Il natural desiderio di sapere - Pontifical Academy of Sciences

FEDERICO CESI, THE FIRST ACADEMY, AND UMBRIA 81the office, even though he did not manage to see the publication of thework, in October of 1625, having died on 8 August of the same year.With the passing of Giuseppe Neri the Accademia dei Lincei lost a preciouspoint of contact with the University of Perugia, although the individualmembers of the Academy, and among them especially Galileo, continuedto see in the Umbrian cultural environment, in the very land ofUmbria a point of reference, at least a place worthy of attention, as willbe demonstrated by Galileo’s memorable visit to Acquasparta, theMarmore falls, and Lake Piediluco in 1624. This is surely an episodewhich must be recalled in the present context, an episode defined bysome, perhaps with a bit of exaggeration due to the recent discovery of aletter written by Stelluti which analyzes it in all its particulars, ‘anextremely significant event for the birth of modern science and for thehistory of the Lynceans’. 111Indeed, with the advent, in 1623, to the papal threshold of Urban VIII,Cardinal Barberini, to whom Galileo had dedicated Il Saggiatore, thingscertainly seemed to have taken a favorable turn both for Galileo and theLynceans. It was absolutely necessary, however, that Galileo undertake ajourney to Rome to pay homage to the person of the Pontiff, and in thespring of 1624 he decides to take this necessary step, this non-deferrableduty, but he decides to pass through Acquasparta on the way in order,finally, to visit the Marmore falls. Galileo leaves Florence on 1 April 1624;from 3 April, the Wednesday of Holy Week, through Easter Monday hestays, for a necessary rest stop, in Perugia, leaving, in all probability, acopy of Il Saggiatore at the Augusta Library where to this day it is still conserved.After a stop in Todi, and a discussion with Giovanni BattistaGuazzerini about the optics of spherical mirrors, he finally arrives on theevening of 8 April at the Ducal Palace of Acquasparta and remains thereas the guest of the Prince until Sunday 21 April.Even though we have no detailed account of Galileo’s two-week stayin Acquasparta, it is known, on the basis of now available documents, the111 On the episode of Galileo’s visit to Cesi in Acquasparta see the detailed and fascinatingreconstruction in G. Gabrieli, Galileo in Acquasparta, op. cit. The value ofGalileo’s experiment at Lake Piediluco is discussed by Conti in Sotto il segno degli astri:lo studio perugino e i Lincei, in G. Sapori, C. Vinti, L. Conti, Il Palazzo Cesi di Acquaspartae la rivoluzione scientifica lincea, op. cit., p. 76; and in Giuseppe Neri: un matematico aristotelicoall’Accademia dei Lincei, op. cit., pp. 55-60. Cf. also: L. Conti, Francesco Stelluti,il copernicanesimo dei Lincei e la teoria galileiana delle maree, in C. Vinti (ed.), Galileo eCopernico. Alle origini del pensiero scientifico moderno, op. cit., pp. 161 ff.