Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro

Who was Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro?

Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro was an Italian mathematician born in Lugo di Romagna. He is most famous as the inventor of tensor calculus, but also published important works in other fields.

With his former student Tullio Levi-Civita, he wrote his most famous single publication, a pioneering work on the calculus of tensors, signing it as Gregorio Ricci. This appears to be the only time that Ricci-Curbastro used the shortened form of his name in a publication, and continues to cause confusion.

Ricci-Curbastro also published important works in other fields, including a book on higher algebra and infinitesimal analysis, and papers on the theory of real numbers, an area in which he extended the research begun by Dedekind.