Mem. S.A.It. Suppl. Vol. 9, 25c© SAIt 2006

Memorie della

Supplementi

Le Memorie della Societa degli SpettroscopistiItaliani

S. Serio

DSFA Universita di Palermo, and INAF Osservatorio Astronomico di Palermo Giuseppe S.Vaiana, Piazza del Parlamento 1, I-90134 Palermo, Italye-mail: serio@astropa.unipa.it

Abstract. Le Memorie della Societa degli Spettroscopisti was the first international scien-tific journal dedicated to Physical Astronomy. I trace its history until, in 1920, it changedits name into Memorie della Societa Astronomica Italiana.

Key words. History, Astrophysics, Italy

The Societa degli Spettroscopisti Italiani 1

was established in Rome on October 5, 1871,during a meeting attended by representa-tives of the Astronomical Observatories ofCapodimonte (Arminio Nobile), CollegioRomano (Angelo Secchi) and Palermo (PietroTacchini) officialy delegated by the directorsof the Observatories of Padua (GiuseppeLorenzoni) and Campidoglio (LorenzoRespighi), and whose transcripts are publishedon the first issue of the Memorie della Societadegli Spettroscopisti Italiani (1872).

The society was rather different from amodern scientific society such as, for exam-ple, Societa Astronomica Italiana. It was moresimilar to what we would call a Consortiumfor a scientific programme requiring cooper-ation among different Institutes. Scope of theSociety was in fact to coordinate solar obser-vations of the participating observatories, to

Send offprint requests to: S. Serio1 For the early history of the Memorie and of the

Society I refer to the chapter by G. Fodera Serioin L’Astronomia in Italia, F. Bonoli Editor, SocietaAstronomica Italiana, Naples 1998, pages 21 to 31.

obtain maximum coverage in monitoring solarphenomena. Work to be done included mon-itoring and morphological studies of promi-nences, sunspots, faculae and spiculae, spec-troscopical studies, measurements of solar di-ameters, study the correlation of solar phenom-ena with Aurorae and terrestrial magnetism.The participating observatories would haveto take monthly shifts to perform monitoringchores, telegraphing the other observatories incase of bad weather or of other impediments.

Tacchini took charge of presenting a pro-posal to the Ministry of Public Instruction toobtain funds for the publication of the results,and for telegraph expenses. The original ideawas to publish on the Giornale di ScienzeNaturali in Palermo, but the funding of theproposal was probably more generous than ex-pected, and he was able to start with a dedi-cated journal, the Memorie della Societa degliSpettroscopisti Italiani. The Journal was pub-lished in Palermo by Stabilimento TipograficoLao and, in its first volume, is embellishedby a number of tables by the lithographerFrauenfelder, author of many of the figures ofGiornale di Scienze Naturali, who had collab-

26 Serio: Memorie Spettroscopisti Italiani

orated with Tacchini to the volume dedicatedto the reports of the Italian Commission for theeclipse of 1870 2 and to the beautiful drawingsof prominences in other previous publicationsby Tacchini.

Obviously, the prompt response of theMinistry and the generous funding were duemainly to the quality of the proposal. Tacchini,however, celebrating the twenty-fifth volumeof the Journal, feels a special obligation tothank three persons, without whom the suc-cess of the Society would have not been pos-sible: Stanislao Cannizzaro (1826-1910), whohad been Rector of the University of Palermoin the years preceeding the foundation andwas Senator in 1871, and “first helped thestarting insitution”; Giovanni Cantoni (1818-1897), Secretary General of the Ministry ofPublic Education from 1870 to 1872 “whohelped it with public support”; and MarcoMinghetti (1818-1886), Minister of PublicEducation from 1873, “who established its lifeon firm foundations” 3

The first volume of the Journal, totaling124 pages, is entirely dedicated to the pro-gramme of solar observations of the society.Already in the second volume we find that thejournal is open to international contributions.We find in fact articles by T. Bredichin, A.De La Rive, M. Faye, E. Loomis, and C. A.Young. We find also a brief article by GaetanoCacciatore commemorating Giovanni BattistaDonati, who died on September 19, 1873. Inthe future, the Memorie will publish obituar-ies of all members of the Society, thus giv-ing an important documentation to history ofAstronomy and of Astrophysics.

The third volume publishes two notes byT. Bredichin, one by H. Draper (with a pho-tograph of the solar spectrum), R. Gautier,N. Lockyer, and R. Wolf. It is interestingto note that one of the articles by Bredichinis on Comet Coggia, and not on SolarPhysics, and that the same volume III pub-

2 G. Cacciatore (ed.), Rapporti delle Osservazionidell’Ecclisse Totale di Sole del 22 Dicembre 1870Eseguite in Sicilia dalla Commissione Italiana,Palermo 1872.

3 Memorie ..., Vol. XXV, 1896.

lishes an Appendice Astronomica, in response,as Tacchini writes, to the need expressed byseveral Italian astronomers to have a journalopen to general astronomy. The Appendix shallbe published until 1878, when the main jour-nal has gradually been increasing the fractionof articles on different subjects, making theAppendix useless.

The new journal acquires very soon aninternational reputation, publishing articles inEnglish and in French in addition to Italian.In 1873 it receives an award at the UniversalExposition in Wien. It is published in Palermountil 1879, when Tacchini becames director ofthe Observatory of Collegio Romano in Rome.From 1899, Annibale Ricco takes charge of itsediting, and the journal is printed in Cataniauntil 1920. On this date the Society changesits name into Societa Astronomica Italiana,and the Journal takes the new title of Memoriedella Societa Astronomica Italiana, gia degliSpettroscopisti, whose publication continuestoday. Since 1986 the journal has changed itsscope, turning to publishing essentially pro-ceedings of international conferences or in-vited reviews, rather than unsolicited contribu-tions.

Volume XIX (1890), for the first time, pub-lishes a list of members of the society (seefigure below). We do not know when, butlikely shortly before this date the Societa degliSpettroscopisti had changed its bylaws. Thenew ones call for 30 italian members and 30foreign members, but the list for 1890 includes4 empty lines in the italian section. Membersinclude astronomers, physicists and other sci-entsists, all having in common an interestin spectroscopy, but not necessarily in Solarstudies. The journal has served the interna-tional community as the first and only journaldedicated to Physical Astronomy, until 1895,when G.E. Hale established the AstrophysicalJournal. This date -it is worth mentioning thatP. Tacchini was among the members of its edi-torial board- substantially marks the end of theMemorie as an international journal. Actuallythe Memorie shall continue to publish articlesin English and French, but mostly reprintingarticles appeared in other journals.

Serio: Memorie Spettroscopisti Italiani 27

Fig. 1. List of members of the Societa degli Spettroscopisti, published in Vol. XIX (1890).

In the occasion of the 40th anniversary ofthe foundation of the Society, Vol. XL is ac-companied by an appendix with a brief historyof the Society and a large index of the arti-cles published since 1872. Despite its apertureto essentially all Physical Astronomy, 56% ofthe articles published at that time can be clas-

sified as Solar Physics, 16% as Solar Systemstudies, 6% as Astrometry and only 2% as stel-lar Spectroscopy. The index also shows sizablefractions of articles (2,6%) dedicated to newobservatories, and to obituaries of members ofthe society (3%).