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Alfred Rosenblatt

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Born
22 July 1880
Kraków, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Poland)
Died
7 July 1947
Lima, Peru
Summary
Alfred Rosenblatt worked at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow until 1938 when he went to Peru and played a major role in building mathematical studies in that country. He made major contributions to algebraic geometry, differential equations, analytic functions, hydrodynamics, probability theory and statistics.
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Biography

Alfred Rosenblatt was the son of Józef Michał Rosenblatt (1853-1917) and Klara Koppelmann (1858-?). Józef Rosenblatt had been born on 21 March 1853 in Bochnia, Lesser Poland Voivodeship, Austro-Hungarian Empire. He followed the long-standing family legal tradition becoming a barrister, went on to become a highly qualified specialist in the criminal law of Austria-Hungary and professor of law at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. He also became a member of the Kraków city council. On 12 August 1879 (24 August by the current calendar), he married Klara Koppelmann who had been born on 20 March 1858 in Odesa, Ukraine. The marriage took place in Odesa. Alfred was the eldest of his parents five children, having four sisters: Joanna Eugenia Rosenblatt (born 12 November 1882), Paulina Rosenblatt (born 30 May 1884), Karola Rosenblatt (born 12 June 1891) and Helena Rosenblatt (born 6 March 1899). Alfred's three youngest sisters all died at a young age (10, 15 and 8 respectively).

After his primary education in Kraków, Alfred Rosenblatt began his secondary education at the Imperial and Royal St Anne's Gymnasium in Kraków in 1890. This school, one of the oldest in Poland, was founded in 1558 to educate boys to a level to enter the Jagiellonian University. It had become known as the Collegium Nowodworskiego after it was endowed by Bartłomiej Nowodworski, was renamed St Anne's Lyceum in 1818, and then given the name Imperial and Royal St Anne's Gymnasium in 1850. Alfred's father, Józef Rosenblatt, had also studied at this school. On 7 June 1898, Alfred obtained a merit pass in the matura examinations and later that year went to Vienna to begin studying for an engineering degree at the Technische Hochschule. This had been founded by Francis I of Austria in 1815 as the Imperial-Royal Polytechnic Institute, it was renamed the Technische Hochschule in 1872 and is now named the Vienna University of Technology. Rosenblatt's studies at the Technische Hochschule did not go very well, almost certainly because he disliked the practical side of the engineering courses. The mathematics and physics he studied were much more to his liking and in 1902 he left the Technische Hochschule in Vienna without completing the work necessary for the award of the engineering degree.

Rosenblatt returned to Kraków and in 1903, in fact the summer term of the 1902-03 academic year, he began his studies in the Philosophy Faculty of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Forced to take the year 1904-05 away from the university because of health problems, he completed work on his Ph.D. in 1908 advised by Stanisław Zaremba. He submitted his thesis On transcendental entire functions (written in Polish) which was examined by Stanisław Zaremba and Kazimierz Żorawski; they found it satisfied the conditions required for the doctorate. More was required, however, before the doctorate could be awarded. On 27 February he was examined on mathematics and astronomy while on 28 March he was examined on philosophy. These were successful and he was awarded his doctorate but he wanted to qualify to become a secondary school teacher so required to take further study.

In 1908-09, Rosenblatt studied at the University of Göttingen where he attended lectures by Felix Klein, David Hilbert and Edmund Landau. Before he left for Göttingen, Rosenblatt completed writing the paper Über Reihenentwicklungen der Integrale der Differentialgleichungen erster Ordnung in der Umgebung einer wesentlich singulären Stelle Ⓣ in August 1908. It was published in 1909 as was his next paper Über die Existenz von Integralen gewöhnlicher Differentialgleichungen Ⓣ. In this paper he extended the main theorem of the theory of differential equations of real variables. His results provided a generalisation of the usual conditions for the existence of integrals of a system of two differential equations by modifying the Picard method. His papers Über das Fundamentallemma der Variationsrechnung Ⓣ and Über die notwendigen Bedingungen des Extremums eines einfachen Integrales in gewöhnlicher Darstellung Ⓣ were also published in 1909.

