Federico Luigi Menabrea

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Federico Menabrea
Federico Luigi Conte di Menabrea

Federico Luigi Conte di Menabrea ( Federico Luigi Count of Menabrea ; born September 4, 1809 in Chambéry , † May 24, 1896 in Saint-Cassin ) was an Italian scientist, general and politician. He was several times minister in various departments and from 1867 to 1869 President of the Council of Ministers (Prime Minister) of Italy and at the same time Foreign Minister.

Life, military and scientific careers

Menabrea was born in Haute-Savoie , the son of a lawyer . After attending a Jesuit school , he studied in 1828 Turin and engineering science and mathematics. a. with Professors Giovanni Plana and Bidone. In June 1832 he completed his studies as a hydraulic engineer , in January 1833 he obtained a second degree as an architect ; then he was hired as a lieutenant in the staff of genius in the Sardinian-Piedmontese army . In December 1835 he moved to the military academy, where he taught applied mechanics , ballistics , engineering, geometry and geodesy , where he was promoted to captain in 1839 and knighted in 1843 (together with his brother Leone, a lawyer and historian) . From 1846 to 1860 he was professor of civil engineering at the University of Turin . Since he was only on leave from the army, he could also be promoted during this period: in August 1848 to major, in August 1849 to colonel, in April 1859 to major general and in September 1860 to lieutenant general. As the commander of the engineering troops , he took part in the Sardinian war , after the war he became inspector general of this type of service. In 1861 he became adjutant general of King Victor Emmanuel II and a short time later he was made count .

In 1846 he married Carlotta Richetta, from the family of the Counts of Valgoria. The only son from this marriage mentioned in the literature died in the spring of 1867.

He was a member of the Accademia delle Scienze di Torino and the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei and was an honorary doctor of civil law from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge . From 1887 he was a corresponding member of the Académie des Sciences in Paris.

Scientific importance

In 1840 the second congress of Italian scientists took place in Turin at the Academy of Sciences, at which the invited Charles Babbage presented his design of a calculating machine and discussed it with the audience. The concatenation of arithmetic operations required in calculating machines represents a preliminary stage of programming and so the description of the Babbage machine published by Menabrea in 1842 can be considered the first scientific work in computer science, even if this text was written a few months later by Ada Lovelace , a colleague of Babbag has been reissued significantly expanded.

Mainly, however, Menabrea dealt with problems of applied mechanics. In this area he set up Menabrea's Theorem in 1858 , which deals with deformation energies in building materials (e.g. bending a beam) and is now considered a special case of Castigliano's theorem, which was drawn up around 20 years later .

Political career

From 1848 to 1850 and again from 1850 to 1864 Menabrea was councilor of his place of residence, Turin. From 1848 to 1859 (when he automatically resigned because of his appointment as general) he was also a member of the Sardinian-Piedmontese Chamber of Deputies for a constituency in the Aosta Valley . As a member of parliament he adhered to the highly conservative , so in 1852 he voted against the introduction of civil marriage and against the abolition of certain Catholic religious orders . From around 1857 he was considered the head of this parliamentary group. As a parliamentarian, he was a member of the Italian commission for the Alpine tunnel projects, he was also involved in the reorganization of an all-Italian cadastre and represented his country in the European Danube Commission from May 1858 .

In February 1860 the king appointed him senator for life. As early as 1848/49 and again in 1859/60 he was given numerous short-term political and diplomatic tasks as part of the Italian unification, e. As a diplomatic representative of Sardinia in the provisional governments of the duchies of Parma and Piacenza or royal Sardinian Commissioner with the troops of the Papal States .

From June 1861 to March 1862 he was Minister of the Navy in the cabinet of Ricasoli (1st) . During this time, the most important Italian naval base, La Spezia, was founded, but the expansion of other naval bases was one of Menabrea's tasks. After nine months without a ministerial office, he became Minister for Public Works in the Farini cabinet in December 1862 and remained so in the Minghetti cabinet (1st) until his fall in 1864. Despite the disastrous state of public finances, he was able to change the railway network during his tenure extend about 2000 km. The first Italian postage stamps were also issued under his ministerial responsibility.

From October 27, 1867 to May 13, 1869, Menabrea served as Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of the Kingdom of Italy . Since he reshuffled his government twice in these one and a half years, one speaks of three consecutive Menabrea cabinets. His first government consisted exclusively of senators and high officials of an extremely conservative character, which was understood by the liberal majority as a declaration of war and answered with a vote of no confidence in December 1867. His second government was a bit more central in party politics, but consisted almost exclusively of northern Italians, which the representatives of the south - regardless of whether they were conservative landowners or radical liberals - unanimously criticized. The government announced administrative reform and the reorganization of the state budget as its goals. For the latter purpose it introduced a flour tax and a tobacco monopoly , which greatly contributed to its unpopularity. Law and reality drifted further and further apart, unrest had to be brutally suppressed, which led to renewed government reshuffle, the dissolution of the Chamber and new elections. These new elections turned out to be devastating for the government, and since the most important foreign policy project - the acquisition of Rome in return for Italy's participation in a Franco - Austrian alliance directed against the North German Confederation - in the refusal of Napoleon III based on French domestic policy . Failed to pay that price, the third Menabrea government resigned in May 1869.

In the 1870s and 1880s Menabrea held numerous honorary posts - from the deputy of the king at the coronation of Oskar II in 1873 to the presidency of the board of directors of the Order of Annunciations to the chairmanship of the Heraldic Advisory Board from 1875. From 1874 to 1882 he represented his country as ambassador in London , then until 1892 in Paris .

Publications

  • Notions sur la machine analytique de Charles Babbage (French, Geneva 1842)
  • Nouveau principe sur la distribution des tensions dans les systèmes élastiques (French, Paris 1858)
  • Memorie (autobiography, last Florence 1971)

literature

Web links

Commons : Luigi Federico Menabrea  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l Menabrea, Luigi Federico. In: Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani . Volume 73, 2009.
  2. ↑ a b c Menabrea, Luigi Federico. In: C. Donzelli (Ed.): L'Unificazione italiana. Treccani, Milan 2011.
  3. ^ List of members since 1666: Letter M. Académie des sciences, accessed on January 22, 2020 (French).
personal data
SURNAME Menabrea, Federico Luigi
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Menabrea, Federico Luigi Count of; Menabrea, Federico Luigi Conte di
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian scientist, general and politician
DATE OF BIRTH September 4, 1809
PLACE OF BIRTH Chambery
DATE OF DEATH May 24, 1896
Place of death Saint-Cassin