The University of Padua (Italian: Università degli Studi di Padova, UNIPD) is an Italian university located in the city of Padua, region of Veneto, northern Italy. The University of Padua was founded in 1222 by a group of students and teachers from Bologna.[1] Padua is the second-oldest university in Italy and the world's fifth-oldest surviving university. In 2010, the university had approximately 65,000 students.[2] In 2021, it was ranked second "best university" among Italian institutions of higher education with more than 40,000 students according to Censis institute,[3] and among the best 200 universities in the world according to ARWU.[4]
The university is conventionally said to have been founded in 1222 when a large group of students and professors left the University of Bologna in search of more academic freedom ('Libertas scholastica'). The first subjects to be taught were law and theology. The curriculum expanded rapidly, and by 1399 the institution had divided in two: a Universitas Iuristarum for civil law and Canon law, and a Universitas Artistarum which taught astronomy, dialectic, philosophy, grammar, medicine, and rhetoric. There was also a Universitas Theologorum, established in 1373 by Urban V.
The student body was divided into groups known as "nations" which reflected their places of origin. The nations themselves fell into two groups:
the cismontanes for the Italian students
the ultramontanes for those who came from beyond the Alps
From the fifteenth to the eighteenth century, the university was renowned for its research, particularly in the areas of medicine, astronomy, philosophy and law. During this time, the university adopted the Latinmotto: Universa universis patavina libertas (Paduan Freedom is Universal for Everyone). Nevertheless, the university had a turbulent history, and there was no teaching in 1237–61, 1509–17, 1848–50.
The Botanical Garden of Padova, established by the university in 1545, is one of the oldest gardens of its kind in the world. Its alleged title of oldest academic garden is in controversy because the Medici created one in Pisa in 1544. In addition to the garden, best visited in the spring and summer, the university also manages nine museums, including a History of physics museum.
The university houses the oldest surviving permanent anatomical theatre in Europe, dating from 1595
The university began teaching medicine around 1250. It played a leading role in the identification and treatment of diseases and ailments, specializing in autopsies and the inner workings of the body.[5]
Since 1595, Padua's famous anatomical theatre drew artists and scientists studying the human body during public dissections. It is the oldest surviving permanent anatomical theatre in Europe. Anatomist Andreas Vesalius held the chair of Surgery and Anatomy (explicator chirurgiae) and in 1543 published his anatomical discoveries in De Humani Corporis Fabrica. The book triggered great public interest in dissections and caused many other European cities to establish anatomical theatres.
On 25 June 1678, Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia, a Venetian noblewoman and mathematician, became the first woman to be awarded a Doctor of Philosophy degree.
The university became one of the universities of the Kingdom of Italy in 1873, and ever since has been one of the most prestigious in the country for its contributions to scientific and scholarly research: in the field of mathematics alone, its professors have included such figures as Gregorio Ricci Curbastro, Giuseppe Veronese, Francesco Severi and Tullio Levi Civita.
Palazzo Bo is the historical seat of University of Padua since 1493Diploma of Girolamo Martinengo, 1582
The last years of the nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century saw a reversal of the centralisation process that had taken place in the sixteenth: scientific institutes were set up in what became veritable campuses; a new building to house the Arts and Philosophy faculty was built in another part of the city centre (Palazzo del Liviano, designed by Giò Ponti); the Astro-Physics Observatory was built on the Asiago uplands; and the old Palazzo del Bo was fully restored (1938–45). The vicissitudes of the Fascist period—political interference, the Race Laws, etc.—had a detrimental effect upon the development of the university, as did the devastation caused by the Second World War and—just a few decades later—the effect of the student protests of 1968-69 (which the university was left to face without adequate help and support from central government). However, the Gymnasium Omnium Disciplinarum continued its work uninterrupted, and overall the second half of the twentieth century saw a sharp upturn in development—primarily due an interchange of ideas with international institutions of the highest standing (particularly in the fields of science and technology).
In recent years, the university has been able to meet the problems posed by overcrowded facilities by re-deploying over the Veneto as a whole. In 1990, the Institute of Management Engineering was set up in Vicenza, after which the summer courses at Brixen (Bressanone) began once more, and in 1995 the Agripolis centre at Legnaro (for Agricultural Science and Veterinary Medicine) opened. Other sites of re-deployment are at Rovigo, Treviso, Feltre, Castelfranco Veneto, Conegliano, Chioggia and Asiago.
Recent changes in state legislation have also opened the way to greater autonomy for Italian universities, and in 1995 Padua adopted a new Statute that gave it greater independence.
As the publications of innumerable conferences and congresses show, the modern-day University of Padua plays an important role in scholarly and scientific research at both a European and world level. True to its origins, this is the direction in which the university intends to move in the future, establishing closer links of cooperation and exchange with all the world's major research universities.
