Samuel Gessner

Research interests

• History of mathematics (séculos XV a XVII);
• Mathematical culture and sub-cultures among savants, teachers, at court, in the workshops and in the field;
• Technical treatises in the first centuries of the printing press;
• The role of mathematical instruments in early modern science.

Projects

• “O papel dos instrumentos matemáticos: cultura matemática nos tratados e nas mãos do prático”, post-doc research project, Faculty of Sciences, University of Lisbon, (FCT/MCTES, SFRH/BPD/35072/2007), 2007-2012.

Participation

• ALFA, "Shaping a European scientific scene: Alfonsine astronomy" (ERC project 2016, agreement n° 723085), 2019-2021.
• “On the instruments' trail: Exploring Royal Cabinets of Natural Philosophy in Portugal (18th-19th century)", (PTDC/HIS-HCT/098970/2008), 2010-2013.
• "Lisbon Academy of Sciences Museum collections scientific background", (HC/0074/2009), 2010-2011.
• "Reading newspapers. An open window to representations of Science and Technology in the Portuguese Press (1900-1926)", (PTDC/HCT/68210/2006), 2008-2011.
• "História dos Jogos em Portugal", (PTDC/HCT/70823/2006), 2008-2010.
• "Reception and developments of logarithms in Portugal in the 17th and 18th centuries", Centro de Matemática (CMAT), Universidade do Minho, 2008-2011.
• "Paving the way for integrated archival and collection-based research in the history of science: Preservation, access and case-studies of the collections of the Museum of Science (University of Lisbon)", (PTDC/HAH/64181/2006), 2008-2011.

Publications (selection)

1. Karsten Gaulke, Michael Korey, SAMUEL GESSNER, “Clocks as Astronomical Models. ‘The heavens daily in view’: Planetary clocks in Europe, 14th–16th century“, in Anthony Turner, Jonathan Betts, James Nye eds., A General History of Horology, Oxford, Oxford University Press [forthcoming end 2021].
2. SAMUEL GESSNER, Karsten Gaulke, Michael Korey, “The Anomalous Sun: Variant Mechanical Realizations of Solar Theory on Planetary Automata of the Renaissance”, Nuncius. Journal for the history of material and visual culture of science, vol. 35, n. 2, 2020, p. 191-234.
3. SAMUEL GESSNER, “The perspective of the instrument maker: The planispheric projection with Gemma Frisius and the Arsenius workshop at Louvain”, Sven Dupré ed., Perspective as practice. Renaissance Cultures of Optics, Turnhout, Brepols Publishers, 2019, p. 103-122, 480, 481.
4. Dominique Raynaud, SAMUEL GESSNER, Bernardo Mota, “Andalò di Negro’s De compositione astrolabii: a critical edition with English translation and notes”, Archive for History of Exact Sciences, vol. 73, 2019, p. 551–617.
5. Michael Korey, SAMUEL GESSNER, Claudia Bergmann(ill.), Der Planeten wundersamer Lauf. Eine Himmelsmaschine für Kurfürst August von Sachsen, Mathematisch-Physikalischer Salon, Dresden, 2017.