CATHOLIC SCIENTISTS:- PAOLO DAL POZZO TOSCANELLI

 CATHOLIC SCIENTISTS:-

PAOLO DAL POZZO TOSCANELLI
DIED 10th MAY 1482.



Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli, born in 1397, was an Italian mathematician, astronomer and cartographer. Son of a doctor, he studied mathematics with Giovanni dell’Abacco in Florence and attended the University of Padua, gaining a Doctorate of Medicine in 1424. He earned a reputation as a leading mathematician and astronomer, and is considered by many to have been the most brilliant scientist of his day. (1) He was one of the central figures in the intellectual and cultural Renaissance in Florence, a friend to Brunelleschi, and friends with an amazing circle of Florentine and Roman intellectuals, including Leon Batista Alberti, (mathematician, writer and architect), Cardinal Nicholas de Cusa, (an early humanist and wide ranging intellect, who dedicated two mathematical works to Toscanelli), Filelfo, George of Trebizond and the humanist Pope Nicholas V.
He is most famous for being the first to calculate the circumference of the Earth, which he did by measuring the distance from the Equator to the North Pole.
He was noted for his observation of comets and his discovery of the comet of 1456, which ended up being named Halley’s Comet after Edmond Halley predicted its return in 1759.
He also devised the gnomon, which is still to be seen in Florence Cathedral, which records the summer solstice to within a half-second. This was used for centuries for other calculations such as studying the movement of the sun.
He was aware that the earth was spherical and not flat and, in 1474, he sent a letter and a map to his Portuguese correspondent, Fernao Martins, priest at the Lisbon Cathedral, detailing a scheme for sailing westwards to reach the Spice Islands and Asia. Fernao Martins delivered his letter to King Alfonso V of Portugal, in his court at Lisbon. …[Toscanelli] later transcribed the letter along with the map and sent it to Christopher Columbus who carried them with him during his first voyage to the New World.”
Miscalculations by both Toscanelli and Columbus resulted in Columbus not realising initially that he had found a new continent. (2)
(2) wikipedia
Images: Wikipedia




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