Carlo Cattaneo was born in Milan on 15 June 1801, son of Melchiorre, owner of a small goldsmith shop, and of Maria Antonia San Giorgio.

Second of six siblings, he is forced by the limited financial possibilities of the family to attend the seminars of Arlenico, Monza and Milan - where he follows the courses of fine letters, logic and metaphysics - before leaving the cassock and enrolling in the Milan high school of S . Alexander.

Here, between 1818 and 1819, he took the exams of religious instruction, universal history, mathematics, experimental mathematical physics and theoretical and practical philosophy.