Rankings
The university is constantly ranked among the best Italian universities.
In the 2020 U.S. News & World Report's World Best Global Universities Rankings, the University of Padua is ranked the world's 116th, tied with the University of Bologna, and 48th in Europe.[7]
The NTU ranking, which focuses on productivity and quality of scientific production, places the University of Padua as 82nd worldwide for 2022.[8]
Notable people
Coats of arms of professors and students in the Aula Magna, Palazzo Bo. Photo by Paolo Monti, 1966Certificate of medicine of the University of Padua, awarded in 1642 to the Flemish Jan Damman.
Alumni
Notable people who have attended the University of Padua include:[10]
In natural sciences
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543) Polish mathematician and astronomer, placed Sun at center of Solar System
Seneschal Constantine Cantacuzino Stolnic (c. 1650–1716), Romanian nobleman and humanist scholar who held high offices in the Principality of Wallachia. Author of a History of Wallachia (unfinished), he was the first Romanian to ever graduate from this prestigious university.[11]
Jan Zamoyski, Polish nobleman, magnate, diplomat and statesman
Ludovico Trevisan (1401-1465), Cardinal, Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church, Archbishop of Florence, Patriarch of Aquileia, Captain General of the Church, and physician.
Elena Cornaro Piscopia (1646 – 1684), mathematics lecturer, and the first woman to receive a PhD degree[13]
Antonio Vallisneri (1661–1730) held chairs of practical medicine, and theoretical medicine, between 1700 and 1730
Giovanni Battista Morgagni (1681-1771) held chairs of theoretical medicine, and anatomy, between 1711 and 1771
Tullio Levi-Civita (1873-1941) held the chair of Rational Mechanics, famous for his work on the absolute differential calculus (tensor calculus) and many other important contributions in the area of Pure and Applied Mathematics
The history of anatomy extends from the earliest examinations of sacrificial victims to the sophisticated analyses of the body performed by modern anatomists and scientists. Written descriptions of human organs and parts can be traced back thousands of years to ancient Egyptian papyri, where attention to the body was necessitated by their highly elaborate burial practices.
Padua is a city and comune in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the area. Padua's population is 214,000. The city is sometimes included, with Venice and Treviso, in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area (PATREVE) which has a population of around 2,600,000.
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Alessandro Achillini was an Italian philosopher and physician. He is known for the anatomic studies that he was able to publish, made possible by a 13th-century edict putatively by Emperor Frederick II allowing for dissection of human cadavers, and which previously had stimulated the anatomist Mondino de Luzzi at Bologna.
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Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia or Elena Lucrezia Corner, also known in English as Helen Cornaro, was a Venetian philosopher of noble descent who in 1678 became one of the first women to receive an academic degree from a university, and the first to receive a Doctor of Philosophy degree.
Johann Vesling was a German anatomist and botanist from Minden, Westphalia. He published a major illustrated work on human anatomy Syntagma Anatomicum (1641).
The Accademia Galileiana, or "Galilean academy", is a learned society in the city of Padua in Italy. The full name of the society is Accademia galileiana di scienze, lettere ed arti in Padova, "Galilean academy of science, letters and the arts in Padova". It was founded as the Accademia dei Ricovrati in Padua in 1599, on the initiative of a Venetian nobleman, Federico Cornaro. The original members were professors in the University of Padua such as professor Georgios Kalafatis; one of its original members was Galileo Galilei. In 1779 the academy merged with the Accademia di Arte Agraria and became the Accademia di Scienze Lettere e Arti; in 1949 it became the Accademia Patavina di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti; its name was changed to Accademia Galileiana di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti in Padova in 1997, in honor of Galileo. The academy is lodged in the Carraresi Palace in Padua.
The Anatomical Theatre of Padua, Northern Italy, is the first permanent anatomical theatre in the world. Still preserved in the Palazzo del Bo, it was inaugurated in 1595 by Girolamo Fabrici of Acquapendente, according to the project of Paolo Sarpi and Dario Varotari. This theatre constituted the model for the anatomical theatres built during the seventeenth century in the main universities of Europe: all would have been based on the Paduan archetype. It is the symbol of a successful period in the University of Padua's history, and it is considered one of the most important achievements for the study of anatomy during the sixteenth century.
References
↑ "History". Università di Padova. Retrieved 8 June 2020.
↑ Jerome J. Bylebyl, "The School of Padua: humanistic medicine in the 16th century," in Charles Webster, ed., Health, Medicine and Mortality in the Sixteenth Century (1979) ch10
↑ Padova, Università di (2019-09-12). "Ranking internazionali". Università degli studi di Padova (in Italian). Retrieved 2022-04-02.
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