Marin Getaldić

Getaldić Marin (Latin Marinus GHETALDUS, Italian Marino Ghetaldi; * October 2, 1568 in Dubrovnik, Republic of Ragusa; † 8 or April 11, 1626 same place ) was a mathematician and physicist. He studied in Rome and lions. He worked mainly in the fields of optics and mathematics.

Life

His family originally came Taranto in Italy and belonged to the wealthy patricians in Dubrovnik. He went to the Franciscan school of his native city, where he also received instruction in mathematics along with a good humanistic education. After he left school to 1588 he dealt in a scientifically interested Friends continue with mathematics and astronomy. From 1590, he held various management positions in the Office of armor and salt trade (salt was one of the main sources of income of Dubrovnik). In 1595 he went traveling around Europe with his friend Marin Gucetic ( constantly accompanied him until his return ), visiting Rome the lectures of Christopher Clavius ​​on the parabola, attended by 1597 two years England was in 1599 in Antwerp by Michel Coignet and 1600 Paris, where he came under the influence of François Viète who encouraged him to own mathematical work. Then he was back in Italy, where he attended lectures by Galileo Galilei in 1600 in Padua, who also explained to him his proportional compass. In 1601 he left Padua and was in 1602 in Rome. 1603 he left Rome and returned back via Venice to Dubrovnik. The exact reason is not known, but he probably feared persecution. In his many years of travel, he visited Europe, in the words of his friend Gucetic also north and south, almost the entire France and Italy. Becoming a professor at Louvain offer he turned down. It is not known exactly how it was financed on these trips, but he was wealthy by default. In Dubrovnik, he became a judge at the Court of Appeal and then inspected the fortifications of the Republic in particular in Ston. He corresponded further with scientists such as Clavius ​​, Galileo, Christoph Grienberger and Guldin, but complained about his scientific isolation. In 1606 he was sent by the Republic of Dubrovnik, on a mission to Istanbul. After his return, he held various management positions again and again was the Court of Appeal. In 1620 he was again in Rome and was elected in 1621 to the Accademia dei Lincei, but left before Rome towards Dubrovnik.

Ghetaldi was married and had three daughters.

Work

Of significance, is his book on hydrostatics Archimedes from 1603 ( Promotus ArchiMedis ) in which experimental data of specific weights of various solids and liquids are listed. In the same year he also published a work on the parabolic and conic sections. He also continued a project of Viète, the reconstruction of lost books of Apollonius, which he published in 1607 and 1613 books. He even looked in vain in Istanbul to an Arabic edition of Apollonius. In 1607 he published a collection of mathematical problems, including with early applications of algebra in geometry. It is thus a precursor of René Descartes, the founder of analytical geometry, which knew his posthumously published book 1630 De resolutione et de compositione mathematica. But he did not took the step of Descartes geometric objects to represent all through algebraic equations.

He builds by some of the instruments of Galileo, including the telescope. Its optical experiments with mirrors, he led in the grotto " Betina Špilja " near Dubrovnik, in which ( it is named after him, his nickname was praying ). Among other things, he melted with parabolic mirrors burning metals.

Most recently, he was concerned with triangulation and wanted to determine the diameter of the Earth, for which he designed in 1626 experiments with two Jesuits. But he died before.

Writings

• Marini Ghetaldi: Patricii Ragvsini promotvs ArchiMedis sev de varijs corporum generibus grauitate et magnitudine comparatis. Rome 1603.
• Marini Ghetaldi: Nonnvlla Propositions De Parabola. Rome 1603.
• Marini Ghetaldi: Variorum problematum Collectio. Venice 1607.
• Marini Ghetaldi: Apollonius redivivus. Seu Restituta Apollonii Pergaei Inclinationum geometria. Venice 1607.
• Marini Ghetaldi: Apollonius redivivus. Seu Restituta Apollonii Pergaei De inclinationibus geometriae liber secundus. Venice 1613
• Marini Ghetaldi: De Resolutione et Compositione Mathematica. Opus posthumum. Rome 1630th
• Zarko Dadić (ed.): Marin Getaldić: Sabrana Djela. ( Opera omnia ). Zagreb 1968 ( Modern works edition ).