Vatican Observatory: Difference between revisions

Father [[Angelo Secchi]] SJ relocated the College Observatory to the top of [[Sant'Ignazio|Sant'Ignazio di Loyola a Campo Marzio]] (Church of St. Ignatius in [[Rome]]). In 1870, with the [[Risorgimento|capture of Rome]], the College Observatory fell into the hands of the Italian Government. Out of respect for his work, however, Father Secchi was permitted to continue using the Observatory. After Secchi's death in 1878 the Observatory was nationalized by the Italian government and renamed the ''Regio Osservatorio al Collegio Romano'' ("Royal Observatory at the Roman College"), ending astronomical research in the Vatican.

 

 

In the late nineteenth-century the Vatican Observatory was part of a group of top astronomy institutions from around the world which worked together to create a photographic "Celestial Map" ("[[Carte du Ciel]]") and an "astrographic" catalog pinpointing the stars' positions. Italian astronomer Father [[Francesco Denza]] led the Vatican's contribution to the project until his death in 1894. In the early twentieth-century Father John Hagen took over the project and recruited a group of nuns from the Sisters of the Holy Child Mary to work on the necessary recording and calculations. The sisters were Sisters Emilia Ponzoni, Regina Colombo, Concetta Finardi and Luigia Panceri.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.catholicnews.com/services/englishnews/2016/nuns-instrumental-in-vatican-celestial-survey.cfm|title=Mapping with the stars: Nuns instrumental in Vatican celestial survey|website=www.catholicnews.com|access-date=26 December 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/these-little-known-nuns-helped-map-stars-180959012/|title=These Little-Known Nuns Helped Map the Stars|last=Blakemore|first=Erin|website=Smithsonian Magazine|language=en|access-date=26 December 2019}}</ref>