Giovanni Domenico Cassini

Who was Giovanni Domenico Cassini?

Giovanni Domenico Cassini was an Italian/French mathematician, astronomer, engineer, and astrologer. Cassini, also known as Gian Domenico Cassini or Jean-Dominique Cassini, was born in Perinaldo, near Imperia, at that time in the County of Nice under the control of the Republic of Genoa. Cassini is known for his work in the fields of astronomy and engineering. Cassini most notably discovered four satellites of the planet Saturn and noted the division of the rings of Saturn. Giovanni Domenico Cassini was also the first of his family to begin work on the project of creating a topographic map of France. Launched in 1997, the Cassini spaceprobe was named after him and became the fourth to visit Saturn and the first to orbit the planet.