While in Göttingen he wrote several papers which were published in 1910. Über zwei Fragen der Theorie des Extremums eines einfachen Integrals Ⓣ was written in Göttingen in June 1909. It has the following introduction:-
It is well known that there is a fundamental difference between the ordinary and the parametric representation regarding the question of the necessary and sufficient conditions for a strong extremum of a simple integral. While in the latter case Zermelo proves in his dissertation that the Legendre, Jacobi and Weierstrass conditions, apart from exceptional cases, are sufficient for a strong extremum if they are fulfilled along an extremal, in the case of the ordinary representation one has only Lindeberg's theorem that for curves "with gradient restriction" the three classical conditions are sufficient just as before.
Über das allgemeine thermoelastische problem Ⓣ was written in Göttingen, dated 6 November 1909. It begins as follows:-
The general equations for determining the displacement components and the temperature of elastic isotropic bodies subjected to mechanical and thermal effects were formulated by Duhamel and Franz Neumann and brought into line with the principles of thermodynamics by Voigt. Their integration includes, as special cases, the integration of the elastic and the heat conduction equations; however, while the equilibrium problem is immediately reduced to the two problems mentioned above, the oscillation problem is of a completely different difficulty. It is in fact equivalent to the investigation of the eigenvalues ​​and eigenfunctions of an integral equation with a non-symmetric kernel of complicated shape.
Rosenblatt was also writing papers in Polish at this time, and Reguła Lagrange'a w zagadnieniu izoperymetrycznem dla całek pojedyńczych Ⓣ was also published in 1910.

Back at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Rosenblatt continued to work on fulfilling the conditions to become a secondary school teacher of mathematics and physics. In April 1910 he submitted supervised works in mathematics and physics which were given an "excellent" grade in mathematics and a "good" grade in physics. On 4 June 1910 he was given two oral examinations, one in mathematics and one in physics, both being awarded an "excellent" grade. After this lengthy and demanding process he was qualified to teach mathematics and physics in secondary schools. Although he had not yet been awarded an habilitation, he began working as an assistant at the Jagiellonian University in 1911.

The International Congress of Mathematicians was held in Cambridge, England, 22-28 August 1912. Rosenblatt attended the Congress giving his permanent address as Basteistrasse 19, Kraków. While in Cambridge, he had accommodation in Emmanuel College. Cargill Knott also had accommodation in Emmanuel College while attending this Congress. He had been one of the founders of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society and at the time of the Congress was General Secretary of the Society. He must have encouraged Rosenblatt to join the Edinburgh Mathematical Society for he was proposed for membership at the Edinburgh Mathematical Society meeting in Edinburgh on Friday 14 November 1913 and elected a member at the meeting in Glasgow on Friday 12 December 1913.

In 1912 Rosenblatt had published his 100-page habilitation thesis in Polish, namely Badania nad pewnymi klasami powierzchni algebraicznych nieregularnych i nad biracjonalnymi przekształceniami nie zmieniajacymi tych powierzchni Ⓣ. It had been presented to the Kraków Academy by Kazimierz Żorawski. Rosenblatt begins the thesis with an historical description which has the following first paragraph:-
The theory of algebraic curves owes to H Schwarz and F Klein important theorems on the groups of birational transformations which transform these curves into themselves. Schwarz showed that only curves of genus zero and one possess continuous groups (in the Lie sense) of birational transformations. Klein stated without proof that curves of genus greater than one cannot possess infinitely many birational transformations. The theorems of Schwarz and Klein were subsequently studied by many mathematicians. Simple and elegant proofs of these theorems were given by Picard. Picard was the first to develop an analogous theory of birational transformations of algebraic surfaces. Algebraic surfaces, having continuous groups of birational transformations, either have rational or irrational bundles of rational curves, or of elliptic curves, having the same modulus, or the coordinates of the surface can be expressed as hyperelliptic functions of two variables, or as degenerations of these functions. In the same paper Picard ponders the question when an algebraic surface admits of an infinite number of birational transformations, without however admitting of a continuous group of birational transformations. If the geometric genus of the surface is greater than two, then, since the canonical curves of the surface pass through birational transformations into canonical curves, therefore, if the canonical curves pass into other canonical curves, the transformations of the surface correspond to transformations of certain algebraic forms of several variables; from this it is possible to deduce the impossibility of the existence of infinitely many birational transformations, which do not belong to the continuous group of transformations.
Also in the same year of 1912 he published a shortened form of the thesis in French as Sur certaines classes de surfaces algébriques irrégulières et sur les transformations birationnelles de ces surfaces en elles-memes Ⓣ. The French version was still 50 pages long. In addition to presenting the Polish version of his thesis for his habilitation, Rosenblatt had to give an habilitation lecture. He gave the lecture O całkach periodycznych problemu trzech ciał Ⓣ on 3 March 1913.

