Roman holiday. George Fortescue and Galileo

Camerota Michele

2020-01-01

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Abstract

In the autumn of 1629 Galileo received a letter from the English poet and writer George Fortescue. Fortescue told Galileo he was about to publish a book in which the Tuscan scientist appeared as a character in a dialogue. The book, entitled Feriae Academicae, saw the light in Douai around the spring of 1630, and consists of several dialogues, all set in Rome, where Fortescue lived between the years 1609 and 1614. A few dialogues showed Galileo engaged in a debate with the Jesuit astronomers Christoph Clavius and Christoph Grienberger on topics like the nature of light, the telescope, the burning mirrors. The article shows that in his tale Fortescue drew on real events occurred during his stay in Rome, combining literary imagination and reality.