Andrea Argoli

Andrea Argoli[1] (1570–1657), born in Tagliacozzo, was a versatile Italian scholar. He was a jurist, mathematician, astronomer and astrologer, and medical writer.[2] His father was Ottavio and his son, Giovanni.[3]

Portrait of Andrea Argoli by Germain Audran

He was professor of mathematics at the University of Rome La Sapienza, from 1622 to 1627, and then the University of Padua 1632 to 1657. His astrology pupils may have included Placido Titi,[4] and Giovanni Battista Seni, astrologer to Wallenstein.

Biography

Andrea Argoli was born at Tagliacozzo in the Kingdom of Naples about 1568. He studied medicine and astronomy; and all that is known of him is, that he was obliged to leave his country by the efforts of those who were hostile to him, some say for his talents, others for his astrology; that retired to Venice, the Senate of which made him professor of mathematics at Padua; and that he died at Padua later than 1650. The astronomical ephemerides which he published, extending as far as the year 1700, gave an extent and permanence to his reputation which his other writings would not have obtained alone. Delambre (Astr. Mod. vol. ii. p. 514) has bestowed three pages upon Argoli, who, it appears, was not well informed on what had been done in his own time, and is aptly described as “one of those laborious men who wrote long works for the use of astronomers, and particularly of those who were also astrologers.” His opinion that logarithms only facilitated easy operations, but made complicated ones more difficult, is better worth preserving for its singularity than any one of his writings for its utility.

Works
Ptolemaeus parvus, 1652.
  • Tabulæ Primi Mobilis, Rome, 1610.
  • Secundorum Mobilium Tabulæ, Padua, 1634.
  • Pandosium Sphæricum, Padua, 1644.
    • Pandosion sphaericum (in Latin). Padua: Paolo Frambotto. 1653.
  • Exactissimae caelestium motuum ephemerides ad longitudinem almae urbis et Tychonis Brahe hypotheses, ac deductas e caelo accurate observationes ab anno 1641 ad annum 1700 (in Latin). Padua: Paolo Frambotto. 1648.
  • De Diebus Criticis, Padua, 1652; with various smaller works and second editions (all in 4º). a list of which is in Lalande's Bibliographie Astronomique. The Ephemerides were published as follows: from 1621 to 1640, at Rome in 1621; from 1631 to 1680, at Padua in 1638; from 1648 to 1700, at Rome in 1647. Those from 1661 to 1700 were reprinted at Leiden as late as 1677.
  • Ptolemaeus parvus (in Latin). Lyon: Joseph Vilort & Pierre Vilort. 1652.
  • Brevis dissertatio de cometa (in Latin). Padua: Paolo Frambotto. 1653.

References
  1. Also Andreas, Andreae; Argolus, Argolo.
  2. The Pandosion sphaericum of 1644, a large-scale geocentriccosmography , includes also description of the circulation of the blood following Jan de Wale.
  3. Hockey, Thomas (2009). The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. Springer Publishing. ISBN 978-0-387-31022-0. Retrieved August 22, 2012.
  4. Baigent, Michael. "Placidus and the Rosicrucian Connection."

Further reading

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