Francesco Bianchini

Francesco Bianchini

:"For Giovanni Bianchini (1410-ca. 1469), see Giovanni Bianchini."

Francesco Bianchini (December 13, 1662 – March 2, 1729) was an Italian philosopher and scientist. He worked for the curia of three popes, including being "camiere d`honore" of Clement XI, and secretary of the commission for the reform of the calendar, working on the method to calculate the astronomically correct date for Easter in a given year.

Bianchini was born of a noble family at Verona. In 1684 he went to Rome, and became librarian to Cardinal Ottoboni, who, as Pope Alexander VIII (1689), raised him to the offices of papal chamberlain and canon of Santa Maria Maggiore. Clement XI sent him on a mission to Paris in 1712, and employed him to form a museum of Christian antiquities. A paper by him on Giovanni Domenico Cassini's new method of parallaxes was inserted in the "Ada Eruditorum" of Leipzig in 1685.

His deduction of the rotational period of Venus was based on the observation of its surface. Today, we know that this is impossible, because of the thick cloud cover on this planet. He also worked on the parallax of Venus, and he measured the precession of the Earth's rotational axis.

As part of his efforts to improve the accuracy of the calendar, Bianchini constructed an important meridian line in the basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei Martiri in Rome, a device for calculating the position of the sun and stars.

His point of view on the Copernican system is not evident, but it was noted that the picture of the planetary system in his book about Venus has an empty center.

Craters on Mars and the Moon were named in his honor.

He also worked as a topographer and archaeologist of ancient Rome, and as a collector.

Books by Bianchini

He published many books, including:
* "Storia universale, provata co' monumenti, e figurata co' simboli degli antichi" (Rome, 1697 and 1747)
* "De Calendario et Cyclo Caesaris" (1703)
* "De vitis romanorum pontificum a Petro Apost. ad Nicolaum I." 4 vol. (Rome, 1718-35)
* "Hesperi et Phosphori nova phaenomena sive observationes circa planetam Veneris" (Rome, 1728), in which he asserted Venus to rotate in 243 days
* (posthumously) "Astronomicae et Geographicae Observationes Selectae" (1737) and
* "Opuscula Varia" (1754).

References

*1911

External links

* [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02541a.htm Catholic Encyclopedia engl.]
* Kurzbeschreibung [http://www.bo.astro.it/~biblio/Vultus-Uraniae/Face_cap4I.html Hesperi et Phosphori nova phaenomena…]
* Bianchini's [http://www.bo.astro.it/~biblio/Vultus-Uraniae/Globe-of-Venus.html Globe of Venus] , 1727. Astronomical Museum "Museo della Specola," Bologna


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  • Francesco Bianchini —     Francesco Bianchini     † Catholic Encyclopedia ► Francesco Bianchini     A student of the natural sciences, and an historian, b. at Verona, Northern Italy, 13 December, 1662; d. at Rome, 2 March, 1729. At first he devoted himself to the… …   Catholic encyclopedia

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  • Bianchini — may refer to: * Bianchini (lunar crater) * Angela Bianchini (born 1921), Italian fiction writer and literary critic * Brian Bianchini (1978–2004), American male model * Francesco Bianchini (1662–1729), Italian philosopher and scientist * Joseph… …   Wikipedia

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