Biringuccio, Vanucci

, an Italian mathematician, was born at Sienna about the end of the fifteenth century, and died about the middle of the sixteenth. After having served in the wars under the dukes of Parma and Ferrara, and the republic of Venice, he employed himself in studying the art of fusing and casting metal for cannon, and improving the quality of gunpowder. He was the first of his nation who wrote upon these subjects. The work in which he laid down his experience and practice, was entitled “Pirotecnia, nella quale si tratta non sole della diversita delle minere, ma anco di quanto si ricerca alia pratica di esse, e che s’appartienne all‘arte della fusione o getto de’ metalli,” Venice, 1540, 4to, often reprinted and translated. ²