Cuneo Civic Library - Giuseppe Peano Collection
Giuseppe Peano Collection Catalog
The "Giuseppe Peano" Collection consists of the Archive, digitized and available online, the Library, catalogued in SBN, and a permanent exhibition, which can be visited by reservation.
Archive
After Peano's death, thanks to the donation of his rich library by his wife Carola, Peano's students and collaborators: U. Cassina, G. Canesi, N. Mastropaolo and M. Gliozzi dedicated themselves to compiling a catalogue of his numerous volumes, manuscripts, correspondence and various documents.
Through Ugo Cassina, the last of Peano's students and then director of the Mathematics Library, most of the scientific volumes were sold to the University of Milan, with the proceeds going to support the journal Schola et Vita. Gaetano Canesi oversaw the organization and inventory of documents relating to international auxiliary languages.
These materials, mostly belonging to the Academia pro Interlingua, were preserved in the 1940s by Gaetano Canesi and Mario Gliozzi. In 1954, Cassina obtained permission from Canesi's heirs to donate them to the Cuneo Civic Library. The then director, Piero Camilla, accepted the donation in March 1955 and moved the interlinguistic library and Peano's correspondence archive to Cuneo.
The archive consists of over four thousand documents of various types: letters, drafts, manuscripts, typescripts, notes, photographs, business cards, newspaper clippings, publication excerpts, and pamphlets. Added to this core is the bequest that Peano's wife left directly to the Cuneo Civic Museum: around fifty documents and honors relating to her husband's career, including diplomas and certificates from national and international academies, as well as several letters and postcards sent to her by Giuseppe during his business trips.
The library contains over eight hundred volumes, books, and periodicals, mostly related to international auxiliary languages. The presence, within the volumes and journals, of numerous notes, letters, and newspaper clippings testifies to the library's daily use by Peano as a study and work tool.
Click on the image to consult the digitization of the Peano Archive, edited by Clara Silvia Roero, Natalia Nervo, Tiziana Armano, published by the Department of Mathematics of theUniversity of Turin.
Please note! Due to a technical issue, the archive can only be viewed with Firefox (it does not work with Chrome or Edge). To view PDF files correctly, you must set the " Open in Firefox " setting
Library
The room housing the Peano library and archive was designed primarily to ensure the safety and preservation of the materials stored there, housed in specially designed folders. Beyond this primary requirement, among the various possible solutions, a layout was chosen that captivates the visitor through words, fabrics, furniture, colors, and books. The words are those of the writer Lalla Romano, granddaughter of Giuseppe Peano, and other friends and colleagues, who describe the home of Giuseppe and Carola Peano and their exquisite hospitality. Hence the idea of the walnut glass-fronted bookcase, the sitting area, the tavern table, the blackboard, and the desk. While the bookcase is newly constructed, the other furnishings were purchased and restored based on a design by architect Simona Villavecchia. The library is catalogued in SBN; the catalogue can be searched on theSBNCloud OPAC.
Permanent exhibition
The title of the permanent documentary exhibition, "The Creative Spirit Is Light," is taken from "A Dream of the North" by Lalla Romano (the mathematician's granddaughter) and was chosen because it sums up, in a nutshell, what Peano was, and wanted to be, as a man and a scientist. The panels summarize the biographical events of the famous mathematician, his most important results, his current relevance, his major projects, and his dreams. The documents on display represent a sample of the richness of the library and archive donated to the Civic Library in 1954 and are complemented by some mathematical games he described in the 1924 volume " Arithmetic Games and Interesting Problems ," which have been reproduced in wood by the Giardino di Archimede in Florence. A video by Carlo Cagnasso chronicles Peano's personal life, his social life, and his openness to colleagues, collaborators, and students. The exhibition was curated by the Civic Library and by Clara Silvia Roero and Erika Luciano of the University of Turin.
Click on the image to consult the exhibition catalogue, published by Nerosubianco Edizioni.