Front page of the book "Algebra" by Rafael Bombelli
Rafael Bombelli (January 1526 - 1572) was an Italian mathematician, known as the introduction of complex numbers.
Bombelli was born in Bologna as the oldest of the six sons of a wool trader Antonio Mazzioli and Diamante Scudieri. He did not pursue university education, but was taught by Pier Francesco Clementi, an engineer / architect. This Pier Francesco Clementi worked from 1548 for the Pope Valley to dry the marshes on the Topino at Foligno. Probably Bombelli was involved, but certainly not.
For the most part of his working life, Bombelli worked for Roman nobleman Alessandro Ruffini, who later became Bishop of Melfi. In this way he worked on the drizzle of the marshes in the Tuscan region of Val di Chiana. This project was stopped for some time between 1555 and 1560. While waiting for the resumption of the project (1557-1560), Bombelli decided to write a math book because he found that many of the differences between the mathematicians in question were due to the lack of profound knowledge. According to Bombelli, only Girolamo Cardano had studied the matter thoroughly, but his publication was not readable without profound knowledge of mathematics. Bombelli's goal was to write a book that was sufficiently simple and bundled all the knowledge.
Bombelli was settled in Rome, where he advised Pope Pius IV, among others, on the proposed dropping of the Pontiac marshes. During one of his visits to Rome, he met Antonio Maria Pazzi and started working with the Diophantus's arithmetic, just discovered.
Bombelli passed away in 1572, probably in Rome. In that same year, before his death, he published the first three parts of 'Algebra'. The remaining two parts, more focused on geometry, were discovered in 1923 and first published in 1929. Externe link
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