Italian Inventions and Discoveries vs. Myths

[Amedeo]

-- ITALIAN INVENTIONS AND DISCOVERIES versus MYTHS --


Introduction

To the extent that Italy is known by the majority of Americans and even Europeans, Italy is or was the place for art, opera, fine cuisine, design (fashion, industrial, etc.), and fantastic citiscapes and landscapes. This appraisal is certainly correct and can be substantiated at great length: more than half of the world art-works were created by Italians, etc. etc. But I am not here to do the substantiation; rather, this thread is meant to bring out the other face of Italy, the Italy of science, inventions, technology, and discoveries. More specifically, this thread concentrates [in a non-chrological order] on Italian deeds which are obscured by various myths that other people created -- as to the authorship of various creations and other matters. In order to directly or indirectly dispel myths, I have to present, albeit briefly, some of the things which were authored by Italians. (I have been collecting and formulating this information for quite some time.)
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(# 1) OLINTO DE PRETTO (Schio, by Vicenza, 1857-1921) arrived at and published the equation between energy and mass in 1903, namely
E = mc^2 [energy = mass times the square of the velocity of light].
Albert Einstein, who used to go to Italy and was familiar with the intellectual developments of the times, later on arrived at the same formula -- which the whole world is familiar with.

See: De Pretto in Wikipedia, and

http://lgxserver.uniba.it/lei/rassegna/010720j.htm

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(#2) GREGORIO RICCI (or RICCI-CURBASTRO) (Lugo di Ravenna, 1853-1929)
was an extraordinary mathemtician. Working on the footsteps of Riemann, he created the Absolute Differential Calculus or Tensor Analysis, which he published. (Later on, he took in some of his pupils, such as Levi-Civita, for the elaboration of more publications.) A mathematics teacher by the name of Grossman taught tensor analysis to Albert Einstein, who later employed it in his General Theory of Relativity.
(Since the days of Galileo, physics has been essentially mathematical, but, unlike Galileo and Newton, Einstein did not create the needed mathematics, nor did he make any radical research in physics. He is simply not the genius that some people make him to be.)

http://www.gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~hi...-Curbastro.html

or search: Ricci-Curbastro [Biography]

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[to continue]

[Amedeo]

(# 3) EUGENIO BARSANTI & FELICE MATTEUCCI.

Barsanti was a physics professor at the University of Florence; Matteucci was a physical engineer. They invented the internal combustion engine (like the one you have in your car). Until then, all power machines (engines) were steam driven. Their one-piston engine, which employed inflammable spirits, was completed and announced in 1853; they obtained an international patent in 1854 (No. 1072 in London). They formed a manufacturing company. Their first engine was produced in the Benini shop (later called Pignone and today Nuovo Pignone. It had the capacity of 8 horsepower. In 1856, the power drill was created with their combustion engine; the improved 20 horsepower drill was produced at the Brera factory in Milan.

Lo and behold, in 1857, at the international Exhibition [Fair] in Paris, the Germans Otto & Langen won a prize for their combution engine, which was a copy of the Barsanti & Matteucci engine. Journalists and others who knew of the Italian invention, protested, to no avail, and to this day the myth persists that the Germans invented it.

Incidentally, the Austrian Marcus used petroil as fuel for the combustion engine, which he fitted to a cab (formelly horse driven) and thus the motor car began. In Italy, the automobile industry was started by Ricordi & Benz in 1888. (Benz developed the 4-piston engine; the four-phase mechanism had been invented and published by Italians during the Renaissance and was being used in mechanical machinery.) Italians excelled in automobile engineering and design ever since. Two of the most outstanding names are Bugatti (1900s) and Ferrari (starting in 1947, with designer Pininfarina). The Ferrari and Lamborghini cars have never been surpassed. Two other designers of the better Italian and foreign cars are Giugiaro and Bertone. (The imitations have been innumerable.)

[Amedeo]

(# 4) CRISTOFORO COLOMBO :: CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS (Genoa, 1451-1506).

(A) What was his name? Who was he?

As far as we know, in his writings, he never used the name "Christopher Columbus" or, for that matter, the Italian name, Cristoforo Colombo. He used a first name which is equivalent to "Christopherens" written in two parts: "Xpo ferens." The letters Xp are Greek, which in ancient times had been used as an abbreviation of "Xpistos" [Christos]; "ferens" is Latin for "carrier." Christopherens = Christ Carrier.
(There is a legend about Saint Christopher, the carrier of the child Jesus, but there is no evidence that such a person ever existed.)

There are biographical indications that Christopher had a missionary spirit and aimed at bringing Christianity to other lands. He is also reputed to have had connections with the surving templars. (The Order of the Templars started in the 11th century, flourished for some centuries, and was then extirpated by a French king -- this is a complex and interesting history -- but a small Templar tradition survived outside France.) Indeed, I find that the seal of the Order of the Templars says, "Sigillum Xpisti Militum" [= Seal of the Soldiers of Christ"]: "Xpisti" is half Greek and half Latin. (The full Latin would be: Christi = of Christ.) The persisting Xp is called the Christ monogram, which was used by Emperor Constantine (beginning of the 4th century) on his labarum or imperial banner after he became a Christian. The two Greek letters were often superimposed. I should also notice that the peculiar shape of the cross of the Templars and of the Order of the Hospitaliers of Malta was employed on the sails of the three caravels which the monarchs of Spain gave Christopher. (The Order of the Hospitaliers had been founded in Jerusalem, before the crusaders' conquest, by people of the Republic of Amalfi, in Italy, whose banner had a Latin-shape red cross.) In or before Columbus's times, the four great maritime republics of Italian post-feudal times were the Republic of Amalfi, the Republic of Genoa, the Republic of Venice, and the Republic of Pisa.

Chapter 10 of THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA, by Maurizio Tagliattini, which is available on the web, bears the title: "Christopher Pellegrino or Christopher Columbus: A Critical Study on the Origin of Christopher Columbus." Here is an extremely brief summary: Christopher's mother had him [who would have been called Cristoforo] and another child before her husband died. Thereafter she went to live with Domenico Colombo and had three more children. The surname Colombo was applied, as usual, to all the children, but Christopher's real surname was Pellegrino. [Incidentally, the name "Pellegrino" in Italy is much more common than Colombo, and Colombo is more common than Picasso. Thus, when painter Pablo Ruiz-Picasso used his Italian surname for his signatures, people think it is a Spanish surname.]

So, I would say that, in deference to his mother, Christopher never use "Pellegrino" and did not even tell his son who was later to become his father's biographer. Though not in writings, Christopher used equivalents of "Colombo:" Colonus (in Portugal) or Colon (in Spain), while Colomb was used in France, and the Latin form, Columbus, was used by a biographer who wrote in Latin. In the USA, the Latin surname is normally used.

