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Pierre de Maricourt
A French military engineer and scholar active in the mid-13th century, he wrote the Epistola de magnete during the siege of Lucera in 1269, an early …
Timeline
- 1261–1268Picardy · PicardyAs a French military engineer he participated in the design of siege engines and in combat operations, possessing practical experience in mathematics and mechanics, laying the technical background for his later experimental research on magnetism.
- 1269Lucera · Province of FoggiaIn August 1269, writing from a siege camp to a friend, he completed the Epistola de magnete, describing experimentally that the two poles of a magnet are inseparable, like poles repel and unlike poles attract, and discussing making a compass by rubbing an iron needle with a magnet, inaugurating systematic European research on magnetism.
Sources
- Epistola de magnete — Petrus Peregrinus de Maricourt (1269) https://www.britannica.com/biography/Peter-Peregrinus-of-Maricourt
- Peter Peregrinus of Maricourt — A. C. Crombie (1974) https://www.encyclopedia.com/science/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/peter-peregrinus-maricourt