"Abraham, planter of mathematics": Histories of mathematics and astrology in early modern Europe

Journal of the History of Ideas

Volumn 67, Issue 1, 2006, Pages 87-106

  Popper, Nicholas ^a  

^a PRINCETON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 31644436788     PISSN: 00225037     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/jhi.2006.0010     Document Type: Review

References (90)

1. Francis Bacon, The tvvoo bookes of Francis Bacon. Of the proficience and aduancement of learning, diuine and humane (London, 1605), Aa.1.r-Aa.4.v. The history of science literature on Bacon is immense. In this context
2. see Paolo Rossi, Francis Bacon: From Magic to Science, trans. Sasha Rabinovitch (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968);
3. and Wilhelm Schmidt-Biggemann, Topica universalis: eine Modellgeschichte humanistischer und barocker Wissenschaft (Hamburg: Meiner, 1983), 212-25.
4. Bacon, Bb.3.v.
5. There are few studies devoted to the histories early modern scholars composed for various sciences. By far the most important is Nicholas Jardine's Birth of History and Philosophy of Science: Kepler's A Defence of Tycho against Ursus, with Essays on its Provenance and Significance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984). Jardine focuses on Kepler, who was more central to the Scientific Revolution than any of the individuals in this article. Kepler's history was distinct in its discussion of, and commitment to, a history of technical advancement. But to attribute the origins of the history of science to his work, as Jardine does, requires an understanding of the discipline as fundamentally committed to a progressive narrative.
6. See also Peter Dear, Discipline and Experience: The Mathematical Way in the Scientific Revolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), 93-123;
7. Anthony Grafton, "From Apotheosis to Analysis: Some Late Renaissance Histories of Classical Astronomy," in History and the Disciplines: The Reclassification of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe, ed. Donald R. Kelley (Rochester, N.Y.: University of Rochester Press, 1997), 261-76.
8. D.P. Walker's, The Ancient Theology: Studies in Christian Platonism from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century (London: Duckworth, 1972) is the classic work on the power of genealogies of knowledge in early modern Europe.
9. For classical and late antique attitudes towards the disciplines under consideration here, see esp. Fritz Graf, Magic in the Ancient World, trans. Franklin Philip (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997), esp. 20-60.
10. See also Jan N. Bremmer, "The Birth of the Term 'Magic'" in The Metamorphosis of Magic from Late Antiquity to the Early Modern Period, ed. Jan N. Bremmer and Jan R. Veenstra (Leuven: Peeters, 2002) 1-11
11. and Peter Brown, The Making of Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978), 19-26.
12. The classic studies of this context are Paola Zambelli (ed.), "Astrologi hallucinati": Stars and the End of the World in Luther's Time (Berlin: W. de Gruyter, 1986);
13. and Ottavia Niccoli, Prophecy and People in Renaissance Italy, trans. Lydia G. Cochrane (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990).
14. See S.A. Farmer, Syncretism in the West: Pico's 900 theses (1486): The Evolution of Traditional, Religious, and Philosophical Systems: with Text, Translation, and Commentary (Phoenix: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1998).
15. Pico della Mirandola, Opera Omnia (Basel, 1601), 80: "Proposuimus & magica theoremata, in quibus duplicem esse Magiam significamus, quarum altera daemonum tota opere & authoritate constat, res medius fidius execranda & portentosa: altera nihil est aliud, cum bene exploratur, quam naturalis philosophiae absoluta consummatio."
16. Recent work on Pico includes H. Darrel Rutkin, Astrology, Natural Philosophy and the History of Science, c. 1250-1700: Studies toward an Interpretation of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola's Disputationes adversus Astrologiam Divinatricem (Ph.D. Dissertation, Indiana University, 2002), esp. 230-467,
17. with considered discussion of the various traditions of Pico scholarship; and Steven Vanden Broecke, The Limits of Influence: Pico, Louvain, and the Crisis of Renaissance Astrology (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 55-81.
18. Pico, 113. "Tota magia, quae in usu est apud modernos, & quam merito exterminat Ecclesia, nullam habet firmitatem, nullam veritatem, nullum firmamentum: quia pendet ex manu hostium primae veritatis, potestatum harum tenebrarum, quae tenebras falsitatis malae dispositis intellectibus offendunt."
19. See Anthony Grafton, Commerce with the Classics: Ancient Books and Renaissance Readers (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1997), 93-134;
20. and Rutkin, 338-43.