World War I broke out in 1914 and Rosenblatt was drafted for active service. The Jagiellonian University, however, made a request that he be released from military service since his work was vital for the university. This was accepted and he was released from military service. Life was difficult in Kraków during the years of the war, 1914-18, but the mathematicians would meet on a regular basis beginning around 1916 and by 1917 they considered themselves as an informal mathematical society. Rosenblatt was part of the informal society which, after Poland became an independent country at the end of the war, sixteen mathematicians met on 2 April 1919 to formally establish the Kraków Mathematical Society. Rosenblatt was one of these sixteen and he was invited to lecture to the second meeting of the Society on 30 April 1919. He gave the lecture Z rachunku warjacyjnego Ⓣ. Soon after this mathematicians from Warsaw joined and it became the Polish Mathematical Society.

On 9 September 1920 Rosenblatt was appointed as an extraordinary professor of mathematics at the Jagiellonian University. This allowed him to use the title of "professor" but it did not provide a salary so his income remained as it had been when he was a docent. Rosenblatt applied for a number of full professorships but, even when ranked first, was not appointed.

Rosenblatt married Paula Perl Unger (1885-1959) on 29 June 1924 in Wieliczka; they had no children. Paula was the sister of Gerard Unger (1903-1957), an engineer and expert on thermodynamics.

In 1928 Rosenblatt attended the International Congress of Mathematicians in Bologna. He was President of Section III-B, Mathematical Physics, on 4 September and again on 8 September. He gave two talks Varietà algebriche a tre e più dimension Ⓣ and Sopra le varietà algebriche a tre dimensioni fra i cui caratteri intercedono certe disuguaglianze Ⓣ in Section II-A, Geometry. In Section III-B he gave the talk Sopra certi moti permanenti dei liquidi viscosi incompressibili Ⓣ.

Unhappy with his failure to obtain a full professorship in Poland, in 1930 he was appointed to a full professorship at the University of La Plata, Argentina. He wrote in a letter of 23 May (see [9]):-
I received a letter from professor J Rey Pastor from Buenos Aires in which he reports on my appointment in La Plata (Argentina, near Buenos Aires). We will soon receive an official notification of the terms, etc. I am getting the chair of mathematics there with the help of Enriques, Severi, Levi-Civita, and Einstein, to whom, in the last instance, the dean from La Plata turned for an opinion about me. ... I enjoy the recognition that I have abroad, an evidence of which, moreover, I just had in Liege and Paris. Einstein also told me: "I am surprised that Poland allows so many to go, they have so few people."
He was to begin teaching in La Plata in the academic year 1930-31, arranged leave from the Jagiellonian University, and made travel arrangement for himself and his wife including passports. On 6 September 1930, a few days before Rosenblatt was due to travel, there was a military coup in Argentina. Travel to Argentina became impossible and Rosenblatt lost the opportunity of the full professorship.

