Uloa, Antonio de

The son of an economist Bernardo de Ulloa. His brother Fernando was the chief engineer of Canal de Castilla . In 1733 he entered the Royal Maritime Academy of Midshipmen in Cadiz . In 1735, with the rank of Teniente de fragata (roughly corresponding to the second lieutenant ), Russian was sent along with his colleague Jorge Juan and Santasilla as members of the French geodetic expedition led by Pierre Bouguer , equipped under the auspices of the French Academy of Sciences to measure the arc of the meridian in Peru . At the end of the expedition (1736-1743), Uloa went to his homeland, but was captured by the British, who were then in the war with Spain . Brought to London, for his scientific merits, he not only lived in complete freedom, but received all his papers back and on December 11, 1746 he was elected a member of the Royal Society of London . He was released and finally returned to Madrid on July 25, 1746, shortly after the death of Felipe V , when Fernando VI ascended the throne. After 11 years of traveling, he was promoted to capitán de navio and was given the task of touring Europe to collect the latest scientific achievements.

Uloa’s participation in the expedition was very valuable. Using a measured meridian arc of 3 ° 7'4 ", he found 56 768 basins for the 1 ° arc under the equator , but at the same time, like some of his other employees (Condamine), he lost sight of the need to bring the measurement results to level Uloa dedicated the following works to his trip to Peru and the observations made there: Relacion historica del viaje a la America meridional (Historical Report on a Trip to South America; Madrid, 1748); Observaciones astronomicas y fisicas hechas de órden de SM en los reinos del Peru; de las cuales se deduce la figura y magnitud. De la tierra, y se applica à la na-vegacion "(Madrid, 1748; 2nd ed., 1773);" Not icias americanas sobre la America meridional etc. ”(ibid., 1772). The second of these works was compiled with the complicity of comrade Uloa, don Jorge Juan .

Among other things, he described platina del Pinto - metal that was found with placer gold in the Pinto Valley in New Granada ). The existence of white metal from South America was written back in 1557 by the Italian scientist J. Scaliger , however, Uloa for the first time gave a rather detailed description of platinum (the name of which can be translated as “silver”, “bad silver”), noting its exceptional refractoriness and difficulty of isolation from rocks.

Upon his release from captivity, Uloa, returning to the fatherland, with his knowledge and activities, contributed much to the development of industry in Spain and especially maritime affairs. In 1762, he was appointed head of the squadron, sent to take possession of Spain assigned to her Louisiana , and in 1766 made governor of this area. In 1768 he was expelled by the inhabitants of the colony during the rebellion that began.

In 1780, he was appointed head of the squadron sent to the Azores to capture the English merchant fleet returning from the East Indies, but had no luck in this matter, for which he was dismissed from the military naval service, albeit with maintaining the previous honorary position in the maritime ministry.

Uloa spent the rest of his life on the island of Leon , near Cadiz, in solitude, devoted to scientific studies. Of the astronomical works of Ulloa, the observation of the passage of Venus through the Sun in 1769 in the southern Spain and the observation of a total solar eclipse on the Atlantic Ocean on June 24, 1778 were more remarkable. This is the last observation described in detail in the essay dedicated to him by Uloa: “ El eclipse de sol con el anillo refractario de sus rayos: la luz de este astro vista del través del cuerpo de la luna, ó antorcha solar en su disco etc. "(Madrid, 1779; also in Mémoires de l'Académie de Berlin, 1778, in Vetensk. Acad. Handl., 1778, and in Philosophical Transactions , 1779), was of particular interest to contemporaries, as the description of the solar corona given to him for the first time, and in particular according to the indication of the appearance of a red light dot during the eclipse on the dark disk of the Moon, which the observer mistook for an opening in the body of the Moon. In addition to the works already mentioned, Ulloa also includes: “ Conversaciones de Ulloa con sus tres hijos en servicio de la marina sobre las navegaciones y modo de hacertas etc. "(Madrid, 1795); Entretenimientos physico-historicos (Madrid, 1772) and Of the earthquake at Cadix (Philosophical Transactions, 1755; also in Vetenskap. Acad. Handl., 1756).

• Spain // Willow - Italics. - M .: Soviet Encyclopedia, 1972. - ( Great Soviet Encyclopedia : [in 30 vols.] / Ch. Ed. A. M. Prokhorov ; 1969-1978, vol. 10).
• Ulloa, Antonio // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.