279
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
I. Chinnici, G. Consolmagno (eds.), Angelo Secchi and Nineteenth Century Science,
Historical & Cultural Astronomy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58384-2_17
Chapter 17
The Unfulfilled “Secchi Monument”
at Reggio Emilia
Fabrizio Bònoli and Agnese Mandrino
17.1 Introduction
A spectre haunted Italian astronomy between the end of the nineteenth century and
the first decades of the twentieth century: the “Monument to Angelo Secchi.” It was
to have been not a real monument (as the name might suggest) but a “scientific
monument.” Thanks to archival documents, many of them unpublished,
1
we can
trace the little known history of what the promoters of the Secchi Monument had
1 Most of the documents here discussed are kept in the Archivio di Stato di Reggio Emilia, in the
section “Monumento Secchi” (hence ASRe-MS). At the time we accessed the documents relating
to the events of the Secchi Monument – taken over by Archivio di Stato di Reggio Emilia in 1927
at the closing of the Committee – they were not ordered and it is therefore impossible to identify
them except by their dates or with rare original signatures; only very recently is that resource is
near to be completely organized. The following archives and libraries have also been consulted:
Biblioteca Antonio Panizzi in Reggio Emilia (BPRe); Archivio Storico della Provincia di Reggio
Emilia (ASPRe); Archivio della Provincia di Reggio Emilia (APRe); Archivio storico
dell’Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri-INAF (AAFi); Archivio storico dell’Osservatorio
Astronomico di Brera-INAF (AOB); Archivio storico dell’Osservatorio Astronomico di
Capodimonte-INAF (ASOC); Archivio storico del Dipartimento di Astronomia, Università di
Bologna (AABo; most of the documents in this archive are digitized and can be accessed online at
http://archiviostoricoastronomia.unibo.it/).
F. Bònoli (*)
Department of Physics and Astronomy, Alma Mater Studiorum, Università di Bologna,
Bologna, Italy
e-mail: fabrizio.bonoli@unibo.it
A. Mandrino
INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera, Milan, Italy
e-mail: agnese.mandrino@inaf.it
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
I. Chinnici, G. Consolmagno (eds.), Angelo Secchi and Nineteenth Century Science,
Historical & Cultural Astronomy, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58384-2_17
Chapter 17
The Unfulfilled “Secchi Monument”
at Reggio Emilia
Fabrizio Bònoli and Agnese Mandrino
17.1 Introduction
A spectre haunted Italian astronomy between the end of the nineteenth century and
the first decades of the twentieth century: the “Monument to Angelo Secchi.” It was
to have been not a real monument (as the name might suggest) but a “scientific
monument.” Thanks to archival documents, many of them unpublished,
1
we can
trace the little known history of what the promoters of the Secchi Monument had
1 Most of the documents here discussed are kept in the Archivio di Stato di Reggio Emilia, in the
section “Monumento Secchi” (hence ASRe-MS). At the time we accessed the documents relating
to the events of the Secchi Monument – taken over by Archivio di Stato di Reggio Emilia in 1927
at the closing of the Committee – they were not ordered and it is therefore impossible to identify
them except by their dates or with rare original signatures; only very recently is that resource is
near to be completely organized. The following archives and libraries have also been consulted:
Biblioteca Antonio Panizzi in Reggio Emilia (BPRe); Archivio Storico della Provincia di Reggio
Emilia (ASPRe); Archivio della Provincia di Reggio Emilia (APRe); Archivio storico
dell’Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri-INAF (AAFi); Archivio storico dell’Osservatorio
Astronomico di Brera-INAF (AOB); Archivio storico dell’Osservatorio Astronomico di
Capodimonte-INAF (ASOC); Archivio storico del Dipartimento di Astronomia, Università di
Bologna (AABo; most of the documents in this archive are digitized and can be accessed online at
http://archiviostoricoastronomia.unibo.it/).
F. Bònoli (*)
Department of Physics and Astronomy, Alma Mater Studiorum, Università di Bologna,
Bologna, Italy
e-mail: fabrizio.bonoli@unibo.it
A. Mandrino
INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera, Milan, Italy
e-mail: agnese.mandrino@inaf.it