Pope Leo XIII Pope Leo XII, born in 1810 as Vincenzo Gioacchino, a son of the noble Pecci family of Carpineto Romano, was the first Pope elected after the fall of Rome in 1870, reigning from 1878 until his death in 1903. In one of the longest pontificates in history,...
Pope Pius X Pope Pius X, Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto (1835 – 1914), was elected Pope in August 1903 and served until his death in 1914. He played a crucial role in the history of the early Specola. After the death of Father Denza in 1894, other scientists assigned to...
Cardinal Pietro Maffi Pietro Maffi (1858-1931) was appointed by Pope Pius X in 1904 to serve as the President of the Governing Board of the Vatican Observatory. In a 1905 memorandum sent to Pius X, Maffi recommended that the Observatory be entrusted to the care of a...
Home The History The Exhibition Area 1 Area 2 Area 3 Area 4 Area 5 The Telescopes Pagina Test Merz Telescope This telescope, manufactured by the famous Merz firm of Munich, has an aperture of 10 cm and a focal length of 1.5 m, with an equatorial mount. Inscribed on...
American Bridge By the early 1900s there were four telescope domes on the walls of the Vatican: The equatorial photographic telescope Carte du Ciel was located on the Leonine Tower, which was later renamed the Tower of St John. A large refracting telescope, the...
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