Tullio Levi-Civita, ForMemRS[1] (English: /ˈtʊlioʊ ˈlɛvi ˈtʃɪvɪtə/, Italian: [ˈtulljo ˈlɛːvi ˈtʃiːvita]; 29 March 1873 – 29 December 1941) was an Italian mathematician, most famous for his work on absolute differential calculus (tensor calculus) and its applications to the theory of relativity, but who also made significant contributions in other areas.

In 1898 he was appointed to the Padua Chair of Rational Mechanics (left uncovered by death of Ernesto Padova) where he met and, in 1914, married Libera Trevisani, one of his pupils.

[9] Levi-Civita's series of papers on the problem of a static gravitational field were also discussed in his 1915–1917 correspondence with Einstein.

The correspondence was initiated by Levi-Civita, as he found mathematical errors in Einstein's use of tensor calculus to explain the theory of relativity.

In one of the letters, regarding Levi-Civita's new work, Einstein wrote "I admire the elegance of your method of computation; it must be nice to ride through these fields upon the horse of true mathematics while the like of us have to make our way laboriously on foot".

The 1938 race laws enacted by the Italian Fascist government deprived Levi-Civita of his professorship and of his membership of all scientific societies.