(B) The Discovery of America.
I will clarify the concept of "discovery of America;" for the moment I refer to the claim that Columbus discovered America and point out that various people have presented counter-claims of the discovery of America and have tried to discredit Columbus. On the other hand, while accepting that he was the discoverer, some people have claimed that he was not Italian, and other have claimed that he of Jewish origins. We can eliminate these two myths before dealing with the other issue:

"Italian" is not a nationality name, just as "Italy" is not a political name. Only some US Americans make the big mistake of identifying a country with a nation, since "United States of America" is the name of a nation (it is a political name), while the country, losely called America, does not really have a name. (Jefferson tried to invent a non-political name for the country of the unified States.) A country is a cultural (neither ethnic nor national) entity, which involves things which are more or less shared (language, customs, culture, laws, etc.etc.) The Republic of Genoa, where Christopher was born, was a political entity within Italy. (Today, too, they say that there is no such a thing as a Palestinian, since there is no or there was no Palestinian nation and, anyway, the state of Israel has appropriated the land called Palestine. Thus, by magic, 15th century Italians disappear and today's Palestinians disappear, in the eyes of the Jews.)

As for Columbus being ethnically Jewish, there is no evidence whatsoever. Most probably he was ethnically a Ligurian (from the ancient ethnic class in the broad area of Genoa), while Italy comprises probably 100 ethnic classes, including Jews. (But Jews are themselves a hybrid ethnic class, with one out of probable 20 bloodlines going to the ancient Semites. A Jew in the sense of an Israelite has no ethnic identity. There is no such a thing as bloodline Jewishness, contrary to what they like to believe. Columbus was not an Israelite: He was not Jewish.) Some of the reasons advanced that Columbus was Jewish [evident in various web entries, for those who care to search] are: His mother had a Biblical name. [The use of Biblical names would make more than a half of the Europeans Jewish!] Columbus in his will remembered a poor Jew who used to sit by the gates (in some city of Portugal). [The Jew who advanced this theory obviously thinks that Gentiles are like the Israelites, namely tribal, so that they help only their own kind and operate for the sake of the tribe rather than for others. This is a false assumption. In all the spheres of life, political or otherwise, an Italian is radically "republican," which means "cosmopolitan" rather than tribal. Finally, Columbus in his expedition took Jews along at a time when they were being persecuted by Spain. [In 1492 Spain completed the suppression of the Moors, gave Columbus the ships for his expedition, and required the Jews to either convert or leave Spain.] Some theorists even hint that the expedition was for the sake of saving the Jews! Actually in the crew of the 3 ships, there were only 2 or at the most 3 Jews.

Columbus himself was apparently interested in having one who might be of assistance in case the people he was supposed to meet in East Asia spoke some Semitic languange. One should notice that neither Columbus nor other Europeans knew much about the East Asians and that neither he nor other Europeans knew that there was a continent on the western route from Europe to Asia. Finally, some Jew gave up and said that, after all, Columbus worshipped the same God (namely the God of the Jews who is indeed a tribal god, but not for Catholics; so, the worship in question does not make a worshipper Jewish).

The Jews [in America] who do not claim that Columbus was Jewish still instist on the Jewish presence in America since the days of Columbus, as if the presence meant either possession or the acquisition of the right (for the present ones and their descendants) to be there.
Especially the presence of the Jews in colonial America and in independent America is emphasized so as to establish the legitimacy of being on the land independently of any political order, which in turn means that they want to make clear that no one may expel or eliminate them, as it happened in Egypt, in Babylonia, in Spain, in England, or in Germany.

The right to a land by occupation is an ancient and barbaric monarchic right and is applied to ancient Palestine and to 20th century Palestine. Not Columbus presence, but the occupation by the representatives of the Spanish crown, and, in north-eastern America, the representatives of the British crown established the rights to the lands. Columbus was not even a Spanish subject. In one of his expeditions, he was refused access to a harbour controlled by a Spanish governor. He was jailed and punished when, at the beginning, he punished some Spaniards for crimes against the native population, but there is a MYTH to this day that HE mistreated and enslaved the native population. The discrediting and debasing of Columbus, especially by certain Americans, is boundless; they attribute to him the sins of their fathers -- the expansionist US Americans who persecuted the Amerindians far and wide.

<<to continue>>

[Amedeo]

[Colombo / continued]

What is the meaning of "the discovery of America"? Innumerable books have been written on the matter. Those who wish to read objective accounts should read:
-- Paolo Emilio Taviani: CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. (translated from Italian). London: Orbis, 1985.
-- Felipe Fernandez-Armesto: COLUMBUS. (translated from Spanish) Oxford/New York: The Oxford University Press, 1991.

As for the question about "the discovery of America," I have to use my own thoughts: What do we mean by "America"? The name applies to a broad mass of land, a continent. This continent was not named on some clear and bright day for the simple reason that the continent was not known on ONE clear and bright day. The name was applied to a certain territory to begin with and was eventually expanded to the continent. I'll give a more detailed answer as we proceed to the historical discovery of the continent. Absolutely no human being discovered the continent, the whole mass of land which we call America -- not Columbus, not the natives or Amerindians, not any other human being.

Columbus was an expert seaman who, like others dreamt of reaching Cathay or a fabled land of East Asia by travelling west across the ocean rather than east by land and by sea. During the 15th century, Italy consisted as small states. Apparently the Republic of Genoa was unable or did not wish to finance an expeditions of such a proportion as Columbus wished. Probably the biggest obstacle was the fact that others had tried to cross the ocean and failed: The Vivaldi brothers of the Republic of Venice embarked on such an expedition and never returned. (Probably they never reached their destination or, if they did, they did not come back to tell about. Columbus had no knowledge of the feasibility of the trip but intended to take a risk.)

The major European powers at that time were Portual, Spain, France, and England. Columbus turned to Portugal. Probably because of the seeming unfeasibility of the trip, he was refused; the Portuguese themselves, who had expert seamen, never bothered to venture across the ocean. Columbus turned to Spain, but the monarchs were busy with the wars against the
Moors. He waited and waited and got married, and studied his projected expedition. His major assistance came from geographer/astronomer Toscanelli, of Florence. (In those days, the cultural renaissance -- investigations, creations, etc, -- was in force. Many Europeans flocked to the Italian universities. For example, a Polish man went to study Law in Bologna, but he started auditing courses in astronomy and other subjects. Whereas until now, the Ptolomeic or geocentric theory of the universe held sway, but the Italians were teachings, for starts, the Pythagorean or central-fire or heliocentric theory, and Copernicus immersed himself in it, publishing the theory in a mathematical dress. Henceforth the sun was thought as the center of the universe.) Toscanelli was concerned with the earth. Unlike the common view, he propounded the Anaximandrian theory that the earth is round and moves freely in space. Using bits of travel information and other data, he figured that the size of the earth and concluded that actually the earth is somewhat pear-shaped rather than perfectly spherical. Columbus and Toscanelli communicated, and the calculations showed the feasibility of the expeditions or what supplies should be taken along.

