Top Italian inventions at a glance
Piano: Bartolomeo Cristofori, Florence, c.1700 | Electric battery: Alessandro Volta, Como, 1799 | Barometer: Evangelista Torricelli, Rome, 1643 | Eyeglasses: Pisa, c.1286 (first documented use) | Radio: Guglielmo Marconi, Bologna, 1895 | Telephone caveat: Antonio Meucci, New York, 1871 (Bell patent 1876) | Thermometer: Galileo, Padua, c.1593
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The piano, the battery and the barometer -- the three world-changing Italian instruments
The piano (pianoforte, the instrument that plays soft and loud, the defining improvement over the harpsichord, which had no dynamic variation) was invented by Bartolomeo Cristofori, a Florentine harpsichord maker employed at the Medici court. The first documentary reference to Cristofori's new instrument is in a 1700 Medici inventory listing 'an Arpicembalo del piano e forte' (a harpsichord of soft and loud). Three of Cristofori's original instruments survive: at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (1720), the Museo Nazionale degli Strumenti Musicali in Rome (1722), and the Musikinstrumenten-Museum in Leipzig (1726). The specific technical innovation: the hammer action, a key press causes a hammer to strike the string and immediately rebound, allowing the note to sustain or be dampened by the player's touch. The harpsichord plucked the string (no dynamic variation). The clavichord had a similar hammer action but was too quiet for concert performance. Cristofori's piano solved both problems simultaneously.
Alessandro Volta (1745-1827, born in Como, professor at Pavia) invented the voltaic pile (the first electric battery) in 1799, a stack of alternating zinc and copper discs separated by brine-soaked cloth, producing a continuous electric current from a chemical reaction. The specific significance: every previous source of electricity (the Leyden jar, the electrostatic generator) produced a momentary discharge. Volta's pile produced sustained current. The unit of electrical potential (the volt) and the unit of electrical energy (the electronvolt) are named for him. The Volta Temple (Tempio Voltiano) in Como, on the lake shore, displays replica voltaic piles and Volta's original instruments. It is one of the finest small science museums in Italy. Lombardy guide
Evangelista Torricelli (1608-1647, born in Faenza, worked in Rome and Florence as Galileo's secretary) invented the mercury barometer in 1643 by filling a glass tube with mercury, inverting it over a mercury bowl, and demonstrating that the mercury column supported by atmospheric pressure settled at 76 cm, proving the existence of atmospheric pressure and the existence of vacuum (the space above the mercury column). The Torricellian vacuum was the first laboratory-produced vacuum in history. The unit of pressure (the torr, 1/760 of standard atmosphere) is named for him.
Who invented the piano?
The piano was invented by Bartolomeo Cristofori, a Florentine harpsichord maker at the Medici court, around 1700. The first documentary reference is in a 1700 Medici inventory listing 'an Arpicembalo del piano e forte.' Three original Cristofori pianos survive: at the Metropolitan Museum of Art New York (1720), the Museo Nazionale degli Strumenti Musicali Rome (1722), and the Leipzig Musikinstrumenten-Museum (1726). The specific Italian invention: the hammer action with immediate rebound, allowing dynamic variation (soft and loud) impossible on the harpsichord.
What did Alessandro Volta invent?
Alessandro Volta (1745-1827, Como, Lombardy) invented the electric battery, specifically the voltaic pile (1799), a stack of alternating zinc and copper discs separated by brine-soaked cloth that produced continuous electric current from a chemical reaction. The first sustained electrical current source ever produced. The volt (electrical potential unit) and electronvolt are named for him. The Tempio Voltiano museum in Como displays his original instruments and replica piles. The Como Lake town of Como is accessible from Milan in 30 minutes by train.
Did Italians invent the telephone?
Antonio Meucci (1808-1889, born Florence, worked in Havana and New York) filed a caveat (a provisional patent notice) with the US Patent Office in 1871 describing a voice-transmission device he called the 'telettrofono', five years before Alexander Graham Bell's telephone patent in 1876. Meucci couldn't afford the $250 annual caveat renewal fee in 1874 and allowed it to lapse. Bell filed his patent two years later. The US Congress formally recognised Meucci's priority in a 2002 resolution. The specific Italian context: Meucci's device had been in use in his Staten Island home from 1854, transmitting voice between his workshop and his wife's bedroom.
What Italian inventions are used in daily life today?
Italian inventions in daily use today: the piano (Cristofori, Florence 1700). Eyeglasses (Pisa, c.1286, the first documented spectacle wearers in a 1289 Florentine manuscript). The barometer (Torricelli, Rome 1643). The electric battery (Volta, Como 1799). The radio (Marconi, Bologna 1895, the first radio transmission across the English Channel 1899, across the Atlantic 1901). Double-entry bookkeeping (Luca Pacioli, Venice 1494, in Summa de arithmetica, the foundation of modern accounting). The typewriter (Pellegrino Turri, Reggio Emilia, 1808, invented to allow a blind friend to write). And hydraulic mining (Agricola's De Re Metallica was systematised from Italian engineering of the 15th century).
Where can I see Italian invention museums?
Italian science and invention museums: the Museo Nazionale della Scienza e della Tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci (Milan, the most comprehensive, with the interactive Leonardo machine reconstructions, the best science museum in Italy). The Tempio Voltiano (Como, on the lake shore, Volta's instruments and the first battery demonstrations). The Museo del Patrimonio Industriale (Bologna, industrial history including the Marconi radio collection). The Museo Galileo (Florence, Galileo's original telescopes and instruments, adjacent to the Uffizi). And the Opificio delle Pietre Dure (Florence, the conservation science institute where the Bronzi di Riace were restored).
What did Galileo invent?
