Scientist of the Day - Gregor Reisch

The ancient Geek astronomer Ptolemy of Alexandria in consultation with a personification of Astronomy, detail of a woodcut in Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517 (Linda Hall Library)

Gregor Reisch, a German monk, died on May 9, 1525, at the age of about 58. Reisch was a Carthusian, a member of an order that was as popular then as it was ever going to be.  Carthusians were monastic, living in what were called Charterhouses, and they took vows of silence. Instead of speaking, they wrote books, sometimes devotional, but more often educational, as most Carthusians, like Reisch, had attended a university. 

Title page, Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517 (Linda Hall Library)

Reisch wrote and published a book called Margarita philosophica, the Pearl of Philosophy.  It was first published in 1503 in Freiburg; our copy was printed in 1517 in Basel.  It is often referred to as an encyclopedia, but it was not. It was more of a guide to the university curriculum of the time, which was based on the seven liberal arts: grammar, logic, and rhetoric (often called the trivium), followed by the quadrivium: arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy. But the Margarita was not a textbook, for it took at least four years at any university to get through the trivium (first 2 years), and then the 4 mathematical sciences of the quadivium.  And the Margarita, with its many woodcuts and larger format, would have been too expensive for most students. So who bought it? (It did sell well, and went through many editions in the 16th century).  Perhaps teachers, and wealthier students. And maybe Carthusian monks.

Allegory of Geometry, the sixth of the seven liberal arts, woodcut in Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517 (Linda Hall Library)

The Margarita is best known for its bold, full-page woodcuts. We wrote our first post on Reisch 8 years ago, and we included for that occasion some of the most attractive images from the book: a geocentric cosmos, a portrait of the still-authoritative ancient astronomer, Ptolemy of Alexandria; a zodiacal man, demonstrating which constellations ruled which parts of the body; an allegory of the liberal art Arithmetic; a diagram of the functional areas of the human brain, and a world map, based on Ptolemy, wearing his other hat, that of geographer. Since we will not repeat any of those today (except for a detail of Ptolemy at work, first image here), you might want to take a look at those woodcuts at some point.  Here is the link again.  I also included a discussion of the connections between Carthusian, charterhouse, and chartreuse.

Allegory of Music, the fifth of the seven liberal arts, slightly cropped, woodcut in Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517 (Linda Hall Library)

For this occasion, I selected two more of the allegorical woodcuts of the mathematical liberal arts, those of Geometry (third image), and Music (fourth image). The iconography of Geometry is easily deciphered, as practitioners take sightings with an astrolabe and a quadrant, or measure a field. The "Typus Musicae" is a little trickier, especially in its sly reference to the story about Pythagoras weighing the hammers of four blacksmiths to find out why three were consonant and one was dissonant, here referenced only by the hammers on the scales at the right. We showed a more obvious rendering of that scene as the last image in our post on Pythagoras.

An armillary sphere, woodcut in Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517 (Linda Hall Library)

A falling stone or meteorite, text woodcut in Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517 (Linda Hall Library)

The section on astronomy in the Margarita has the most woodcuts, showing a variety of epicycle-deferent systems taken from George Peurbach's New Theory of the Planets. We show here a very nice armillary sphere, a basic teaching instrument in the astronomy classroom (fifth image). There is also a short section on meteorology, with a delightful small woodcut (here enlarged, sixth image) of a "stone from the sky,” and a stunned observer, of sorts, perhaps a reference to the Ensisheim meteorite that fell in 1492.

Fortuna’s wheel, woodcut in Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517 (Linda Hall Library)

My favorite woodcut comes near the end, after all forms of knowledge have been covered. It shows Fortuna and her wheel, a subtle reminder that no matter how smart you are and how hard you study, the vagaries of Fortune may raise you up or plunge you down, and it is entirely out of your hands (seventh image).

The front cover of our copy of Margarita philosophica cu[m] additionibus nouis, by Gregor Reisch, 1517, with a contemporary binding of roll-stamped vellum over wood (Linda Hall Library)

Finally, we show you the binding of our copy, which came out of a library in Liechtenstein, and, as Fortune would have it, into our own (eighth image).  It was certainly not a student’s copy, being bound in roll-stamped vellum over wooden boards, which at one time had brass clasps (now missing) to keep the book closed when the air got humid. It is a lovely copy.

William B. Ashworth, Jr., Consultant for the History of Science, Linda Hall Library and Associate Professor emeritus, Department of History, University of Missouri-Kansas City. Comments or corrections are welcome; please direct to ashworthw@umkc.edu.