The memory of the Pontaniana Academy of which she was the first president
NoonFebruary 10, 2023 – 21:54
The first Chemistry graduate in Italy, she was a pillar of Italian research. She was born of the wife of the Russian revolutionary during the marriage, she was actually the daughter of a Neapolitan lawyer
Of Natasha Party
Mmathematics, chemistry and revolution. The Bakunin surname unites this powerful triptych by intersecting at least two families in Naples. On February 2, 1873 Maria Bakunin was born in Siberia, sister of Giulia Sofia who will be the mother of Renato Caccioppoli, the brilliant Neapolitan mathematician also told in the famous film by Mario Martone with an incomparable Carlo Cecchi.
Marussia for friends
Maria, Marussia for friends, the Lady for others (Alessandro Rodolfo Nicolaus who was his pupil remembers her) was a point of reference for Caccioppoli, culturally as well as emotionally. Before her, she graduated in Chemistry of Italy, an intransigent intellectual also famous for her asperities of her character, in 1938 she intervened to prevent the arrest for anti-fascist actions of her beloved nephew.
Russian surname but daughter of a Neapolitan
The magazine The science with two voices tells it very well, which returns the stories of Italian women scientists who are too often misunderstood. She was a high-profile scholar, she had inherited from her father more than her blood, as we will see, the courage to oppose injustices. When the Germans set fire to the libraries in via Mezzocannone – always Nicolaus to remember – Bakunin sat down near the flames crossing her arms. The German lieutenant, amazed by so much courage, gave the order to retreat and the damage was less serious. She herself will then sign a memorandum entitled The University of Naples set on fire by the Germans: September 12, 1943.
We were talking about blood because we now have certain proofs that Maria – as well as her two brothers Giulia Sofia and Carlo – was not the legitimate daughter of the Russian philosopher Michail Bakunin, who died only three years after her birth, but of the lawyer Carlo Gambuzzi . Neapolitan, friend and associate of the anarchist, upon his disappearance he welcomed his wife and those who were actually his children to Naples, regularizing the family with a marriage.
150 years after birth
Exactly 150 years after the birth of this other important Bakunin, an interesting Symposium. The profile of the famous professor of Organic Chemistry at the School of Engineering and the Faculty of Sciences will be reconstructed, a forward-looking researcher at a time when laboratories were rarely open to women. Maurizio D’Auria, Domenico Caputo, Lelio Mazzarella, Daniela Montesarchio, Emanuela Bufacchi, Gennaro Marino and Carmine Colella will intervene. It will be recalled that Maria Bakunin, in addition to being the first woman to graduate in Chemistry in Italy, was also the first to be admitted to the class of physical and mathematical sciences at the Accademia dei Lincei. The study day promises to be precious for the reconstruction of a biography of a teacher – reads a note – researcher and woman involved in the culture and social promotion of young people, also highlighting that the memory that remained of her as a woman lasts, severe, sometimes ferocious to the point of derision, should be tempered in the light of new documentary acquisitions.
Life and research, the wedding with Oglialoro-Todaro
The year after her record-breaking degree, Maria marries Agostino Oglialoro-Todaro, director of the Institute of which she had become a collaborator. Life and research end up identifying more and more and even the spaces of life and studies have only a small diaphragm between them. always Nicolaus to provide details that restore the charm of the lady of Chemistry: The Lady lived, with some cats, in large and gloomy rooms adjacent to house number 8 and which she accessed from a small door. When she left the house to go to the Institute at number n. 4, there was a general stampede, while the Chemical Institute appeared extraordinarily industrious. Bakunin was very harsh and demanding with her staff. But if any of them fell ill then she ran to visit and assist them.
The estimate of Benedetto Croce
The fields most investigated by the scientist were sterochemistry and photochemistry and it was she who carried out a mapping, on behalf of the Ministry of Public Education, on the bituminous schists of southern Italy. With her sister Sofia she frequented Palazzo Filomarino and it was Benedetto Croce who was heartened by her that in 1944 the Academy (Pontanian ndr), stripped of everything, spiritually resourced, gathered its old partners, nominated new ones, and had young forces at its disposal under the presidency of the chemist Maria Bakunin.
February 10, 2023 | 21:54
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