Columbus did not disclose everything to the investigators of the Spanish court; anyway they did not recommend the expedition because, if the earth is round and we are obviously at the top, as the ships move along the curvature of the earth, at a certain point they would fall into space (rather than proceed upside down around the earth). They laughed, but Queen Isabella was in favor of the expedition. Nobody knows why, but today we know that her confessor and advisor was a certain cardinal Geraldini, an Italian from a town near Rome. (Other Geraldinis had emigrated. One went to Ireland and changed his name to something similar: Fitzgerald. He was one of the ancestors of President Fitzgerald-Kennedy. On some occasions, the president acknowledged his part-Italian ancestry.) But the Geraldini role may be more complex than that of an advisor. Let me explain, though briefly: Still unreleased documents in the Vatican archives show, as one pontiff stated, that the Vatican played a role, especially financial, in the Columbus expedition. I suppose that the financial support of the Vatican, through Geraldini, convinced the Catholic monarchs to issue the ships to Columbus. Indeed, after the success of the expedition, Geraldini was appointed as the papal representative in the newly discovered lands.

The trip seamed to be a bit longer than expected, but finally the three caravels arrived: October 12, 1492. Columbus and the others tried to figure out exactly where they had landed. They supposed they were in India (and called the people Indians). Some big island was taken to be Japan -- something about which they knew only the name. Anyway, it was Columbus' conviction that he had reached East Asia. His mission had been established. In his various trips, he explored areas of what we today call Central America. He gave names to particular islands such as Holy Saviour (San Salvador) and New Little Spain (Nova Espanola).

The news of Columbus success took Europe by storm and many countries started to make projects of expeditions (and conquest). Expert seaman from Italy were employed. Amerigo Vespucci (from Florence) was employed first by Portugal and then by Spain. He explored large areas of the mainland south of the Columbian islands, studying the flora, the fauna, and the people. He concluded and informed Europe that this is a "new world," not Europe, not Africa, not Asia. Map-makers tried to use every bit of information about this new world. In the map of Waldensee, a German map-maker, we see islands and coastlines of central and south America. He called all the newly discovered territory, Terra Americae (which is Latin for "The Land of Amerigo") or, in short, America, as in some later maps. (The original accent of the word would be: Ameri`ca; English speakers say: Ame`rica, as in Eric.)

The name "America" kept on being applied as new disciveries were made. France employed Giovanni da Verrazzano, who explored the area which today is around New York city (Manhattan island, Staten Island), parts of Long Island, and areas up what is now called the Hudson River. The Venetians Giovanni Caboto
[Cabot] and his brother were employed by England. They explored areas in the upper part of North America, where they met people whom they called Redskins (rather than Indians). Their ship carried both the British standard and the standard of the Republic of Venice, with the lion (which represents St. Mark). Thus, practically the whole continent was called America. The four major European powers, with the four major Italian navigators at the helm, claimed the continent and to this day the European languages spoken preponderantly on the continent are Spanish, Portuguese, French, and English.

I would say that, in this manner, a "new word" was discovered by Columbus and Vespucci. "America" comprises this New World and lands disocovered by others. Possibly Vikings AND others traveled to areas of what is called continental America, but they were not discoverers of this continent. Furthermore, there are archeological reasons to believe that ancient people, including the Romans, traded with the Amerindians, by way of the ocean, but no extant Roman or other map of the ancient earth suggests anything beyond Europa, Asia, and Africa, nor does any Medieval map. Reached lands beyond these three continents may have been believed to be simply distant lands; the whole earthly land complex is always pictured on a flat plane and as being surrounded by the Ocean. The Ocean, as in the writings of Homer, is the vast sea which reaches the equator of the cosmic sphere... if you could reach that sphere, then you might climb to the stars, which are attached at the upper vault of the cozy and really small cosmos!

Columbus always speaks of the crossing the Ocean Sea (the great sea, rather than the Mediterranean or other sea), which obviously lies between western Europe and Eastern Asia -- but this is round-earth geography, not Homeric or flat-earth geography. In view of Toscanelli's studies (who actually underestimated the size of the earth), Columbus expedition was unique, as it can be seen as an experimental putting of a theory to the test; he did not just embark on a trip and then he happened to come across some land. He was an investigator rather than a travel venturer. Furthermore, the only way he could have refuted or ignored the objection of falling off the earth was his acceptance of Toscanelli's geography: If we lie at the top of the earth and Marco Polo and the others did not fall off when they went to China, and the Chinese were in no danger of falling off the earth, then, going to China westward -- traveling more or less the same distance, no ship is going to fall off. Toscanelli's underestimation may have been the "happy fault" that launched the caravels across the Ocean ... and started to make some people think about what will be called the earth's gravitation.

[Amedeo]

[Colombo / continued]

The Seattle Times (3/10/'02) reported: "Chinese may have beaten Columbus."
Headlines such as this show the total lack of comprehension of historical events people have. What exactly is the claim?

A British historian, Gavien Menzies, claims that a Chinese admiral reached America decades before Columbus. The claim is "based on contemporary European maps and records, Chinese star charts and archeological finds." According to Menzies, Zheng He commanded seven voyages of exploration from 1403 to 1433. Going west, He (before Magellan, obviously) circumnavigated the globe. Mentioned parts of this circumnavigation are East Africa, the rounding of the Cape of Good Hope, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Australia, [The order of the last three sites is puzzling, but one may presume that He went northward along eastern South America, to the Caribbeans, and then backwards, heading west on the Pacific and reaching Australia.]

I am not familiar with the original evidence, but if all this is correct and assuming that the Chinese terms were properly transposed into European terminology [the use of the term "south America" etc.] , we should rejoice in admiration of the Chinese for their discovery ventures of the world. (Many discoveries and inventions are made almost simultaneously and independently of one another. He detracts nothing from Columbus, who detracts nothing from He.) But there is another side to the story.

Menzies contends that "Chinese maps passed to the west through the Portuguese, by way of an Italian traveler, Nicolo` da Conti, who went on some Portuguese voyages. According to Menzies, Columbus, Magellan, and Cook always refer to maps they carried with themselves before setting sail. So, Menzies contends that "somebody must have drawn these maps before the Europeans got there [to America]."

Indeed, says Manzies, there is a 1424 map of Europe and the Atlantic that "shows the islands of Puerto Rico and Guadalupe [Caribbean islands]." Gillard Hutchinson, curator of the History of Cartography at London's National maritime Museum says
she is convinced. The map "shows that people knew that there were islands out there in the Atlantic, but it does not necessarily mean that they can be identified with any island we know of."

