Decoding the Stars: A Biography of Angelo Secchi, Jesuit and Scientist / Ileana Chinnici.

• Author: Chinnici, Ileana.
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden, , Boston : : BRILL,, 2019.
• Year of Publication: 2019
• Language: English
• Series: Jesuit Studies 16.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (387 pages)

In Decoding the Stars , Ileana Chinnici offers an account of the life of the Jesuit scientist Angelo Secchi (1818-1878). In addition to providing an invaluable account of Secchi’s life and work—something that has been sorely lacking in the English-language scholarship—this biography will be especially stimulating for those interested in the evolution of astrophysics as a discipline from the nineteenth century onward. Despite his eclecticism, reminiscent of the natural philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Secchi was in many ways a very modern scientist: open to innovation and cooperation, and a promoter of popularization and citizen science. Secchi also appears fully inserted in the cultural context of his time: he participated in philosophical and scientific debates, spread new theories and ideas, but also suffered the consequences of political events that marked those years and impacted on his life and activities.

Table of Contents

Front Matter -- Copyright Page -- Foreword -- Foreword / Nichi D’Amico -- Preface -- Acknowledgments -- Illustrations -- Abbreviations -- A Century in Ferment -- Secchi’s Early Life and Education: From Childhood to the Priesthood -- The Experience of Exile: A Tragic Opportunity -- Establishing the New Collegio Romano Observatory: An Observatory for “Physical Astronomy” -- Advisor to the Papal States: Science in the Service of the Public -- A Rising International Career: Travels, Achievements, and Recognition -- Contributions to Astrophysics and other Sciences -- A Crucial Political Change: New Risks and Missed Opportunities -- A Society for a New Astronomy: Building a Network for Spectroscopic Research -- A Controversial Personality: Secchi and the Scientific Debates of His Time -- Secchi’s Final Years: Uncertainty and Illness -- Secchi’s Scientific Legacy -- Back Matter -- Bibliography -- Index.