Francesco Stelluti

Francesco Stelluti (1577 to 1652) was an Italian polymath who worked in mathematics, microscopy, literature and astronomy. Born in Fabriano, he went to Rome to study law and practised it all his life while pursuing scientific interests. In August 1603 he joined Federico Cesi, Anastasio de Filiis and Johannes van Heeck in founding the Accademia dei Lincei, where he taught mathematics, geometry and astronomy, calculated the motions of the stars and was known by the pseudonym Tardigrado, the slow stepper. With Cesi he printed the broadsheet Apiarium in 1625, which carried the first published microscopic images of biological structures, three bees enlarged for the crest of Pope Urban VIII. His 1630 translation of Persius is the first codex-format book to contain images of organisms seen through a microscope. After Cesi died he kept the Academy together and in 1651 saw through the press the Tesoro Messicano, the long collaborative edition of the Mexican natural history of Francisco Hernandez.