Maria Gaetana Agnesi

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Maria Gaetana Agnesi

Maria Gaetana Agnesi (born May 16, 1718 in Milan ; † January 9, 1799 ibid) was an Italian mathematician and philanthropist in the Age of Enlightenment . She examined and published, among other things, the Versiera der Agnesi .

Life

Maria Gaetana Agnesi was born into a wealthy family of intellectuals and merchants. Her father Pietro Agnesi was a mathematics professor, her mother the Italian noblewoman Anna Fortunata Brivio from the Brivius de Brokles family. Newer sources state that it is unclear or inaccurate that her father was a professor; but all sources agree that he was (also) a textile merchant.

Frontispiece from Instituzioni analitiche (1748)

Maria Gaetana Agnesi was the oldest of a total of 21 children. Her father in particular encouraged her mathematical talent and helped her get a good education. Maria was considered a child prodigy. At the age of nine, she gave a free hour-long Latin speech in which she discussed women's right to education, which was controversial at the time. At the age of only eleven, she could speak seven languages. At the age of about 20, contemporaries describe her as a young girl of "simple and gentle disposition", who, however, was able to discuss any subject in philosophy or mathematics in Latin. From her youth Agnesi to at Samnambulismus , neurasthenia and chorea have been ill. When she was 21 years old, she wanted to go to the monastery. Her father objected, however, and Maria Gaetana Agnesi respected this wish. For a decade she devoted herself to mathematics and the sciences. In 1748 her work Instituzioni analitiche ( Foundations of Analysis ) was published.

Agnesi dedicated her book to the Austrian ruler Maria Theresa . In 1748 she was appointed professor at the University of Bologna by Pope Benedict XIV . However, she never taught there, although her well-known contemporary, the physicist Laura Bassi , asked her to do so several times.

When Maria Agnesi was 34 years old, her father died. From then on she gave up science in favor of her faith and charitable activity. She studied Catholic theology and cared for the poor and the sick. At first she lived in her parents' house, later she rented a house in which she provided shelter for the homeless. In 1771 she took over the management of a retirement home for women. For 28 years she devoted herself to this facility, which in the year of her death housed 450 residents.

Memorial plaque in Varedo

Her sister Maria Teresa Agnesi Pinottini was a well-known and successful composer and musician (vocals and harpsichord) in her time. In contrast to the secluded, church-oriented Sister Maria Gaetana, she is described as gallant and sophisticated.

On a memorial plaque in Varedo it says (loosely translated):

In this father's house the gifted mathematician Maria Gaetana Agnesi taught, helped the poor, and found peace for her studies. At her suggestion, her sister Paolina donated her house and the land to chronic patients in Milan. Together, the two names shine in a fame that surpasses everything else.
1718-1799 1731-1825
The Council of the Hospital Institute 1889

Quotes

“The goal of the Christian is the glory of God. I hope that my studies have increased the glory of God by being useful to others and being guided by obedience, for that was my Father's will. Now I've found better ways to serve God and be useful to others. "

- Maria Gaetana Agnesi : on why she gave up her mathematical studies to devote herself to charity.
Curve construction

Fonts

Honors

literature

  • Massimo Mazzotti: The World of Maria Gaetana Agnesi, Mathematician of God . Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, MD 2007, ISBN 978-0-8018-8709-3 .
  • Antonio Francesco Frisi Elogio storico di Donna Maria Gaetana Agnesi , reprint of the Milan 1799 edition, edited and annotated by Arnado and Giuseppina Masotti, Milan 1965.
  • Luisa Anzoletti Maria Gaetana Agnesi , Milan 1900 (uses Agnesi's estate in the Ambrosiana Library).
  • Ulrike Klens: Mathematicians in the 18th Century: Maria Gaetana Agnesi, Gabrielle-Emilie du Châtelet, Sophie Germain: Case studies on the interaction between science and philosophy in the Age of Enlightenment. Centaurus, Pfaffenweiler 1998, ISBN 3-89085-826-0 (also dissertation at the University of Augsburg 1992).
  • Luise F. Pusch , Susanne Gretter (Ed.): Famous women . Insel, Frankfurt am Main / Leipzig 1999, ISBN 3-458-16949-0 , p. 16 .
  • Constantin von Wurzbach : Agnesi, Maria Cajetana . In: Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich . 1st part. University printing house L. C. Zamarski (formerly JP Sollinger), Vienna 1856, p. 6 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Clifford Truesdell Maria Gaetana Agnesi. In: Archive for History of Exact Science. Volume 40, 1989, pp. 113-142. Corrections and additions to this, Volume 43, 1992, pp. 385/386
  • Marilyn Bailey Ogilvie : Women in science: antiquity through the nineteenth century: a biographical dictionary with annotated bibliography . 3. Edition. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1991, ISBN 0-262-65038-X , pp. 28-31
  • Della Dumbaugh: Maria Gaetana Agnesi, Notices AMS, March 2019, pp. 414-415

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ogilvie, Marilyn Bailey (1986). Women in science: antiquity through the nineteenth century: a biographical dictionary with annotated bibliography (3rd edition). Cambridge, Mass .: MIT Press
  2. ↑ U. Klens: Lecture "Maria Gaetana Agnesi and the Witch", Mainz, 2004
  3. ^ A. Kleinert: Maria Gaetana Agnesi and Laura Bassi - two Italian scholarly women in the 18th century , University of Halle, 2004.
  4. ↑ Jean-Pierre Jenny: Of women and frogs. Forays through the natural sciences of the 18th century in Northern Italy , LIT-Verlag Münster. ISBN 3-643-80204-8 ISBN 978-3-643-80204-0
  5. ↑ NZZ, Jean-Pierre Jenny Female Science in the Century of Reason: When the Pope made publicity with clever women
  6. ↑ Lynn M. Osen, "Women in Mathematics," MIT Press, Cambridge, 1975
  7. ↑ Marilyn Bailey Ogilvie: Women in science: antiquity through the nineteenth century: a biographical dictionary with annotated bibliography , 3rd edition. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA 1990, ISBN 0-262-65038-X .
  8. ↑ Andreas Kleinert : Maria Gaetana Agnesi and Laura Bassi: Two Italian learned women in the 18th century. In: Women in the exact natural sciences , edited by Willi Schmidt and Christoph J. Sciba. Steiner, Stuttgart, 1990, pp. 71–85, ISBN 3-515-05793-5 (= contributions to the history of science and technology , volume 21).
  9. ^ Wilhelm Lange-Eichbaum, Wolfram Kurth: Genius, madness and fame . 2nd Edition. Ernst Reinhardt Verlag, Munich / Basel 1979, p. 321 .
  10. ^ Massimo Mazzotti: Maria Gaetana Agnesi. Mathematics and the Making of the Catholic Enlightenment . In: Isis . Issue 92, No. 4 , 2001, p. 682 .
  11. ↑ Venus crater Agnesi in the Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature of the IAU (WGPSN) / USGS (English)
  12. ↑ (16765) Agnesi in the Small-Body Database of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (English).Template: JPL Small-Body Database Browser / Maintenance / Alt
  13. ↑ Google-Doodle for the 296th birthday of Maria Gaetana Agnesi , accessed on June 26, 2016.
  14. ↑ Postage stamp of the Italian Post , 2018, accessed on March 25, 2019
  15. ^ Postage stamp of the Vatican Post , 2018, accessed March 25, 2019

Web links

Commons : Maria Gaetana Agnesi  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Agnesi, Maria Gaetana
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian mathematician and philanthropist
DATE OF BIRTH May 16, 1718
PLACE OF BIRTH Milan
DATE OF DEATH January 9, 1799
Place of death Milan