Experiments on the generation of insects / Francesco Redi, of Arezzo: tr. from the Italian ed. of 1688 by Mab Bigelow.

  • Francesco Redi
Date:
1909
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Experiments on the generation of insects / Francesco Redi, of Arezzo: tr. from the Italian ed. of 1688 by Mab Bigelow. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    studied medicine and philosophy at the University of Pisa, whence he returned with his Doctor’s degree to practice in Florence, where his family, meanwhile, had settled. His parents were of the provincial nobility, and his father, Gregory, a well-known physician, supported the family by his profession. Francesco had the good luck to be called to attend the Grand Duke after a hunting accident. Subsequently he became court physician and was much beloved by Ferdinand II and by his son and successor, Cosimo III. This prince did not resemble his magnanimous father, the founder of the Accademia del Cimento, for he did not protect the arts and sciences through love of them, but rather from vanity and a sense of his own importance. Cosimo was a bigot, whose mind was chiefly occupied in prosecuting religious offenders or in settling matters of etiquette. Small wonder that Swammerdam refused an invitation to this Court, or that Steno, his friend, who accepted it, soon afterwards ab- jured Protestantism. Redi’s training admirably fitted him for this position, which was a difficult one; for be- sides his duties as physician and head of the Medicean laboratory, he was often commanded to negotiate minor diplomatic matters or requested to act as mediator when friction occurred between the Grand Duke and his son. He was obliged to follow the Court in its migrations to seaside and villa, forced to interrupt his own work, and to add to his troubles, his nephews (Redi was unmar- ried), who through his influence held lucrative positions, were’often in difficulties of a compromising nature. The favor accorded to Redi by Cosimo caused him to be courted by many learned men, and he unselfishly used his privileges for the benefit of his numerous friends, among whom were the poets Filicaja and Menzim, Bel-
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