Galileo Galilei (1564-1642, born Pisa, worked Padua and Florence) is credited with the thermometer (the thermoscope, c.1593, a sealed glass tube with water and air that measured temperature variation), improvements to the telescope (1609, based on the Dutch design but with dramatically improved magnification), and the law of pendulum isochronism (1581, observed at the Pisa Cathedral chandelier, equal-length pendulums swing in equal time regardless of arc). The specific importance of Galileo for Italy: the Museo Galileo in Florence (Piazza dei Giudici 1, €10) holds his two surviving original telescopes, his compass, and the preserved middle finger of his right hand (displayed in an ornate case since 1737, the specific Florentine approach to a scientist who spent the last 9 years of his life under house arrest for proving the Earth moved).
What is Guglielmo Marconi famous for?
Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937, born Bologna, worked in England and Italy) is the inventor of practical radio communication, he transmitted the first radio signal across the English Channel in 1899 and across the Atlantic in 1901 (from Cornwall to Newfoundland, disproving the sceptics who claimed radio waves wouldn't follow the Earth's curvature). He received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1909. The specific Bologna connection: Marconi conducted his first radio experiments on the Pontecchio Marconi estate outside Bologna in 1894-1895, transmitting between the villa and a point 2.4 km away on the hillside. The villa is now the Marconi Museum (Museo Marconi, Pontecchio Marconi, open Sundays by appointment).
Planning an Italian science and invention heritage trip?
Museo Leonardo Milan + Tempio Voltiano Como + Museo Galileo Florence + Marconi Museum Bologna, the Italian inventor circuit.
Plan my trip →Eyeglasses, double-entry bookkeeping and the thermoscope -- three more Italian world-changers
Eyeglasses (spectacles) were invented in Pisa around 1286, the first documentary reference is in a 1289 manuscript by the Florentine Sandro di Popozo ('I find myself so impaired by sight that without the glasses known as spectacles I would no longer be able to read or write'). The Venetian glassblowing tradition facilitated the production of the first corrective lenses. The ophthalmologist dispute: Salvino d'Armato degli Armati (Florence) and Alessandro della Spina (Pisa) are both credited in different medieval sources. The Pisa attribution is the more consistently documented. Before eyeglasses, presbyopia (the age-related loss of near-vision that typically begins at 40-45) ended the scholarly and artisanal careers of every European who developed it.
Double-entry bookkeeping was codified by the Franciscan friar Luca Pacioli in his Summa de arithmetica, geometria, proportioni et proportionalità (Venice, 1494), the first printed treatise on the subject. Pacioli didn't invent the system (Venetian merchants had been using it since at least the 14th century, and the Medici bank used it from the 1390s) but he codified and published it, making it universally accessible. The specific innovation: recording every transaction twice (a debit in one account, a credit in another), creating a self-checking system where the total debits always equal total credits. Every modern accounting system descends from Pacioli's 1494 codification. Pacioli was also a close friend of Leonardo da Vinci. Leonardo illustrated Pacioli's next book (De divina proportione, 1509).
What other Italian inventions exist in science and medicine?
Italian contributions to science beyond the most famous: the thermometer (Galileo's thermoscope, Padua c.1593). The seismograph (Luigi Palmieri, Naples, 1856, the first instrument to record earthquake P-waves specifically, not just ground motion generally). The telephone caveat (Antonio Meucci, 1871). Nitroglycerin as a medicine (Ascanio Sobrero, Turin, 1847, though Alfred Nobel's use of it as an explosive followed. Sobrero regretted the discovery). The Voltaic pile/electric battery (Volta, Como, 1799). And the radio (Marconi, Bologna, 1895). In mathematics: the cubic and quartic equation solutions (Niccolò Tartaglia and Gerolamo Cardano, 16th century Milan). Fibonacci's introduction of Arabic numerals to Europe (Pisa, c.1202 in the Liber Abaci).
Where was the piano invented?
The piano was invented in Florence, at the Medici court, around 1700 by Bartolomeo Cristofori, a Paduan harpsichord maker employed as the Keeper of the Instruments by the Medici. The first document reference: a 1700 Medici household inventory listing 'an Arpicembalo del piano e forte newly invented by Bartolomeo Cristofori.' Three original Cristofori pianos survive: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (1720). Museo Nazionale degli Strumenti Musicali, Rome (1722, open to visitors, €5 entry). And Musikinstrumenten-Museum, Leipzig (1726).
What did Leonardo da Vinci invent?
Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519, born Vinci, worked Florence, Milan, Rome, France) is the most famous Italian inventor, though the key distinction is that most of his inventions were never built in his lifetime, they survived only in his notebook drawings. Documented Leonardo concepts: the aerial screw (a helicopter precursor). The ornithopter (a flapping-wing flying machine). The tank (an armoured vehicle powered by men turning cranks). The revolving bridge. The parachute. The solar power concentrator. And the robotic knight (a mechanical knight figure that could move its arms, documented in the 1495 Milan notebooks). The Museo Nazionale della Scienza e della Tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci in Milan (Via San Vittore 21, €10) has the most comprehensive collection of working reconstructions of Leonardo's machines, the best science museum in Italy and the best Leonardo machine collection in the world.
What is the Italian contribution to astronomy?
Italian contributions to astronomy: Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), first systematic telescopic observations (1609), discovery of Jupiter's four largest moons (the Galilean moons), support for the Copernican heliocentric model leading to his 1633 Inquisition trial. Giovanni Domenico Cassini (1625-1712, born Perinaldo, Liguria), discovery of the Cassini Division in Saturn's rings, measurements of the distance to Mars used to calculate the astronomical unit, first director of the Paris Observatory. Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835-1910, Savigliano, Piedmont), the 1877 Mars observation that described 'canali' (channels), mistranslated into English as 'canals' and triggering the Martian civilization debate that dominated popular astronomy for 30 years.