Ambrogio Soldani

Ambrogio Soldani (15 June 1736 – 14 July 1808) was an Italian Camaldolese monk who is known for his works relating the shell fossils found in the mountains of Tuscany. Some of his work could now be viewed as the intersection of geology, zoology and paleontology. Today Soldani is considered, together with Jacopo Bartolomeo Beccari, the father of micropaleontology. Charles Lyell considered him one of the most important eighteenth-century naturalists. He also published observations about astronomy.

Biography He was born in Pratovecchio, and entered the Camaldolese order in the Monastery of Santa Maria degli Angeli in Florence as a young man (1732), yet he took an interest in mathematics. He transferred to the Monastery of San Michele di Pisa. Soldani was anointed abbot in 1776, and four years later he became the superintendent of the abbey of Santa Mustiola in Siena. There he began examining under a microscope the fossils in Tuscan chalk deposits, near Siena and Volterra. In 1780 he published a preliminary Saggio orittografico, where he described various fossil bearing localities and explains the geology of Tuscany. The work impressed his contemporaries, and the Grand duke of Tuscany, Pietro Leopoldo, appointed Soldani professor of Mathematics at the University of Siena. Soldani also became the secretary of the Accademia dei Fisiocritici, consisting of individuals with interest in natural sciences. In 1783, he traveled through the Romagna region gathering more samples and exploring thermal springs. On 16 June 1794, there was an aerolite or meteor shower in Siena, and he published his observations and about meteor samples. Upon his death, he gifted his fossil collections to the state.

Works

Among his works were: