In August, we wrote that a valuable manuscript from the University of Michigan library, whose authorship is attributed to Galileo Galilei, was a masterful forgery. A document in the Morgan Library in New York is also false. An Italian historian investigating this question came across the work of another scientist.

this is fake

The letter from Michigan was confirmed by Cardinal Pietro Maffei, Archbishop of Pisa. In the cardinal’s collection were two other documents allegedly written by Galileo, which he used for comparison. However, they were later proven to be fake. It is interesting that one of these frauds was accompanied by a letter. “Libro della Thoughazione Astronomica” by Alemberto Mauri, 1606. In this text, among other arguments, evidence for the existence of mountains on the Moon is given and the motion of celestial bodies in irregular orbits is explained for physical reasons.

• Speculation that “Libro della Regardazione Astronomica” might actually have been written by Galileo began to surface shortly after the text was published. For example, according to one of Galileo’s colleagues at the University of Padua, Fortuna Liceti, Maury was a man who was a gifted mathematician but appeared to be an astronomer.
• “Libro della Regardazione Astronomica” is actually a commentary and response to the works of Lodovico delle Colombe, the philosopher of the period, who is called Galileo’s “rival”. Delle Colombe was a supporter of the ancient teachings that the Earth is at the center of the universe, the Sun revolves around it, and the stars in the sky are fixed. In his reflections on cosmology entitled “Risposte piacevoli e curiose”, he criticizes Galileo’s views, but does not directly refer to him, calling his rival “Mr. Maska” and “that professor who taught in Padua”.
• At the same time, one of the University of Padua students wrote “Galileo Galilei” next to the subtitle of his work “Risposte”, which mentions “Mr. Maska”.
• It has also been confirmed that Galileo used pseudonyms. For example, Cecco also participated in the 1604 supernova debate under the name Ronchitti.

The strongest evidence of Galileo’s authorship is the list of delle Colombe’s “speaking of me with contempt” from certain places in his text. However, when Matteo Coschi, a historian at the Ca’Foscari University of Venice, reviewed all these references, he found that they all led to passages that were offensive to the pseudonym Alemberto Mauri. Koski says that these remarks would not have felt personally attacked if Galileo himself had not been a Maury.

The research also uncovered a handwritten note from Galileo stating that the astronomer was preparing another response to delle Colombe, but he decided it was not worth his time. Years later – the movement of the Earth, the surface of the Moon, etc. They continued to argue about him, but by that time Galileo was already famous and no longer needed a nickname.