In 1932 the International Congress of Mathematicians was held in Zurich. Rosenblatt attended and gave the talk Sur les ondes de gravité Ⓣ in Section VIb, Mechanics and Mathematical Physics. At this Congress he met Godofredo García whom he already knew from their meeting at earlier conference in Poland. García (1888-1970) was a Peruvian mathematician and engineer who had studied at the University of San Marcos in Peru, had been on the staff there from 1919, and was Dean of the Faculty of Exact Sciences from 1928. They kept in contact after the Congress ended.

Rosenblatt was, as we indicated above, unhappy that he had not been able to obtain a full professorship. He felt, with justification, that he had a strong reputation outside Poland. In addition to the International Congresses, he had been invited to lecture in Rome in 1926, Stockholm in 1930, Liege in 1930, and Paris in 1931. He had been invited to the Institut de Mécanique des Fluides de l'Université de Paris where he gave three lectures on hydrodynamics. He was invited there again by the director Henri Villat in 1933 and it was at Villat's suggestion that Rosenblatt published the two monographs Sur certains mouvements des liquides visqueux incompressibles Ⓣ (1933) and Solutions exactes des équations du mouvement des liquides visqueux Ⓣ (1935). His international reputation is emphasised in [21]:-
He gave a series of lectures in Sofia and Belgrade. His work in the field of particle equations brought him recognition - and he was awarded the academic palm of an officer d'Instruction Publique by the French government. He became a member of the Academic Society in Liège and the Academy of Athens. He was a member of the Polish Mathematical Society in Kraków, the Circolo Matematico di Palermo, the Société Mathématique de France in Paris, the American Mathematical Society in New York, the Deutsche Mathematiker Vereinigung and others.
The authors of [9] write:-
It is a pity that a research centre in the field of hydrodynamics was not created in Kraków, since Rosenblatt's work and his recognition abroad offered a good reason for a chair, which could be opened at the Jagiellonian University.
The Jewish community in Poland suffered from anti-Semitism during the 1920s and 1930s. Rosenblatt's family were Jewish and he himself had been married in Wieliczka by a rabbi from Kraków. He felt he was being discriminated against. In December 1925 he wrote to Levi-Civita [14]:-
I am oppressed by the political situation in which the Jews of my country find themselves. You certainly know the Steiger trial in Lvov, a new page in this martyrdom. It is good that I have somewhere to escape in the domain of this clear and profound thought, in the domain of the ideas of the scholars of this radiant country that is Italy.
Two years later he wrote again to Levi-Civita [14]:-
We do not massacre the Jews in Poland, as in Romania and now in Lithuania, but we deprive them of the means to live, and we force them either to convert or to leave the country. This occurs in the first place in the universities, which are here, as in all of Eastern Europe, the centres of anti-Semitism.
In the mid 1930s, he wrote to his friend García in Peru, explaining the risks he felt for himself and his fellow Jewish Poles. He had come to the point, he wrote, where he feared for the safety of himself and his family. García replied offering Rosenblatt a one year, 1936-37, lecturing position at the University of San Marcos in Lima. Rosenblatt accepted and, following the death in March 1936 of José Roberto Gálvez, who had been the Chair of Astronomy and Geodesy, Rosenblatt was also offered that Chair for the two years 1936-38. He arranged for unpaid leave of absence from the Jagiellonian University and, together with his wife, he arrived in Lima on 19 August 1936.

