 vincenzo viviani (april 5, 1622 â september 22, 1703) was an italian mathematician and scientist. he was a pupil of torricelli and a disciple of galileo.viviani article Î¹Î½ the university of st andrews ==biography== born and raised in florence, viviani studied at a jesuit school. there, grand duke ferdinando ii de' medici furnished him a scholarship to purchase mathematical books. he became a pupil of evangelista torricelli and worked on physics and geometry. in 1639, at the age of 17, he was an assistant of galileo galilei in arcetri. he remained a disciple until galileo's death in 1642. from 1655 to 1656, viviani edited the first edition of galileo's collected works. after torricelli's 1647 death, viviani was appointed to fill his position at the accademia dell'arte del disegno in florence. viviani was also one of the first members of the grand duke's experimental academy, the accademia del cimento, when it was created a decade later. in 1660, viviani and giovanni alfonso borelli conducted an experiment to determine the speed of sound. timing the difference between the seeing the flash and hearing the sound of a cannon shot at a distance, they calculated a value of 350 meters per second (m/s), considerably better than the previous value of 478&nbsp;m/s obtained by pierre gassendi. the currently accepted value is 331.29&nbsp;m/s at 0 Â°c or 340.29&nbsp;m/s at sea level. it has also been claimed that in 1661 he experimented with the rotation of pendulums, 190 years before the famous demonstration by foucault. by 1666, viviani started to receive many job offers as his reputation as a mathematician grew. that same year, louis xiv of france offered him a position at the acadÃ©mie royale and john ii casimir of poland offered viviani a post as his astronomer. fearful of losing viv
1622_births 1703_deaths 17th-century_Italian_mathematicians Fellows_of_the_Royal_Society Italian_astronomers Italian_mathematicians Italian_physicists People_from_Florence Scientific_instrument_makers