Scipione del Ferro

Scipione del Ferro ( * February 6, 1465 in Bologna, † November 5, 1526 in Bologna ) was an Italian mathematician. Since 1496 he was professor of arithmetic and geometry at the University of Bologna.

Luca Pacioli ( to 1445-1514/17 ), who was at the University of Bologna from 1501 to 1502, represented in his Summa de Arithmetica ( 1494) the view that there is no general solution methods for equations 3 and higher level. This premonition proved for equations of Grade 3 and 4 to be wrong, but was later proved for equations of degree greater than 4 with the set of Abel - Ruffini be correct. Pacioli's view must have aroused the interest of del Ferro. He managed to find a solution for the reduced cubic equation. The knowledge was never published by him; only on his deathbed he gave it to his students Hannibal Nave del ( his son and successor to 1500-1558 ) and Antonio Maria Fior on.

History of the solution

Nicolo Tartaglia, who from 1535 onwards (as Fiore him with the question of the solutions of 30 equations that can be put in the above form, challenged ), the solution of del Ferro used in public competitions to earn money and this solution may independently found, at least as his private secret knowledge considered, this was in a roundabout form of Gerolamo Cardano further, but had to swear to keep the solution in itself. After Cardano learned that del Ferro had found the solution long before Tartaglia's use of the same, he felt no longer bound to the oath and published the general, well above del Ferro and Tartaglia special case beyond solution in his book Ars magna de Regulis Algebraicis of 1545th It also highlights the general solution for equations of degree 4 is included, the Cardano express his pupil Lodovico Ferrari attributed. Tartaglia accused Cardano then intellectual theft, but was convicted by a court in Milan to the accusation publicly recant.

Solution of del Ferro

The solution found is the only real, the Cardanische formula in its modern version shows two more complex solutions.