21. Pico, 483.
22. See books 11 and 12 of Pico della Mirandola's Disputationes adversus Astrologiam divinatricem, esp. 11.2 at 483. For Abraham's teaching, see 485.
23. For Vergil, see Denys Hay, Polydore Vergil: Renaissance Historian and Man of Letters (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952);
24. Brian Copenhaver, "The Historiography of Discovery in the Renaissance: The Sources and Composition of Polydore Vergil's De inventoribus rerum, 1-111," Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 41 (1978): 192-214;
25. and Copenhaver's introduction to Polydore Vergil: On Discovery, ed. and trans. Brian P. Copenhaver (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2002) vi-xxx.
26. On Discovery, 147-49.
27. Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, trans. H. St. J. Thackeray (Cambridge, Mass.: Loeb Classical Library, 1930), I.ii.68-71.
28. For Josephus, and his later reputation, see Josephus, the Bible, and History, ed. Louis H. Feldman and Gohei Hata (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1989).
29. See On Discovery 139-47. For the references in Josephus, see I.viii.166-68. For the medieval readings of Seth's Pillars,
30. see Cora E. Lutz, "Remigius' Ideas on the Origin and the Classification of the Seven Liberal Arts," Medievalia et humanistica 10 (1956): 32-49.
31. It should be noted that Vergil expressed caveats about astrology despite his genealogy: "Such was the beginning of the art of astrology, which doubtless was devised simply to befuddle sound minds" (On Discovery, 143). This runs contrary to his enthusiasm for letters, mathematics, and other arts that shared its genealogy.
32. For Annius see Walter Stephens, "Berosus Chaldaeus: Counterfeit and Fictive Editors of the Early Sixteenth Century" (Ph.D. Dissertation, Cornell University, 1979);
33. parts of which were integrated into his Giants in Those Days: Folklore, Ancient History, and Nationalism (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1989);
34. and his "Livres de haulte gresse: Bibliographic Myth from Rabelais to Du Bartas," MLN 120.1 Supplement (January 2005): S60-S83.
35. See also Anthony Grafton, Forgers and Critics: Creativity and Duplicity in Western Scholarship (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990).
36. I have used the 1552 Antwerp edition [Annius of Viterbo], Berosi sacerdotis Chaldaici, antiquitatum Italiae ac totius orbis libri quinque . . . (Antwerp, 1552), 41. "Ante aquarum cladem famosam qua universus periit orbis, multa praeterierunt saecula, quae a nostris Chaldaeis fideliter servata."
37. Annius, 45. "Erant igitur in usu litterae, & ars fusilis, & lateritia & vaticinia, mille annis & amplius ante inundationem terrarum."
38. Annius, 44. "Verum quod ab Adam primo condito coeperint literae & disciplinae infusae, non est ex [fide] tantum, sed etiam historia gentium & traditione Chaldaeorum qui se astronomiam & literas habuisse ante Alexandri monarchiam tribus millibus & sexcentis annis ac trigintaquator asserunt. . . . Quare coniectura & argumentum firmum est, ab ipso Atavo eius primo Adam eundem Enoch suscepisse literas & disciplinas, cuius tempore fuisse literas & disciplinas Adae infusas Theologi asserunt, & eodem tempore se cepisse literas & Astronomiam Chaldaei affirmant."
39. Stephens, "Berosus Chaldaeus." The notion of the "pious Chaldaean" is explored in depth 57-135, while the Annian Berosus's portrayal of the piety of his sources is discussed from 136-208.
40. See Stephens, "Berosus Chaldaeus," 136-208 for Annian-focused discussion of the importance to early modern scholars of saving ancient historical texts preserved from obliteration, with special focus on the Pillars. Some of this section has been published in
41. Stephens, "Livres de haulte gresse."
42. For the Neohermetic tradition, see Frances Yates, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1964);
43. for the Neoplatonic tradition see James Hankins, Plato in the Italian Renaissance, 2 vols. (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1990).
44. For Ramus in general, see French Renaissance Studies, 1540-70, ed. Peter Sharratt (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1976). For Ramus and the history of mathematics,
45. see Reijer Hooykas, Humanisme, science et réforme; Pierre de la Ramée (1515-1572) (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1958);
46. and articles by Bruyère-Robinet, Vasoli, and Cifoletti in Revue des Sciences Philosophiques et Théologiques 70.1 (1986).
