author
Luigi Federico Menabrea
1809–1896
A soldier, mathematician, and statesman, he moved easily between science and public life. He is especially remembered today for an early account of Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine and for later serving as prime minister of Italy.
1 Audiobook
Sketch of the Analytical Engine invented by Charles Babbage, Esq.
by Luigi Federico Menabrea
About the author
Born in Chambéry in 1809, he studied at the University of Turin, where he trained as an engineer and earned a doctorate in mathematics. Early in his career he taught and wrote on mathematics and engineering, building a reputation that reached beyond Italy.
He has a lasting place in computing history because he wrote the 1842 French paper describing Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine after attending Babbage’s lecture in Turin. That text became even more influential when Ada Lovelace translated it into English and added her famous notes.
His life also took a major political and military turn. Menabrea served as a general, diplomat, and statesman, and from 1867 to 1869 he was prime minister of Italy. He died in 1896, after a career that linked the worlds of science, government, and early computing.