Mathematical Treasure: Vincenzo Viviani’s Formazione, e misura di tutti i cieli and Manuscript Notes

Vincenzo Viviani (1622–1703) was an Italian mathematician who studied under Galileo—with whom he remained a close associate. One of his main interests was speculative geometry, particularly, the properties of the cycloid. In 1692 he published Formazione e misvra di tutti i cieli : con la struttura, e quadratura esatta dell' intero, e delle parti di un nuovo cielo ammirabile, e di uno degli antichi delle volte regolari degli architetti ; curiosa esercitazione matematica di VV (Formation and measurement of all the skies: with the exact structure and squaring of the whole and of the parts of a new admirable sky and of one of the ancient regular vaults of the architects / curious mathematical exercise of VV [Vincenzo Vivani] last pupil of Galileo).

A sample page from this text:

Vivani also kept handwritten notes of Galileo’s theories and discussions. They were later bound into a series that he named after his preferred role: Discipoli di Galileo. Here we see images of book 98 on “Pure Mathematics.”

A glimpse of the notes within:

The Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) offers a complete digitization of Formazione, e misura di tutti i cieli via Gallica. Viviani’s manuscript notes are held by Museo Galileo.

Index to Mathematical Treasures