On 17 September 1936 he wrote to Oswald Veblen (see [9]):-
I am here in Lima invited by the University for two years to lecture on mathematical astronomy. I am lecturing about Celestial Mechanics. It would be for this reason very agreeable to me, if I could study your last important paper on the tensorial calculus. You have been so kind to send to me in Kraków your published previously important papers.
It is certainly surprising that, although Rosenblatt had a PhD from the Jagiellonian University, this was not recognised by the University of San Marcos. He submitted his paper Sobre la representación conforme de dominios planos limitados variables Ⓣ as a doctoral thesis and he was awarded a doctorate by the University of San Marcos in a ceremony on 21 December 1936. Together with Godofredo García, Rosenblatt was the founder of the Academia Nacional de Ciencias Exactas, Físicas y Naturales de Lima which was formally set up on 6 August 1938. In 1939 it was recognised by the Government of Peru by a Supreme Decree and in 1966, with another Supreme Decree, its name was changed to "Academia Nacional de Ciencias". The Academy published its journal Actas de la Academia Nacional de Ciencias Exactas, Físicas y Naturales de Lima beginning in 1938 with volume 1 which contained Rosenblatt's paper Nouvelles recherches sur les coefficients des séries univalentes Ⓣ. In volume 2, dated 1939, there are two papers by Rosenblatt: Sur la théorie mathématique de la lubrification Ⓣ; and Sur les points singuliers des équations différentielles Ⓣ. Volume 3 contains 7 papers by Rosenblatt, volume 4 contains 4 of his papers, volume 5 contains 2, volume 6 contains 6, etc. Thanks to Rosenblatt, Levi-Civita, Fubini, Terracini, and Beppo Levi joined the Academy of Sciences of Lima and published in its "Actas."

He wrote to the vice-chancellor of the Jagiellonian University on 12 August 1938 (see [21]):-
I am far away abroad but I was called there as a member of the Jagiellonian University, while the University of San Marcos in Lima constantly emphasises how proud it is of the contact made with Kraków University, and my modest academic achievements in Peru are not to be accredited to my efforts but are the achievements of the Jagiellonian University to which I belong.
Although he had gone to Peru on a two year contract, he arranged with the Jagiellonian University to extend that for one further year. They agreed, so Rosenblatt, although in Peru, was still employed by the Jagiellonian University when the German armies invaded Poland on 1 September 1939. He then took Peruvian nationality and decided to spend the rest of his career at the University of San Marcos.

Ortiz writes in [18] about Rosenblatt coming to Peru:-
The arrival of Rosenblatt was crucial for the development of mathematics in Peru. From that moment on a new stage in the history of mathematics in our country began. He introduced new teaching methods of modern mathematics and as a professor at the University of San Marcos (the only university in the country then having Pure Mathematics as a subject of study) new courses, where complex variables, complex analysis, topology, differential equations, algebra, modern differential geometry and many other subjects were taught. He also conducted seminars and shaped a new generation of mathematicians, which, although sparse, was enough to open new horizons for further conquests and goals.
He was awarded a research fellowship from the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton to spend from January to June 1947 as a Member of the School of Mathematics of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. During this time, he lectured at Princeton University, Harvard University, the University of Chicago, the University of Philadelphia, and the University of Illinois. His health deteriorated, however, and he had to turn down invitations to lecture at Columbia University in New York, Brown University in Providence, and the University of Toronto. He returned earlier than he had intended to Lima on 15 April 1947 and was admitted to the Delgado de Miraflores Hospital where he died on 8 July 1947. He was buried in the Jewish Cemetery of Lima. His wife Paula Rosenblatt wrote to Oswald Veblen on 20 July 1947:-
I feel the sad duty to inform you about the death of my husband Alfred Rosenblatt, which occurred on 8 July. Since his return from the United States he could not recover from pneumonia and in spite of the efforts of the best physicians he suffered a relapse, which caused his death. I wish to express my deep gratitude to you for your thoughtfulness and assistance when he was ill in the USA.
For more information about Alfred Rosenblatt, see THIS LINK.
Other Mathematicians born in Poland
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References (show)

