On Francesco G. Tricomi's heritage: archive and miscellany (Q2238856)

The article under review presents the archive of the Italian mathematician Francesco G. Tricomi (1897--1978). The archive, built by Tricomi from 1913 to 1978, and meticulously ordered by himself, is kept at the Department of Mathematics of the University of Turin. It is a rather large archive (``12 folders of student notes, 753 manuscripts, 20 manuscript versions of books, and a collection of institutional and family papers''). After a short biography of Tricomi, the author describes the origins and contents of the archive. She includes two large tables summing up and classifying the contents of Tricomi's ``offprints and scientific-bibliographical notes'' and of his ``personal card index'', showing its striking bibliographical contents. She gives enough details about the contents -- including what is missing -- to make it clear that this material is rich and can provide sources for great studies in various parts of the history of mathematics (although I wish we could have seen at least one facsimilé!). The author also considers various aspects that could be further studied using this archive, in line with recent works on the archive in cultural history and patrimonial studies. In particular, she shows the interest for biographical and mathematical research. The paper certainly achieves its goal in arousing interest for Tricomi's archive and for future more detailed works on it.