VITO VOLTERRA E LA COSTRUZIONE DI UNA IDENTITÀ STORICO SCIENTIFICA NAZIONALE

Scientific institutions, particularly universities and academies, have often competed to identify and memorialize in stone the most prominent scientists or the most significant collections for scientific education. This article examines three cases in Rome in which the mathematical physicist Vito Volterra played a leading role: the bust of the mathematician Luigi Cremona, that of the physicist Alfonso Sella (son of Quintino, one of the most notable figures in the Risorgimento period and the formation of the unified state), and the Astronomical and Copernican Museum. The objective is to demonstrate the importance Volterra attributed to these and other ‘memorabilia’ as an integral part of a multifaceted strategy to innovate the country’s cultural activities and research policy, in which the historical dimension and its materializations were not insignificant.