Beating untrodden paths: James Gregory and his Italian readers

0525026 - FLÚ 2022 RIV GB eng J - Journal Article
Crippa, Davide
Beating untrodden paths: James Gregory and his Italian readers.
British Journal for the History of Mathematics. Roč. 35, č. 1 (2020), s. 25-42. ISSN 2637-5451
R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GJ19-03125Y
Institutional support: RVO:67985955
Keywords : history of mathematics * scientific academies * James Gregory * Stephano degli Angeli
OECD category: Philosophy, History and Philosophy of science and technology
Method of publishing: Limited access
https://doi.org/10.1080/26375451.2019.1701860

In this paper, I shall reconstruct the stay in Italy of James Gregory (1638–1675), Regius professor of mathematics at St Andrews. According to a standard account, Gregory spent four years (1664–1668) in Padua, as Stephano degli Angeli’s student. However, this claim is problematic. First, Gregory’s stay in Padua is confirmed only for the years 1667–1668. Second, the existence of a partial scribal copy of Vera quadratura circuli, ellipseos et hyperbolae in sua propria specie inventa et demonstrata, Gregory’s debut work in the domain of quadrature problems, as well as a number of letters preserved at the National Library of Florence, suggest that relations between Gregory and Italian mathematicians were more complex and varied than have been suspected. On the basis of new, albeit scarce, textual evidence, I shall advance a few conjectures regarding scholars and philosophers that Gregory could have met in Padua, Rome and perhaps Florence.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0309228