Let's take this claim [a new myth] apart bit by bit:

-- Manzies thinks that the maps Columbus and the others had with them had to be based upon the 1424 map, because certainly their maps could not be of their own making, precisely because they could not draw what they had not discovered yet. It never crossed Manzies mind that, for example, Columbus had generic maps based upon Toscanelli's geographical speculations and on Columbus elaborate experience of sea and wind currents in the Atlantic close to Europe (which were of great importance to seamen), and the like. What could the 1424 map offer Columbus or anybody else? A couple of distant islands which even today one could not identify, by their contours of other features, as being Puerto Rico or other Caribbean Island. The drawing must be a far cry from European Portolan maps with highly accurate countours, directions and milage information. A poor map-maker of the flat earth today would show the Azores as being close to the edge of the Ocean, rather than being relatively close to Spain, and if this map-maker had explored the real Caribbean, he would show some of the mainland. (If Columbus had made a drawing of Puerto Rico and called it Japan, we could recognize it as being Puerto Rico rather than Japan.)

-- Even supposing that the 1424 map showed that there were islands far away across the ocean and roughly on the parallel of the Strait of Gibraltar, what could make Manzies think that the map ever reached Columbus (not to mention later people)? Once he assumed that the 1424 map was essential for Columbus trip, he had to assume that he received it, even though there is absolutely NO evidence for this. Let's follow the trail: Chinese voyagers - Nicolo` da Conti - Columbus.

If the Chinese discovered or invented something and made records or maps of it, they would not be passing out the information. (Information about ceramic production, silk production, etc, was always kept under lock and key, and was not even for sale.) Manzies assumes that the Chinese made information easily available. He also assumes that the Portuguese could not have rounded the Cape of Good Hope, unless the Chinese provided information; he does not believe that Europeans are capable of exploratory missions.

Let's look at this mystery man, Nicolo` (or Niccolo`) da Conti, also known as Niccolo` di Conti or Nicolo` de' Conti (1395-1469):
http://www.win.tue.nl/~engels/discovery/conti.html

He was a Venetian merchant. He left Venice in 1419, moved to Damascus and learned Arabic. Then he embarked on many journeys in Asia... sailed the Persian Gulf and, along the coast of Iran, he learned Persian [an Indo-European language];...
proceeded to the west coast of India... In 1421 he crossed to Sumatra... sailed to the mouth of the Ganges... passed overland to Burma... sailed to Java... went to north-west Vietnam... sailed back to Quilon... traveled overland via Mt. Sinai to Cairo. He returned to Venice in 1444, where he remained as a respected merchant.

For his deviation from the Christian faith, Pope Eugenius IV gave him the penance of dictating his travels to the papal secretary, the famous humanist Poggio Bracciolini. [Now, that's what I call a useful penance!]

Presumably some of his sea faring was done on Portuguese ships, but there are no clues that he ever received from the Portuguese any information about the westward ocean route to the far East or about any land mass, such as the one the Chinese presumably discovered. (If they did, they kept the secret and apparently established no connections with the Amerindians either at the time of the discovery or later. ) There is absolutely no evidence either that da Conti and Columbus ever heard of each other or communicated between them. Manzies just builds a myth out of nothing.

Some of the biographical references about da Conti are quite interesting. For example:

-- Major. R. H. (Ed.): India in the Fifteenth Century, being a collection of narratives and voyages... preceding the Portiguese discovery of the Cape of Good Hope.(1857).
By the way, the Cape of good Hope was sighted by the Portuguese navigator B. Diaz in 1488. If for some weird reason the Chinese had given away navigation maps to the Portuguese around 1424 and da Conti, for more wierd reasons, was given the map before 1444, when he retired, WHAT DID ALL OF THESE VOYAGERS DO UNTIL 1492? Did they wait for Columbus to show up? Well, well...Columbus showed up in Portual and was REJECTED -- never mind him receiving navigations maps which the Portuguese themselves would have used, if they had them.

-- Anonymous (printed by V. F. Alemao): Marco Polo. Ho liuo de Nycoalo veneto... (Lisbon 1502) This was the first Portuguese translation of the travels of Marco Polo, bound together with the Travels of the Venetian Niccolo`. Obviously the Portuguese had an interest in the travels of Marco Polo and of da Conti EVEN after Columbus had crossed the Ocean sea.

Manzies has a brain full of holes.

[Amedeo]

[Colombo / continued]

Did Columbus sail the Ocea Sea before 1492?

Ruggero Marino presents what is at best some slim circumstantial evidence that Columbus reached "America" before 1492. He wrote an article in 1990-91 and then a book on this subject. In the web article, "Cristoforo Colombo: un'investitura divina," he says he came to that conclusion after ten years of research. He sudied the period 1484-1492, when the pope was Innocent VIII (Giovanni Battista Cybo). I will touch on two evidence points: an inscription on the bronze tomb of this pope and a geographical map.

Innocent VIII died a few days before Columbus depature from Palos The bronze tomb (with a statue of Innocent) was made afterwards. An inscription on this tomb says, "novi orbis suo aevo inventi gloria," which means "With the glory [he died] of the new world discovered in his era [his pontificate of 1884-1492]. I find that this inscription had been noticed before Marino. In the book, Pagan and Christian Rome, (New York, 1892), Rodolfo Lanciani says, "The inscription on the tomb of Innocent VIII mentions, among the glories of his pontificate, the discovery of the new world." But apparently Lanciani did not realize that the discovery did NOT take place during the reign of that pope (who died before Columbus set sail), unless the inscription refers to a prior voyage and discovery.

Actually neither Lanciani nor Marino realize that the terminology employed in the inscription does not belong to the sphere of Columbus activities; the "new world" is Vespucci's concept, which was divulged in 1502 (eight years after Columbus's first expedition). So, what did really happen? First of all I found that Pollaiuolo executed the bronze monument in 1492-98 (between the primary exploits of Columbus and of Vespucci). So, either "new world" is used in the inscription generally for a novel place, or the inscription (mindful of Vespucci's language) was added to the monument afterwards. I have no detailed evidence about the relationship of the monument and the inscription. At any rate, the placing of the Columbus discovery during the reign of Clement VIII may be due to an existing hypothesis that this pope contibuted to the expedition and, in a way, credit is due and given to him.

In fact, Antonio Socci reports on web pages that in 1851, Pope Pius IX wrote, "When these documents [in the Vatican] will be known as having to do with a part of the New World discovered by Cristoforo Colombo, it will be clear with the greatesr certitude that Colombo himself engaged in that excellent project with the aid of this Apostolic See," which means with the aid of Clement VIII. (I have already mentioned the role which Geraldini may have played in this Vatican-Spain connection.) So, my view is that the statuary inscription does not imply that an actual Columbus trip had to have taken place during the reign of Clement VIII.

The other point of advanced evidence is a nautical Piri Reis map in possession of an Ottoman admiral. An annotation about a mass of land on it refers to its having been discovered by an infidel from Genoa [the Christian Columbus] in 890, which translates to A.D. 1485/86. The map itself is dated the equivalent of 1513. If everything is authentic about this map, the only issue that arises is whether the 1513 map-maker had accurate knowledge of the year of discovery. (Was it really 1485 or 1492?) We cannot automatically assume that 1485 is wrong, but I would expect at least one piece of evidence that corraborates that date, for in the case of 149e, we have innumerable pieces of evidence about the aftermath of the discovery. If there is a total silence about a discovery trip in 1485/86, I would presume that the map-maker wrote the wrong date or -- and an analysis can be made -- the whole inscription about the infidel from Genoa may have been added much longer after the making of the map (1513) by somebody who did not have very accurate knowledge of the discovery year.