  1. Alfred Rosenblatt, Institute for Advanced Study (2025).
    https://www.ias.edu/scholars/alfred-rosenblatt
  2. Alfred Rosenblatt, Maria Jadwiga Minakowska, Wielka genealogia Minakowskiej (23 January 2025).
    https://www.sejm-wielki.pl/b/psb.26537.1
  3. Alfred Rosenblatt, geni-com (2025).
    https://www.geni.com/people/Alfred-Rosenblat/6000000023262684729
  4. C Carranza, Historia de la matemática peruana (Ciclo de Conferencias, 2007).
  5. D Ciesielska, Rola Funduszu im. dra W. Kretkowskiego w kształtowaniu krakowskiego osrodka matematycznego, Studia Historiae Scientiarum 15 (2015), 157-192.
  6. D Ciesielska, On invariants in the early history of algebraic surface. Alfred Rosenblatt (1880-1947) and his results, Seminar on the History of Mathematics, St Petersburg (7 April 2016).
    https://www.mathnet.ru/PresentFiles/13620/2016.04.07_cieselsca.pdf
  7. D Ciesielska and L Maligranda, Alfred Rosenblatt (1880-1947). Biografia, Wiadomosci Matematyczne 52 (2014), 2-45.
  8. D Ciesielska and L Maligranda, Alfred Rosenblatt (1880 -1947). Publikacje, odczyty, wykłady, Antiquitates Mathematicae 8 (1) (2014), 3-44.
  9. D Ciesielska and L Maligranda, Alfred Rosenblatt (1880-1947). Polish-Peruvian mathematician, Banach Center Publications 119 (2019), 57-108.
  10. R Duda, Rosenblatt Alfred (1880-1947), in Matematycy XIX i XX wieku zwiazani z Polska, Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego (Wrocław, 2012), 399-400.
  11. G García, Grado del Prof A Rosenblatt, Revista Ci., Lima 38 (1936), 21-28.
  12. D Hirschberg, Rosenblatt family, Information & Computer Science, University of California Irvine (26 October 2024).
    https://ics.uci.edu/~dhirschb/genealogy/Krakow/Families/Rosenblatt.html
  13. Józef Michał Rosenblatt, Maria Jadwiga Minakowska, Wielka genealogia Minakowskiej (23 January 2025).
    https://www.sejm-wielki.pl/b/psb.26539.1
  14. E Luciano, Italian and Polish Mathematicians Face Racial Persecution and Emigration: Backgrounds, Individual Fates and Global Aspects, Kwartalnik Historii Nauki i Techniki 69 (2) (2024), 69-92.
  15. T Nunez Bazalar, Vida i obra de A Rosenblatt, Revista de la Facultad de Ciencias Matematicas de la Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Lima 2 (1988), 45-65.
  16. A Ortiz Fernández, Alfred Rosenblatt, in A Ortiz Fernández, Artistas, Científicos y Maestros (Lima, 1999), 163-168.
  17. A Ortiz Fernandez, Alfred Rosenblatt, in La Matematica en el Peru. Breve Visón (Lima 2012), 57-61.
  18. A Ortiz Fernandez, Alfred Rosenblatt, in A Ortiz Fernández, Integrales Singulares. La Escuela de Chicago (Lima, 2011), 21-25.
  19. R Siegmund-Schultze, Some remarks and documents concerning the emigration of Polish mathematicians during the 1930s and early 1940s, Studia Historiae Scientiarum 18 (2019), 139-162.
    https://ojs.ejournals.eu/SHS/article/view/6905/6832
  20. J Sotomayor, Reminiscences of a mathematical sojourn at San Marcos, 1959-61, and at IMPA, 1962, Nexus Mathematicae 3 (2020), 1-14.
  21. E Valde-Nowak, Alfred Rosenblatt (1880-1947), in Scholars of Jewish origin in the contemporary history of the Jagiellonian University (Jagiellonian University Publishing House, 2014), 215-220.
    https://ruj.uj.edu.pl/server/api/core/bitstreams/389bb693-8772-4c9b-a5bd-1f32476428c5/content
  22. R Velasquez López, Alfred Rosenblatt en el Perú, in Hacer ciencia en el Perú. Biografía de ocho cientificos (Sociedad Peruana de Historia de la Ciencia y la Tecnología, Lima, 1990), 107-134.

Additional Resources (show)

Other pages about Alfred Rosenblatt:

  1. More about Alfred Rosenblatt

Other websites about Alfred Rosenblatt:

  1. Mathematical Genealogy Project
  2. MathSciNet Author profile
  3. zbMATH entry

Cross-references (show)

Written by J J O'Connor and E F Robertson
Last Update March 2025