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Girolamo Cardano[1] (1501-1576) was born in Pavia, Italy, the illegitimate son of a well-educated jurist, Fazio Cardano, who was also a friend of Leonardo da Vinci. As a child, Cardano was frequently sick and often mistreated by his parents. He entered the University of Pavia at the age of nineteen, eventually transferred to the University of Padua and spent several years at the university, completing his doctorate in medicine in 1826. After he was graduated from the university, he set up a medical practice in Saccolongo, and married five years later. In 1534 Cardano moved to Milan with his family, set up a new medical practice, and began teaching mathematics at the Piattine schools.
Over the next decade, Cardano gained great notoriety for both his medical practice and his mathematical abilities. He published two mathematical treatises during this time, the Practica arithmetica (Practical arithmetic) (1539) and the most influential of his works, Artis magnae sive de regulis algebraicis liber unus (The Great Art or the First Book about Regular Algebra) (1545), which introduced the Cardano rule for solving reduced third-degree equations and described the linear transformation that would eliminate the second degree term in a complete cubic equation. Although Cardano accepted the chair of Medicine at the University of Pavia in 1543, his interest in mathematics and mechanics never wavered. He wrote about the impossibility of perpetual motion (except in celestial bodies), and in his Opus novum de proportionibus (New work on proportions), Cardano tried to apply quantitative methods to the study of physics. He also created a set of three concentric rings, able to rotate in three perpendicular planes known as the Cardano suspension.
In his lifetime, Cardano published over 200 works on topics ranging from medicine and mathematics to physics, philosophy, religion and music. He was considered one of the greatest physicians of his time, second only to Andreas Vesalius. But his work on occult philosophy, and his astrological predictions of the life of Christ in the De astrorum iudiciis (On astrological laws) of 1554 created a great stir within Catholicism, especially since they were made during the time of the Inquisition. He was imprisoned briefly in 1570, and in 1576, he committed suicide, ensuring that his prediction that he would live to be only seventy-five years old would come true.
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