In conclusion, the claim that Columbus made his discovery before 1492 is very weak but is open to substantiation.

[Amedeo]

[Colombo / continued]

THE PIRI REIS MAP IS A FORGERY!!!!!!!!

Neither Ruggero Marino nor many scholars outside Italy have had the slightest critical sense to realize that the map is a forgery.
I read more about it at
http://www.crystalinks.com/atlantisphyedidence.html

It has to be read to be believed! Supposedly the Turkish captain Piri Reis was commissioned to make maps. It was his good fortune to have with him a man who was Columbus' pilot in three voyages across the Atlantic, and more fortunately he was in possession of the map which Columbus had with him. So, in 1513 Piri Reis made a map of the known world using Columbus' personal very ancient maps [as there was a rumor -- at an unspecified date -- that Columbus had a map of America], and any other map scrap that Reis could find.

The Reis map was discovered in the early part of the 20th century, buried in archives. It reveals a very accurate outline of cental and South America, as well as North America. Columbus himself
repeatedly went to central America. So, either the Reis map of America is not based on the presumed Columbus map, or it was, even though Columbus never ventured into the lands of Vespucci, Verrazzano or Caboto.

FURTHERMORE, the map shows, to the south of America, a portion of Antartica. Why not? Antartica was discovered in 1820 and the outline
of that ice-covered territory was unknown until sonar studies were made. So, assuming the authenticity of the map, various scholars had to explain the presence of Antartica in the presumed Columbus map [which ended in Reis' hands]. One obvious possibility was that the map was made in remote ancient times before the shores of Antartiua were covered with ice! Other disagreed and postulated the presence of the fabulous Atantis. (Conclusion: Columbus had a map with Atlantis!!!!!)

The whole point of the map was obviously to prove that America was known to exist and that somehow only Columbus was in possession of the secret. According to the latest theory, the map Columbus (and obviously only Columbus) had was provided by the Chinese admiral who traveled around the world some 70 years earlier. This theory does not have to face the issue of Atlantis. In both theories, however, the two maps had to end up exclusively in Columbus's hands. I have already pointed out that the latest theory is 100% fiction. In the former theory there is one fatal flaw [aside for the outrageous nonsenses]: Columbus trip was in 1492, not in the year stated by the Reis map. Marino and all the others should have realized immediately that the misdating of Columbus' trip was the clue to the forgery. The hoax is over.

=================

Final Refutation of the claims that Columbus had maps to reach America:

It's funny to hear what people say about pre-existing maps to "America."

A portolan map is useful to a mariner, if he aims to go to a particular
site; the map provides the compass direction line to ports. (Maps which are not portolan, maps which merely show some lands are totally useless to a mariner -- something which not even some navigation museum curators understand.)

There is no evidence that anybody, before 1492, had a map of east Asia which contained the fabulous Cathay -- which was the place that Columbus wanted to reach. The people who claim that Columbus had a "map" make a simple LOGICAL MISTAKE:
They
talk
about
a MAP OF AMERICA (or parts of America).

Since Columbus continued to believe that he had reached
Asia, obviously he had no map of America (or a land by any other name).

Until Vespucci made his
explorations and announced (in 1502) that the territory across the Atlantic was a "new world," nobody in Europe talked about a new world or anything
like that. All the European exhuberance upon Columbus' return was about the feasibility of navigation to the far East by going westwards and the availability of lands. (Columbus brought back "Indians" to Europe as evidence of having been in a a non-European land.) No intelligent map forger would have advanced or proposed a map with lands known only after 1502 to be new-world lands.

Then there is also the inaccuracy of talking about a world map. The
presumed and undoubtedly real Florentine map was a map by the Florentine astronomer/geographer Toscanelli who estimated the size of the (round) earth. Actually, on the basis of all available bits of travel information, he "protracted" portolan maps of Europe and concluded that the world was somewhat pear-shaped. He also under-estimated its size -- which must have convinced Columbus that the trip was feasible (in terms of ships and supplies). A presumed Toscanelli map (which is not extant) would have provided no clue about a continent between Europe and Asia.

VERITAS FILIA TEMPORIS : Truth is the daughter of time. After five centuries, we can put all the fakers and forgers to rest.

[Amedeo]

[Colombo / continued]

----------- ANOTHER FORGERY ----------

Around the year 1,000, the Vikings supposedly reached North America.
So, they are called the discoverers of America. They are even
conceived as providing information to the Europeans that made
Columbus' trip possible.

The Vikings were navigators and invaders indeed. They were able to
undertake short trips. If you look at a map, the sea-distance between
Norway and either Ireland or England is relatively short. There is
historical evidence that they invaded the British islands (as well as lands to the east). Possibly
they traveled to Iceland (which is the longest sea-distance they
would ever have covered), and from here to Greenland, and from here
to Baffin Island or to the Labrador and to the island of
Newfoundland. (In future times, after 1492, the latter two islands
and the Labrador were considered part of the American continent.

If Greenland is considered part of Europe, the reason must be that before 1492, some literate Europeans knew about it and thus was part of THE world. (For
the Vikings, there were islands both south and west of Norway.) The
Vikings did not engage in a trans-Atlantic [trans-Oceanic] expedition,
did not try to reach the East (probably never heard by them) by
sailing west since, like the others of their own times, they thought that
by traveling west, one will be in the west, not in the east. There is
nothing in the Vikings that compares with the spherical world of
Columbus and his objectives. If they came across a land which was
previously unkown to them, then that's what they discovered, and there is no argument about that.

There is even a map, called the Vinland Map, which is supposed to
show a portion of America discovered by the Vikings. It is considered
the most important map of the world and is valued at $ 20 million. It
looks like a very old map and has some writing on it; so it is
unlikely to be a map made by the Viking navigators, who were
illiterate. But then, a friar might have been the scribe at their
service. (The writing is not in runes, which means that the map is NOT akin to stones with runic glyph which have been discovered in north America -- at least according to some disputed claims. The point is that the map was produced in a ROMAN, not a Scandinavian, script.) There have been heated debates about the map, but I will speak of only what I myself notice.

If I place myself at the times of the Viking exploits, around the
Year One Thousand, I would indeed draw a world map with inaccuracies: a smaller or shorter Africa, no huge block of land like the American continent, and no Artic or Antartic territories,
but:
the center of this map would be Jerusalem,
as it was customary in the Dark Ages, and according to custom,
it would be upsidedown (relatively to the writing on it);
most importantly,
the layout of the dry land would NOT be oval (as the
Vinland map shows), but circular, according to the conception of the
times.
This dry land was formerly understood to be surrounded by the Ocean, which also lay within a circle.
On the contrary, this map's layout is oval, like
that of some MODERN PROJECTION MAPS of the Western hemisphere.