47. Peter Ramus, Scholae Mathematicarum, Libri Unus et Triginta (Basle, 1569), 1. "Aristoteles igitur 1.coeli & 1.meteor, artes aeternas, ut mundum, arbitratur, sed earum tanquarn stellarum varios ortus & occasus esse, ut modo excitentur & floreant, modo jaceant & contemnantur. Haec magni philosophi magna prorsus sententia, artes sunt aeternarum & immutabilium rerum: at ipsarum apud homines notifia nequaquam est aeterna."
48. Ramus is here extrapolating from Aristotle, The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford Translation (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984) [270b1], and [352b1-353a1], though Aristotle here is not referring to arts specifically, but to the vicissitudes of all phenomena in an eternal world.
49. See Joannes Stadius, Tabulae Bergenses aequabilis et adparentus motus Orbium Coelestium . . . (Cologne, 1560), 1-3;
50. Heinrich Rantzau, Catalogus Imperatorum, Regum, ac Principium qui astrologicam artem amarunt . . . (Antwerp, 1580), esp. 19-24;
51. Matthaeus Dresserus, Isagoges historicae pars prima . . . (Leipzig, 1593), 26-29.
52. For Howard see Linda Levy Peck, Northampton, Patronage and Policy at the Court of James I (London: Allen & Unwin, 1982);
53. and her article on Northumberland in The Mental World of the Jacobean Court, ed. Linda Levy Peck (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). For the astrological debates of the 1580s,
54. see esp. Margaret Aston, "The Fiery Trigon Conjunction: an Elizabethan Astrological Prediction," Isis 61/2 (1970): 159-87;
55. see also Walter B. Stone, "Shakespeare and the Sad Augurs," The Journal of English and Germanic Philology 52 (1953): 457-79;
56. Don Cameron Allen, The Star-Crossed Renaissance: The Quarrel about Astrology and Its Influence in England (Durham, N.C., Duke University Press, 1941), 121-25;
57. and Nicholas Popper, "The English Polydaedali: How Gabriel Harvey Read Late Tudor London," JHI 66 (2005): 351-81.
58. Henry Howard, A defensative against the poyson of supposed prophecies (London, 1583), G.iv.r-v.
59. Howard, O.i.v.
60. Howard, O.i.v-O.ii.r.
61. For Gabriel Harvey, see Virginia Stern, Gabriel Harvey, His Life, Marginalia and Library (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1979);
62. Anthony Grafton and Lisa Jardine, '"Studied for Action': How Gabriel Harvey Read His Livy," Past and Present 129 (Nov. 1990): 30-78.
63. Gabriel Harvey's copy of Joannes Thomas Freigius, Mosaicus: continens historiam ecclesiasticam . . . (Basle, 1583), 60. BL shelfmark C.60.f.4. "Duae famosae columnae Mathematicae."
64. Joannes Thomas Freigius, Mosaicus: continens historiam ecclesiasticam . . . Ibid., "Duae Columnae Astronomicae, a Sethi nepotibus excitatae."
65. Harvey's Freigius, 140. "Abrahamus, primus Mathematicarum plantator in Aegypto: Unde, nee ita multo post, tot Mathematica, et Physica Miracula. Hinc fere Magia omnis Naturalis."
66. Ibid., 141. "Aegiptiorum Arithmetica, et Astronomia, ab Abrahamo: Mathematicarum artium nobili professore."
67. Ibid., 158.
68. Harvey's Freigius, 166. "Radius, Instrumentum, Perantiquum, omnium Geometricorum Instrumentorum praestantissimus; vulgo Baculus Jacobi dicitur, tanquam a sancta patriarcha illo iam olim inventus sit. Ram. Geometriae lib.9. Nimirum hoc Jacobi, mathematicum inventum, superioribus avi Abrahami inventis Mathematicis addendum videbatur."
69. Thomas Hood, A Copie of the Speacbe: made by the Mathematicall Lecturer, unto the Worshipfull Companye of present (London, 1588), A.iiii.v-B.i.r.
