Scientific instruments and the emergence of experimental volcanology: the case of Mount Etna

Abstract

This article investigates how volcanology emerged as an experimental science through the study of scientific instruments employed in research on Mount Etna. Etna served as an open‑air laboratory, not only to observe volcanic phenomena but also to test competing physical, chemical, and geological theories. From the early investigations of the 1669 eruption by Giovanni Alfonso Borelli, scholars began incorporating new methods and instruments into the study of volcanic activity. Yet, the development of volcanology as an autonomous field was neither linear nor uniform, shaped by the interplay of diverse disciplinary approaches and by the intrinsic complexity of the phenomena under study. The analysis is framed within the cultural and academic context of Catania, starting from
the 1779 university reform, which introduced the first chairs in the scientific disciplines and promoted the acquisition and commissioning of instruments from both local craftsmen and prominent European ateliers. Special emphasis is placed on the cabinets of natural history, physics, and chemistry, as well as the meteorological observatory, which housed instruments that were emblematic of the scientific progress achieved within each discipline and concurrently employed in the study of volcanic phenomena. Surviving artefacts today provide tangible evidence of how research and teaching practices converged to establish volcanology as a scientific discipline at the University of Catania.