Science in the vanished Arcadia : knowledge of nature in the Jesuit missions of Paraguay and Rio de la Plata

In __Science in the Vanished__**Miguel de Asua** provides the first modern comprehensive account of Jesuit science in the missions of Paraguay and the River Plate region during the 17th and 18th centuries. Focusing on individual Jesuits and underlining the relationships of their work to the religious goals of the Society of Jesus, the book covers the disciplines of natural history, cartography, medical botany, astronomy and the topics pursued by the former missionaries in their Italian exile. Based on many so far unexplored manuscripts and a vast corpus of primary sources, the book argues the existence of a tradition of research on nature consistent with universal Jesuit science and at the same time original in its articulation of Western learning and aboriginal lore on nature." Contents 7 Acknowledgements 11 List of Maps and Figures 15 Abbreviations 17 Introduction 19 1 Some Historiographical Remarks 22 2 The Jesuits in Paraguay and the River Plate 26 3 A Brief Survey of Events 31 4 Life in the Reductions 37 Chapter 1 Natural Histories 43 1 The Jesuit Natural Histories of Paraquaria 47 2 Textual Organization 54 2.1 Organizing 54 2.2 Listing 58 2.3 Naming 64 3 The Natural Histories 73 3.1 Lozano and the Wondrous Nature of Paraguay 73 3.2 Paucke: “I Tell What I Have Seen” 79 3.3 Sánchez Labrador’s Catalogue of the Natural World of Paraquaria 86 4 Writing on Nature in Paraquaria 98 4.1 A Jesuit Genre of Writing 99 4.2 Theatrum naturae 104 4.3 The Jesuit Works and Eighteenth-Century Natural History 106 4.4 Native Lore on Nature 110 Chapter 2 Herbals 114 1 Jesuits Medicine and Pharmacy in Eighteenth-Century Paraguay and Río de la Plata 117 2 The Major Works 131 2.1 Montenegro 131 2.2 Aperger 133 2.3 A Jungle of Herbals 135 2.3.1 Manuscripts Containing Montenegro’s Materia medica misionera 137 2.3.2 Manuscripts Containing Versions of Montenegro’s Materia medica misionera Attributed to Aperger 141 2.3.3 Manuscript History 143 2.4 Montenegro’s Herbal. European Pharmacopoeia and Guaraní Plant Lore 144 2.4.1 Identification of Plants 148 2.4.2 Pictures 149 2.4.3 Montenegro’s Materia medica misionera, the Guaraní and the “Galenization” of Native Herbal Lore 152 2.5 Jesuits and Guaraní Healers 156 2.6 A Medical Handbook for the Missions 159 3 The Lost and Minor Works 165 3.1 A Guaraní receptarium 166 3.2 Medicinal Botany in the Paraguay Natural 168 3.3 The English Surgeon 169 3.4 A Book of Surgery 175 4 The Herbal Tradition in Paraquaria 177 Chapter 3 Maps 182 1 Quiroga 192 2 Astronomical Instruments 195 3 Charting Patagonia 197 3.1 Quiroga’s Maps and Observations 199 4 An Expedition to the Mato Grosso 203 5 The Chair of Mathematics 205 6 The Sources of the Paraguay River 207 7 Maps and Politics 212 8 Maps and Mission 217 9 Maps of the Productive Structure of the Missions 220 10 Jesuits, Natives, and Maps 222 Chapter 4 The Heavens 229 1 The Stars Lead to Kircher 230 1.1 Comets and Eclipses 1 1.2 The Mission by the Lake Nahuel Huapi 237 2 Buenaventura Suárez S.J. 240 2.1 Suárez’s Telescopes 244 2.2 Observations from the Mission of San Cosme 246 2.3 A Lunar Calendar 250 2.4 Suárez and the Royal Society 253 2.5 Longitude 260 2.6 Teaching of Astronomy in Córdoba 265 2.7 Theory 269 2.8 The Guaraní as Instrument Makers 271 3 Missionary Astronomy 275 Chapter 5 Science in the Italian Exile 277 1 Juárez’s Vatican Garden of the Indies 279 1.1 The Osservazioni 287 1.2 Juárez’s Botanical Outlook 293 2 Spiders and Electric Fish 297 2.1 Jesuits and Electric Fish 301 2.2 The Immediate Background of Termeyer’s Experiments 303 2.3 A Fishy Anatomy 306 2.4 Experiments among the Mocoví 308 2.5 A Fluid Discussion 310 2.6 An American Postscript 313 3 Looking at the Heavens through Someone Else’s Eyes 314 3.1 The Cádiz Quadrant 318 4 The Cultural Transplant 325 Chapter 6 A Last Word 328 1 Empirical Reference 328 2 Science and Religion 332 3 Science and Native Lore on Nature 333 Appendix 337 Bibliography 339 Index 383 In Science in the Vanished Miguel de Asua provides the first modern comprehensive account of Jesuit science in the missions of Paraguay and the River Plate region during the 17th and 18th centuries. Focusing on individual Jesuits and underlining the relationships of their work to the religious goals of the Society of Jesus, the book covers the disciplines of natural history, cartography, medical botany, astronomy and the topics pursued by the former missionaries in their Italian exile. Based on many so far unexplored manuscripts and a vast corpus of primary sources, the book argues the existence of a tradition of research on nature consistent with universal Jesuit science and at the same time original in its articulation of Western learning and aboriginal lore on nature." In Science in the Vanished Miguel de Asúa provides the first modern comprehensive account of Jesuit science in the missions of Paraguay and the River Plate region during the 17th and 18th centuries. Focusing on individual Jesuits and underlining the relationships of their work to the religious goals of the Society of Jesus, the book covers the disciplines of natural history, cartography, medical botany, astronomy and the topics pursued by the former missionaries in their Italian exile. Based on many so far unexplored manuscripts and a vast corpus of primary sources, the book argues the existence of a tradition of research on nature consistent with universal Jesuit science and at the same time original in its articulation of Western learning and aboriginal lore on nature. In Science in the Vanished Arcadia Miguel de Asúa provides the first modern comprehensive account of Jesuit science in the missions of Paraguay and the River Plate region during the 17th and 18th centuries