The Vinland map is too good to be true. It is a modified modern projection map.

On both the Vinland map and our projection maps, Greenland appears very small, but its contour, like that of England and other places, is quite
accurate. The placement of Corsica and Sardinia relatively to Italy is just as it appears on a modern projection map (which renders on a flat surface
what is really spherical), not as in maps three or four centuries old.

To produce a map like this, the Vikings would
have had to know geography such as it was established centuries after 1492,and they would have to have had to use triangulation and other measurement procedures which were invented AFTER the 15th century.

If the Vikings had been such explorers and geographers, there would have been such maps, in the year 1000, all over Europe and at least two or three maps would have survived, not to mention accounts in Europe of such fabulous geographers. They would have to be called EXPLORERS and MEASURERS of the entire old world (plus that Vinland territory) -- and that would have taken quite a few years, not to mention innumerable encounters with other peoples.

From the modern nature of that map and the lack of any relevant evidence surrounding the map (such as production of maps of this nature before and after the year 1000, historical accounts or mention of the making of such maps or or the earth-measuring people, any European mention of their measuring methods, etc.) , I must conclude that the solitary map has been manufactured in modern times.

An article confirms that the Vinland Map is a forgery: "Vinland Map
is a 20th Century Forgery," by B. Hassel, in ANCIENT AMERICAN --
Archeology of the Americas before Columbus. Vol. 7, No. 47 (2002).
The scientific report was made in ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY (July 31,
2002). The physical map was studied. It looked very old, with the
yellowing/staining of the ink which appears in old manuscripts, but
the scientific analysis revealed that the yellowing was induced by
the use of a certain ink which was created synthetically around
1923. Therefore, this map could not be older than 1923. Other
findings cohere with this result: Naturally the paper becomes brittle
though the action of ink, over centuries of time; this paper showed
no signs of brittleness. The forgerer was careful to create the appearence of an ancient map, but apparently he did not know that even past the 13th century, the Scandinavians were writing in runes rather than Roman letters.

All things considered, the Vinland Map is a forgery beyond the shadow of a doubt. It is not worth even 2 dollars.

[Amedeo]

(# 5) ALESSANDRO VOLTA (Como, 1745-1827)

A phenomenon of static electricity was observed by the ancient Greeks and some studies were made by modern Europeans. Current [flowing] electricity occurs in nature but is nearly impossible to detect without modern instruments. Current electricity was made possible by Volta's invention of a generator (a battery) in 1799. He himself had made various studies of electric phenomena and, while attempting to understand phenomena brought about experimentally by Galvani, he made his most extraordinary invention. It and the subsequent developments changed human living. (For details, imagine how you would live, if electricity generators disappeared from the face of the earth.) One of the earliest application of current electricity was for plating (electro-plating) a baser metal by a more precious metal.

As it happens with practically all Italian inventions and explorations, after they are made, somebody claims that such inventions and explorations had been made before.
At http://www.tmeg.com/artifacts/elect/a_elect.htm

one reads that an ancient electric battery is in the Baghdad museum. Presumably it was invented by the Parthians (warriors who were ruling there) around 250. B.C.
It is believed that such batteries were used for plating.

At http://www.unmuseum.org/bbattery.htm

We learn that the Baghdad battery was first described by an archeologist, Wulhelm Konig, in 1938 and published in 1940. "It is unclear if Konig dug the object up himself or located it within the holdings of the museum." Apparently the pottery jar which housed the battery is one of other jars some 2000 years old.

Obviously Konig made a description of an object which was indeed in that museum, but he does not reveal who placed it there, where it came from, or who made it. (Speculations about the Parthians are not facts.)

At http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Neb...3/update17.html

we learn more about Konig. He found copper vases plated with silver in the Baghdad Museum. When a vase was tapped, a blue patina or film separated from the surface, this being characteristic of silver electroplated onto a copper base. Obviously, then, he was facing an archeologist's problem: How come the vases act as if they had been electroplated? He must have concluded that they had been electroplated and even built a battery to confirm his theory. (Since the voltage produced is very low, somebody theorized that a series of such batteries must have been used to plate small objects. Nobody has tried to find out how big the plated vases are, and if any scientific study was made as to whether the vases were plated at all.)

Almost anything is possibile, and batteries may have been produced by the Parthians, but strangely enough, an Age of Electricity like our own never developed in the Near East, and, as far as we can tell, that battery was not used for anything but electroplating. As far as we can tell, nobody has known of, used, or invented any battery between 250 B.C. and 1799.

The article writer cleverly points out that those supposedly electroplated vases had actually been dug up in Sumer sites [Mesopotamia] Conclusion, the battery itself must have been invented by the Sumerians. This necessary pushing back of the invention reminds us of the Piri Reis map (presumably Columbus') which had to be pushed back to the pre-glacial age of Antartica. According to another theory, the Parthians or somebody must have received the battery or batteries from extra-terrestrials; the earthlings could not have invented it, since they were not even able to figure out any use of it besides electro-plating. But the superior extra-terrestrials must have had bigger and better batteries than the Baghdad one; at least they would have used copper and zinc (as Volta did) rather than copper and iron.... Of course an archeologist like Konig knew that zinc was unknown 2000 years ago and did not make the mistake of placing zinc in a 2000 year old little jar, but his archeological report had to be an unscientific one, otherwise he would have revealed his authorship.

The so-called Baghdad battery strangely resembles a historic simple leyden jar, except for the use of earthenware. Forgeries never end.

=============================================
[to continue]

[Amedeo]

