Fabrizio Mordente

Fabrizio Mordente (* 1532 in Salerno ; † around 1608 ) was an Italian mathematician. He became famous for his invention of an eight-pointed compass, which enabled the smallest graduation.

Life

He traveled to the Mediterranean countries and Central Europe for a long time. In 1567 he had a treatise printed on his invention in Venice, which he dedicated to Daniele Barbaro . Around 1572 he went to the court of Maximilian II and from 1578 he was in the service of Rudolf II in Prague . To this emperor he dedicated another pamphlet on the circle, which was printed in Antwerp around 1584. Here he met Michel Coignet (1549–1623), who later dealt with the invention of Mordente in several writings. Another decisive factor was his encounter with Giordano Bruno , who prompted him to consider the smallest possible measurable unit.

Around 1591, in the service of Alessandro Farnese , he gave the final version of his circle to print. The accuracy of the astronomical measurements has thus been significantly improved and a wide variety of practical mathematical operations made possible.

The "circle of proportions"

Fabrizio Mordente's essential invention is what he called compasso proporzionale a otto punte (proportional circle with eight points). It made it possible to measure the circumference , circular area and angular arc dimensions with previously unattainable accuracy.

The argument with Giordano Bruno

The first two dialogues that Bruno wrote in 1586 - Mordentius and De Mordenti circino - were intended to present the circle of proportions to the scientific public (Mordente himself did not speak Latin). He referred to Mordente's own publication, a sheet printed in Paris - it explained the functions of the circle - and Mordente's first work himself, published in Antwerp in 1584 under the care of his brother Gaspare.

Insomnium of Giordano Bruno snubbed the inventor Fabrizio mordents deeply because Giordano Bruno should have abused the possibilities of its proportion circle for "anti-Aristotelian philosophical considerations". Mordente interpreted Bruno's publication as ideological propaganda. From an exchange of letters between the Corbinelli and Gian Vincenzo Pinelli we learn that Fabrizio Mordente bought and destroyed all copies.

Giordano Bruno's reaction was to publish the diatribes Idiota triumphans and De somnii interpretatione in June 1586, before his departure from Paris.

Fonts

• Gasparo Mordente (Ed.): Il compasso del signor Fabritio Mordente. Con altri istromenti mathematici, ritrovati da Gasparo suo fratello . Christophe Plantin, Antwerp 1584, new ed. by Filippo Camerota, Il compasso di Fabrizio Mordente: per la storia del compasso di proporzione , Olschki, Florenz 2000 (= Biblioteca di Nuncius, 37), ISBN 88-222-4853-8
• Il compasso, & figura ... con li quali duoi mezzi si possono fare un gran numero di mirabili effetti, al tutto necessarj all'arte, imitatrice della natura. Jean Le Clerc, Paris, March 20, 1585 [single sheet]
• La quadratura del cerchio, la scienza de 'residui, il compasso et rigo, di Fabritio et di Gasparo Mordente fratelli . Philip Galle, Anvers 1591
• Le propositioni di Fabritio Mordente salernitano mathematico della sacra ces.a m.ta dell'imperatore Rudolfo II Mediante le quali da hora inanzi si può sapere, come da numero, à numero, la proportione, ch'è fra qual si uoglia due date specie di quantità continue. Antonio Giamin, Rome 1598

literature

• Giuseppe Boffito: Il primo compasso proporzionale costruito da Fabrizio Mordente e la Operatio cilindri di Paolo dell 'Abbaco. Libreria internazionale, Florence 1931
• Maria Luisa Righini-Bonelli : Di una bellissima edizione di Fabrizio Mordente salernitano "mathematico della sacra Ces.a M.ta dell'imperatore Rudolfo II" . In: Physis 1,2 (1959), pp. 128-148
• Filippo Camerota: Il compasso di Fabrizio Mordente. Per la storia del compasso di proporzione , Olschki, Florence 2000
• Filippo Camerota: Two new attributions: a refractive dial of Guidobaldo del Monte and the "Roverino compass" of Fabrizio Mordente. In: Nuncius 18.1 (2003), pp. 26–37 ( online version )
• Luciana De Bernart: Numerus quodammodo infinitus: per un approccio storico-teorico al dilemma matematico nella filosofia di Giordano Bruno , Edizioni di storia e letteratura, Rome 2002, ISBN 88-8498-050-X (here especially chap. 4: Compassi e strumenti di misura , chap. 5: La materia delle "invisibili frazioni (i primi dialoghi di Bruno su Mordente) )
• Ad Meskens: Michiel Coignet's contribution to the development of the sector. In: Annals of Science 54.2 (1997), pp. 143-160
• Ad Meskens: Some new biographical data about Michiel Coignet . In: Nuncius 17.2 (2002), pp. 447–454 ( online version )
• Paul L. Rose: The origins of the Proportional Compass from Mordente to Galileo . In: Physis 10 (1968), pp. 53-69
• Michelangiolo Testa: Della vita e delle opere di Fabrizio Mordente . Migliaccio, Salerno 1872
• Frances A. Yates: Giordano Bruno: Some New Documents . In: Revue internationale de philosophie 5,2 (1951), pp. 174-199 (on the letters of Jacopo Corbinelli discovered by Yates), reprinted in Frances A. Yates, Renaissance and Reform: The Italian Contribution , Routledge & Paul, London 1983, pp. 111-129

Web links

• Mordente Compasses , with illustration, in the glossary and multimedia catalog of the Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza , Florence (English, Italian)
• Short article on Fabrizio Mordente and Michel Coignet in the Multimedia Catalog of the Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza, Florence (English, Italian)
• Short article on the dialogues Mordentius - De Mordentii circino and Idiota triumphans - De somnii interpretatione in the portal Giordano Bruno (ital.)
• Positive Atheism Magazine chap. 6, note 5, with partially outdated bibliographical information from: Dorothea Waley Singer : Giordano Bruno: His Life and Thought. With Annotated Translation of His Work - On the Infinite Universe and Worlds. Henry Schuman Publisher, New York 1950, ISBN 1-11731-419-7 .