70. John Chamber, A Treatise Against Iudicall Astrologie (London, 1601), 118, 121.
71. Christoper Heydon, A Defence of Iudiciall Astrology (Cambridge, 1603), Zzz.4.v
72. [George Carleton], ATPOOOMANIA: The Madnesse of ASTROLOGERS. Or an Examination of Sir Christopher Heydons Booke, Intituled A Defence of Iudiciarie Astrologie. Written nearly 20 yeares ago by G.C. (London, 1624), 56. Since there were multiple ancient figures identified with Zoroaster, it should be noted, both critics and proponents of astrology were able to claim one of them in support of their position. See Lauren Kassell's article in this volume.
73. Jean Bodin, Method for the Easy Comprehension of History, trans. Beatrice Reynolds (New York: Norton, 1969), 300.
74. For the original, see Jean Bodin, Methodus, ad facilem historiarum cognitionem (Paris, 1566), 358-59: "Neque solum virtutes in nostris hominibus, sed etiam disciplinae pares, atque in veteribus extiterunt. est enim literarum sua quoque vicissitudo, ut primum quibusdam in locis ingeniosorum hominuw experientia & labore artes oriantur, deinde incrementa suscipiant, post aliquantum in statu vigeant, tandem sua vetustate langueant, denique sensim emoriantur, & oblivione diuturna sepeliantur: vel bellorum diuturna calamitate: vel quod nimia copia (malum his temporibus valde metuendum) satietatem levissimo cuique afferre soleat: vel quod iustas Deus poenas expetit ab iis qui scientias salutares, in hominum perniciem convertunt. Nam cum disciplinae, apud Graecos sensim adolevissent, ut ad summum pervenisse crederentur, tanta mutatio postea secuta est, ut ne ipsa quidem Graecia ubi nunc est unquam extitisse videatur . . . Omitto quammultos philosophes, geometras, astrologos, peperit Aegyptus, India Aethiopia: quammulti apud Caldaeos nobiles mathematici ante fuerunt, quam ullae essent in Graecia literae: ad nostra tempora relabor, quibus multo postquam literae toto pene terrarum orbe conquierant, tantus subito scientiarum omnium splendor affulsit, tanta fertilitas extitit ingeniorum, ut nullis unquam aetatibus maior."
75. Christophe Milieu, De scribenda universitatis rerum historia (Basle, 1551).
76. See Schmidt-Biggemann, 23-30;
77. and Donald R. Kelley, "Writing Cultural History in Early Modern Europe: Christoph Milieu and His Project," Renaissance Quarterly 52.2 (1999): 342-65. Kelley also notes that Bacon seemed unaware of Milieu's work, though it had indeed addressed his precise concerns.
78. Reiner Reineck, Methodus Legendi Cognoscendique Historiam tam sacram tam profanam. . . . (Helmstadt, 1583),
79. also including his oration on the dignity of mathematics. The section on the historia scholarum, is 22v-29v. For his description of the Pillars as a pedagogical tool, see within the Oratio, 36r-v.
80. Reineck, 28r.
81. Walter Ralegh, The History of the World (London, 1614), 1:199-212.
82. John Wallis, Geometriae Professoris Saviliani, Oratio Inauguralis in Auditorio Geometrico, Oxonii, habita . . . (Oxford, 1657). See b.3.r and passim. I thank Tony Mann for this reference.
83. See also Stephens, "Livres de haulte gresse," for the continued resourcing of the Pillars through the eighteenth century.
84. William Whiston, An Essay Towards Restoring the True Text of the Old Testament; and for Vindicating the Citations made thence in the New Testament (London, 1722), clx.
85. For Whiston, see James E. Force, William Whiston: Honest Newtonian (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985). For Whiston's biblical exegesis, and especially his study of ancient Egypt and the Near East,
86. see John Gascoigne, "'The Wisdom of the Egyptians' and the Secularisation of History in the Age of Newton," in The Uses of Antiquity: The Scientific Revolution and the Classical Tradition, ed. Stephen Gaukroger (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1991), 171-212.
87. Whiston; the quote is on cxxxix; his analysis is on clix-clx.
88. Others in the early eighteenth century dismissed the Pillars just as easily. For example, Vico consigned them to the "Museum of Credulity," though on the assumption that they had been attributed to Seth to exaggerate the ancient origins of the Chaldeans rather than on antiquarian criticism (see Giambattista Vico, The New Science, trans. David Marsh (London: Penguin, 2000), [49], p. 43).
89. For this point, see Anthony Grafton, Joseph Scaliger: A Study in the History of Classical Scholarship 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983-1993), 2: 253-62;
90. and Dear, 116-19.