(# 7) GUGLIELMO MARCONI (Bologna, 1974-1937)
>
>Volta's invention of an electric current generator
>gave rise to many applications of electric power and
>to inventions which utilized current electricity.
>
>In order for the electricty to flow, there must be a
>metallic closed circuit, a wire loop between the two
>battery poles, through which it flows. A loop can be
>cut. A simple switch or interruptor consists of a
>simple device which either keeps the two cut ends
>apart, or connects them. When the ends of a cut loop
>are connected by a very thin wire, this wire becomes
>hot and gives off light. Advanced or long-duration
>heaters and lighters were developed in the course of
>time [the hot plate, the electric light lamp, etc.] A
>switch is used to either connect or disconnect the
>electricity to any device or appliance.
>
>Around 1836, the American Samuel Morse invented an
>ACTION on an electric system -- an electric circuit
>with a switch and a "lamp." The action consists in
>switching on and off the electricty so that the light
>would be on for either long or short periods of time.
>Probably while playing with a light switch, just as
>one would be tapping music with a finger, he became
>aware of a simple and astonishing fact which results
>from the use of CURRENT electricity: flashes or
>squirts of light, or other effects, could be either
>short or long. (Here we are beyond the production of
>light sparks which were known before the invention of
>currents). So, he had a genial idea: to translate the
>alphabet into long and short flashes or other
>effects (using different configurations of longs and
>shorts). Thus he created what is known as the Morse
>Code, which is Morse's version of the aphabet into
>electric pulses (done by switching or by
>pressing a key -- to make the electric connection).
>
>My homemade telegraph in childhood consisted of a long
>loop, from one room to another, with a key in one room
>and an electric lamp in the other room. This
>contraption could be called a "Light Speller," for
>communicating words by means of the light-alphabet.
>
>Morse actually created a more advanced alphabet communicator:
>as it were, he replaced the "lamp" by a morse-alphabet writer. Thus
>he invented the telegraph -- the long distance
>morse-code electric writer. The writing consists of
>longer dashes and shorter dashes (or dots). The
>invention of this writer depended on different
>discoveries. [I used the example of my homemade
>communication contraption
>to present as clearly as possible the essential idea
>of the telegraph: a systematic manipulation of an
>electric circuit with a switch and a lamp or other
>appliance.]
>
>At the time which includes the 1821-1831 period, the
>British Michael Faraday made a series of very
>important experiments and discoveries: When an iron
>bar is crossed over by an active electric current (in
>an insulated wire), the bar becomes magnetic. This
>electricity-induced magnetism is called
>electro-magnetism. (By going further, Faraday produced
>the first electric motor.) Somehow the iron becomes
>magnetic even though no electricity runs through it;
>there is an "action at a distance" or a field-action
>from the current unto the iron. The reverse also
>happens: A magnetic field [the area in which small
>metallic things are attracted by a magnet] through
>which a cable is passed induces an electric current in
>the cable (which must be in a circuit form). Later on,
>powerful eletro-magnets were produced by winding a
>long cable around an iron bar. A variety of "coils" or
>"spools" were devised. On the other hand, recently the
>Italian Space Agency developed the proper cable
>circuit system to convert the Earth's electromagnetic
>field into electricty -- first demonstrated from a
>space-ship on the 500th anniversary of Columbus
>landing in the new word.
>
>Now then, get an electric circuit with a switch and an
>electro-magnet. Switching on and off means activating
>and stopping the magnetism. If an attached metallic
>plate is placed near the electromagnet, attraction
>occurs as long as the switch is on. If a long strip of
>paper is slowly rolled between the magnet and the
>plate, and if a pencil or a pen is attached to the
>magnet, the electric pulses result in longer and
>shorter lines, dashers and dots, on the rolling paper.
>(The idea of on/off circuits will yield other
>inventions much later.)
>
>As a reciprocal communication system, the telegraph is
>a two-way system, both the sender and the receiver
>being equipped with a switch or key and an
>electro-magnetic writer. Incidentally, just as Meucci
>had experimented with wireless mechanical telephony --
>utilizing the electric currents of the earth, sea, or
>atmosphere, others experimented with both wireless
>mechanical telephony and wireless mechanical
>telegraphy. In 1865, for example, the American Mahlon
>Loomis demonstrated that atmospheric electricity could
>be exploited for telegraphy: kites were raised 18
>miles away [and grounded, I suppose]; the on/off
>switching in one place resulted in an electric
>disturbance in the other kite-wire, evinced by a
>galvanometer. Probably the Western Union Company was
>not interested in Loomis because his demonstration was
>made during a lightning storm. A telegraphy system has
>to be reliable under normal conditions.
>
>The invention of wireless telegraphy by means of
>man-produced electro-magnetic waves (rather than by
>means of naturally occurring electric currents just
>spoken of) presupposes other inventions I will mention
>in a moment. The invention of wireless, electro-magnetic (or
>"radio") telegraphy was made by Marconi. (I will explain the
>myth to the contrary.) Of course, it is quite possible
>that similar inventions or discoveries are made
>independently in cultural areas which share the same
>scientific backgrounds. As a matter of fact, what is
>unexpected is rather this, for example, that although
>many countries knew of Faraday's work, the telegraph
>should have been invented in only one country
>and by one person only. It is
>the singularity of many inventions that I find
>surprising.
>
>Marconi was born in a well-to-do family in 1874 of an
>Italian father, Giuseppe, and an Irish mother, Anna
>Jameson. In school he did not do so well with the
>study of the classics; he was concerned primarily with
>chemistry, electricity, and the like. One of his
>objectives was to find new energy sources; as we might
>say, like other typical italian inventors, he strove
>to harnass or deploy energy. [For the harnassers of
>energy, see "The Age of the Recontrivance."]
>
> From 1893, Marconi started keeping diaries of his
>thoughts and researches, receipts of items he bought
>for experiments, etc. He made his laboratory in the
>attic of the villa where he lived. One of his projects
>was the construction of a thermo-electric battery.
>Meanwhile, professor Vincenzo Rosa was his tutor in
>mathematics, physics, and electrology. A few of his
>pages and documents are reproduced in "I diari di
>laboratorio di Gugliemo Marconi" at
>http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/gm_diari.htlm
>
>In 1894, a new world of science was opened to Marconi
>through his contacts with and auditing of Professor
>Righi, physics teacher in Bologna. At this point we
>have to retrace our steps.
>
>Faraday's discovery of induction or effects at a
>distance between a current and an iron-bar, or an
>electro-magnet and a circuit, stirred innumerable
>questions. The idea of "fields" or unperceptible waves
>was is in the air. (Mechanical perceptible waves had
>been known for a long tiime; unperceptible waves, such
>as those of sound, had been inferred and studied. Now
>the idea began to emerge that the induction field in
>question constituted light-like waves. Etc....) The
>Scottish Maxwell wrote the mathematics of undulating
>fields and predicted that an electric oscillation
>generates electromagnetic (light-like) waves. In 1879,
>von Helmotz proposed a contest: the demonstration of
>such waves which had been predicted. Contest aside,
>Heinrich Hertz took up the challenge and eventually in
>1893 published a book to tell of his researches
>and findings: Electromagnetic waves, other than light,
>can be generated. They are propagated from a source,
>just as light is. What thereafter became known as
>Hertzian waves, and light waves, and other waves, are
>generically called electro-magnetic waves or
>radiations.
>
>Since Hertzian waves are invisible either directly of
>from reflections, how did he show they were generated?
