History of Science Museum Museo di Storia della Scienza
Timetable
Entrance
Since 1930 the seat of the museum is in the old palace, restored several times down the centuries, that takes ist name from ist last owners, the Castellanis. The museum displays a very accurate and important collection of scientific instruments, the proof that interest of Florence in science from the 13th century onwards was as great as its interest in art. The collection, or at least the oldest core, originates from the interest of the Medici and Lorraine family in natural, physical and mathematical sciences. It is well known that Cosimo I and Francesco de’ Medici encouraged the scientific and artistic researches in the Gran Ducal workshops, although even Ferdinando II and Cardinal Leopoldo promoted and continued, in the 17th century, physics experiments in the full light of Galileo’s method.
During the 19th century, even Francesco and Pietro Leopoldo of Lorraine continued this type of collection with the aid of qualified specialists like the abbot Felice Fontana (1730-1805), who was appointed to direct and increase the collection of the new Museum of Physics and Natural History inaugurated in 1775. Most of the instruments displayed come from the workshop of the latter museum and are now exhibited on the second floor of the Museum of History of Science that also comprises the old Medici collection originally displayed at the Uffizi. The first floor (11 rooms) is dedicated to the Medici core: quadrants, astrolabus, meridianas, dials, compasses, armillary spheres, bussolas, real works of art made by famous Tuscan and European artists.
The museum also exhibits the Galileo’s original instruments, the thermometers belonging to the "Accademia del Cimento" (1657-1667), the microscopes and meteorological instruments. The second floor (10 rooms) shows a large number of very interesting and beautiful instruments, mostly belonging to the Lorraine family. The Institute of History of Science, close to the museum, owns a very large and old library with lots of research material that is continuously updated. The Institute publishes an internal review on history of science, "Nuncius", besides carrying out permanent research work on history of science and technique, organising exhibitions and publishing monographical work, catalogues of instruments, etc. The institute also has a photographic laboratory, two restoration laboratories and a modern IT laboratory.
The 18 thematic rooms of the museum: Room I
The Medici Collections Room II
Astronomy and Time Rooms III and IV
The Representation of the World Room V
The Science of Navigation Room VI
The Science of Warfare Room VII
Galileo’s New World Room VIII
The Accademia del Cimento: Art and Experimental Science Room IX
After Galileo: Exploring The Physical and Biological World Room X
The Lorraine Collections Rooms XII and XIII
Teaching and Popularizing Science Room XIV
The Precision Instrument Industry Rooms XV and XVI
Measuring Natural Phenomena Room XVII
Chemistry and the Public Usefulness of Science Room XVIII
Science at home
Seventeenth century. Galileo Galilei. Brass
This is one of the instruments made by Galileo from 1597 onwards.
This instrument, which should not be confused with the reduction compass, is a sophisticated and versatile calculating device. It renders possible several geometrical and arithmetical operations by comparing the sides of similar triangles
Galileo 's telescope
Galileo's notes on the mountains on the moon
Galileo Galilei
Galileo's Microscope
Armillary sphere
Santucci's Sphere, constructed circa 1590, attempted to make a mechanical model that demonstrated Ptolemy's incorrect model of the solar system.
Tellurium Copernican planetarium model to illustrate terrestrial and lunar revolutions
around the Sun. Attributed to Charles-François Delamarche.
ca. 1800
This astrolabe, attributed to Gerard Mercator, contains six tympanums for latitudes 43°, 36°, 39° and 42°, 45° and 48°, 51° and 54°, and 57° and 60° (corresponding to the regions between North Africa and Sweden); a seventh tympanum carries the geographic mirror for the northern and southern hemispheres. Probable provenance: Robert Dudley bequest to the Medici collections.
Astronomical compendium consisting of a box with three compartments. In the first, there is an astrolabe and a lunar calendar. Between the first and second compartment is an hour circle. The second compartment houses a sundial and a magnetic compass for orientation. The third compartment contains the Horae planetarum table and an horary quadrant with a shadow square. The markings are in German.
Case of mathematical instruments
late 17th century
Apparatus to demonstrate the parabolic trajectory of projectiles
Maker unknown, late 18th cent.
Electric bells
Later version of an accessory sold with electrical kits in the late eighteenth century to demonstrate the electrostatic repulsion of like charges and the attraction of unlike charges.
Circle-dividing engine 1762
Electrical machine, ca. 1860
Fr. Filippo Cecchi, founder of the Italian
Meteorological Society
Planetary clock, 1510,
by Lorenzo della Volpaia (replica)
Sundial in the shape of a truncated tetrahedron generating seven finely decorated faces. Each carries a sundial (horizontal or inclined) complete with a gnomon. There is a magnetic compass to orient the instrument toward the local magnetic meridian.
Water-raising machine
Frictional electrical machine with glass disk rubbed by four leather cushions. The prime conductor consists of two brass tubes with spherical ends connected by a cross-tube fitted with an electrode, resting on glass supports; they terminate in jaw-collectors to facilitate the transfer of the charge at both sides of the glass disk. Positive charge is taken from the prime conductor, while negative charge is taken from the hook at the top of the machine.
