Boscovich and the Matter of the Mediterranean Harbours

The Jesuit Ruggiero Giuseppe Boscovich (1711-1787), born in the Dalmatian city of Ragusa, was professor of Mathematics in the Roman College from 1741 to 1760. He wrote many important papers on geometry, physics, optics and astronomy. From 1742 he complemented the educational activity with a great number of consultations on applied mathematics, especially hydraulics. He wrote reports on the regulation of some rivers and streams, and the reclamation of extensive marshlands. His main contributions concerned the settlement of Italian harbours placed at the river mouth. The long journey (1750-52) made by Boscovich in order to measure the meridian arc between Rome and Rimini, gave him the opportunity to visit some important harbours on the Tyrrhenian and the Adriatic Sea. Boscovich was asked for consultations about the harbour of Viareggio on behalf of the Republic of Lucca (1756), the harbour of Rimini by the Papal State, the harbour of Savona by the Republic of Genoa (1771), and the mouth of the river Adige by the Republic of Venice (1773). Soon after the Jesuit suppression, Boscovich left Italy in 1773 and accepted a prestigious assignment in Paris as director of naval optics in the French Navy. In this role he devoted himself to studying the achromatic telescope and its application. Boscovich left France in 1782 and returned to Italy in order to attend the publication of his work on optics and astronomy (Opera pertinentia ad opticam et astronomiam, 1785). The works on hydraulics have recently been collected and published in the National Edition of Boscovich’s works and correspondence.