>How did he detect their presence? Galvanometers or
>other electric meters or detectors will not do, since
>electro-magnetic waves are not electricity running in wires.
>Both the generator and the detector Hertz
>invented results from the application of already
>established ideas. (The invention consists in the
>joining of such ideas, just as most inventions are.
>Basically radical inventions, like Volta's battery or
>Vincenzo Galilei's device to measure the tension of a
>string are rare in history.) Hertz generator was a
>theoretical generator, that is, a device which
>theoretically generates e-m waves, whose reality has
>to be substantiated by the detector.
>
>The generator has to be -- as per Maxwell proposal --
>something which involves an electric oscillation. Now,
>if one takes an open electric circuit, will the
>occurrence of magnetism in a nearby iron bar constitute
>a demonstration that the induction is due to waves?
>We knew that waves of different kinds produce
>different effects. For example, Galileo Galilei had
>discovered that sounds of different pitch, during his
>scraping of a metallic plate, resulted in different
>wave arrangements of the metallic filings. So, an e-m
>detector would have to be something that responds
>differently to different e-m wave generations. Well,
>in the world of sound, we know of a very common
>phenomenon: resonance. If a metallic fork is struck
>(thereby producing a sound), a nearby idential fork
>starts producing the same sound all by itself. If two
>guitar strings are equally tuned, when you strike one,
>the other starts to vibrate similarly and produces the
>same sound. Resonance is an induction phenomenon.
{By the way, I am reconstructing Herz's invention;
I don't know if he kept a diary of his thinking.}
>A flame (light and heat) does not induce a flame: if
>you strike a match next to another, the second one
>does not ignite automatically, nor does an electric
>light induce another light.
>
>If the ends of a cut [open] circut are brought together, a
>spark of light results. In addition to this, it was
>known that that when the two wire ends are slightly
>pulled apart, electricty jumps from one end to the other
>and form a light-arch. (Arc lamps were constructed.)
> Hertz constructed a simple apparatus which involved a
>variable gap between the ends of a cut circuit. It is
>called the spark-gap, since the electricity will be
>made to jump across the gap. A similar open-end
>circuit was produced nearby, with an identical gap.
>When he sent electricity through the first gapped
>circuit and a spark occurred, the spark was repeated
>automatically in the other gapped circuit. Hence, the
>second circuit was called a resonator. The two
>circuits were in syntony -- equally tuned, so to
>speak. Not the light in the first circuit, but some
>waves of a certain kind (or length)
>were responsible for the "resonance" in the resonator.
>(Electro-magnetic waves must have induced an electric
>current in the other circuit which, according to its
>construction, replicated the light spark.) The
>generator or emitter and the resonator (which allows you
> to DETECT the received waves) are kept some distance apart,
>but they are not duplications of Faraday's experiments,
>since there is no criss-crossing of electic wires and
>iron-bar or magnet. Waves generated by an electric
>disturbance induce, though open space, an electric
>flow which in turn, under the gap circumstance, yields
>a spark.
>
>The Hertzian set of "generator (transmitter) and
>resonator (detector; receiver)" can be called the Hertzian
>"demonstration system." A physics teacher, professor
>Righi, experimented with the Hertzian system and
>improved the detector. For example in 1897, he
>replaced the spark gap with divided quicksilver bands,
>etc. Photographs of these earlier and of later pairs
>that make up an Hertzian system are given at
>
>http://www.sparkmuseum.com/BEGINS_RADI.HTM
>
>As I was saying, Marconi attended Righi's lectures at the university.
>Marconi became infatuated with electromagnetic physics
>and received instructions from Righi. Marconi, we
>remember, is one who was on the lookout for energy
>sources. And now he had found one. While operating an
>Hertzian demonstration system, he must have done
>exactly what Morse did when he operated an electric
>circuit with a switch! He saw that by manipulating the
>switch in different time lengths, longer and shorter
>electromagnetic pulses were trasmitted, and Morse had
>already provided an alphabet translation. Thus
>wireless electro-magnetic telegraphy [radio telegraphy]
>was born. What Morse did relatively to an electric
>current, Marconi did relatively to an electro-magnetic
>radiation.
>
>Hertz, Righi, and many others, who made improvements
>and variations on the Hertz demonstartion system, were
>intent upon studying induction phenomena. Thus the
>resonator or DETECTOR is, in its own way, like the
>detectors and meters used in the field of electricity.
>Marconi understood electro-magnetic waves as energy or
>forces which act upon something else, wherefore there
>are effect recepients. His ongoing concern with
>syntonization is, in other words, a concern for the
>susceptibility to forces which certain objects have
>(or are constructed to have).
>
>The invention of radio telegraphy =
>Marconi's invention = the combination of 2 ideas =
>Hertz' invention + Morse's invention.
>Or: Marconi = Hertz + Morse.
>
>The relationship of Hertz and Harconi is analogous to
>that of Columbus and Vespucci [whom I have discussed].
>Who discovered the New World? Columbus was intent upon
>reaching the Far East by travelling west from Europe,
>according to Toscanelli's earth model. He made the
>first successful trip. Vespucci made a similar trip
>and arrived, too, but, through his own observations,
>he realized that the land reached by Columbus (and
>himself) was not the Far East but a New World. So,
>Vespucci unveiled a new world, but the expedition
>which established the feasibility of the trip was made
>by Columbus: the Columbus-like trip was the
>discovering enterprise. Similarly, the Hertzian-like
>system was the radio-telegraphic communicating enterprise.
>As I see it, Columbus-Vespucci discovered the New
>World; Hertz-Marconi invented radio telegraphy.
>
>When Marconi spoke of wireless telegraphy and of his
>prospects to Righi, the Professor had nothing to
>disagree with but practically discouraged Marconi from
>pursuing his dream (of wireless telegraphy on a practical
>city-wide or nation-wide scale), especially because the
>effectiveness of the radio telegraphy was as big as a
>room.
>
>
>http://www.fgm.it/ing/perc/perc1/sche29.htlm
>
>In his continued investigations, Marconi started using
>a coherer for radio-reception. A coherer was a radio
>wave DETECTOR which was designed in 1890 by Branly on
>the basis of observations conducted by physicist
>Temistocle Calzecchi-Onesti between 1884 and 1886:
>metal filings in an insulating tube conduct an
>electric current under the action of an
>electro-magnetic wave. Branly attached two metallic
>plates at the ends of the tube: the effect of a transmitted radio
>wave produced an electric current. (Thus spark-gap
>resonators became outmoded; the sparks were actually
>useless for non-demonstrative purposes. It is the e-m
>wave's induction of an electric current that matters.)
>Marconi had to invent certain devises to make the
>coherer practical. He made use of an antenna [to be affected by >transmitted waves], etc. So,
>in 1895, Marconi had created an effective long distance wireless
>telegraphy system. His first long-distance broadcast
>(of the letter "S") was in September 1895, from the
>laboratory in his villa to a hill opposite to the
>house.
>
>The Italian Postal Ministry turned down
>Marconi's wireless telegraph. His mother suggested
>they go to England, when she had relatives. They went
>in February 1896. On 2 June, 1896, Marconi registered
>a provisional description of his invention at the London
>patent Office (Patent 7777). Demonstrations were given
>and wireless telegraphy became widely discussed.
>
>An investigator of electro-magnetism in London, Bose,
>congratulated Marconi; he himself was not concerned
>with telegraphy. (Much later one, Bose is one of the
>many who is proclaimed to be the inventor of radio.
>Today one might also say that a person who has an
>electric circuit in his house has a telegraphic or
>light-speller communication system, for an invention
>which consists in an activity leads people to believe
>t