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Olinto De Pretto

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Olinto De Pretto (1857 - 1921) was an Italian industrialist from Schio, Vicenza. According to University of Perugia historian of mathematics Umberto Bartocci, Pretto published the famous formula E=mc² two years before Albert Einstein on June 16 1903 in a paper titled "Ipotesi dell’etere nella vita dell’universo" (Hypothesis of the Essence of the Universe). The paper was later included in the Italiain scientific journal "Reale Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti" (The Veneto Institute of Science, Letters and Proceedings) on February 27 1904.

It has been claimed that Einstein, who spoke Italian as well as he spoke German, first learned of this formula from his friend Michele Besso, who also may knew Olinto De Pretto.

But of course Pretto did not derive the equation using theory of relativity. The equation seems to have been anticipated by several other physicists such as Henri Poincaré also.

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