The Limits of Influence: Pico, Louvain, and the Crisis of Renaissance Astrology (Medieval and Early Modern Science)

Title Page Copyright Page Table of Contents Acknowledgments List of illustrations Introduction Chapter one. Some preliminary remarks on astrology 1. The problem: “astronomy” and “astrology” 2. Natural and superstitious astrology 3. Teaching the “science of the stars” 4. The structure of the “science of judgment” 4.1. Astrological physics 4.2. Judicial astrology 5. Astrology, natural philosophy, and secrecy 5.1. Astrology and natural philosophy 5.2. Epistemic secrecy 5.3. Epistemological secrecy 6. Lucio Bellanti’s De astrologica veritate (1498) Chapter two. Astrology and late medieval academic culture. Louvain, 1425–1516 1. Academic astrological genres 1.1. Annual almanacs 1.2. Conjunctions and comets 2. The uses of academic astrology 2.1. Academic astrological consulting: Louvain and the Burgundian court 2.2. The importance of being printed: patronage, secrecy, and censorship 3. The teaching of academic astrology 3.1. Mathematics at the arts faculty 3.2. Astrological instruction at the medical faculty 4. Astrology and theology in late medieval academic culture 4.1. The Louvain union of revelation and astrology 4.2. Logic, revelation, and future contingents 4.3. Astrology and future contingents Chapter three. Between astrological reform and rejection: Giovanni Pico’s Disputations (1494) 1. The problem: Pico and the astrologers 1.1. Pico, Ptolemy, and astrological theory 1.2. Pico and the challenges of conjunctionism 1.2.1. The background: conjunctionist astrology in late fifteenth-century Italy 1.2.2. Pico and astrological boundary-work 2. The solution: Aristotle, mathematics, and experience 2.1. Aristotle and astrological physics 2.2. Mathematical astronomy and astrological physics 2.3. The value of common astrological experience 2.3.1. The antiquity of empirical records 2.3.2. The inaccuracy of astronomy 2.3.3. Contradictions in the astrological canon 2.4. The shape of astrological reform 3. Astrology demonized: Girolamo Savonarola’s attitude to astrology Chapter four. Humanism and court astrology: the 1524 conjunctions at Louvain 1. Introduction 2. The 1524 conjunctions and the expectation of a new Flood 3. Albert Pigghe and the return to Ptolemaic practice (1519) 3.1. An astrological practitioner at the French court 3.2. Humanism and astrology 3.3. In defense of reformed annual prognostications 4. Gaspar Laet in defense of personal experience (1520) 5. The debate at Louvain university: Thomas Montis’ disputation (1521) 6. Prudence, faith, reason, and astrology: Scepper’s Assertion (1523) 6.1. Scepper’s dream 6.2. Scepper and the Louvain humanists 6.3. Scepper’s problem 6.4. Scepper’s astrological critique 6.5. Scepper’s philosophical arithmetic Chapter five. Astrology and the Louvain cosmographical tradition 1. Introduction: cosmography and the 1524 debates 2. The rise of Louvain cosmography: Gemma Frisius 3. New opportunities for cosmographical patronage 4. Cosmography and academic mathematical instruction 5. Humanism and cosmography 6. Astronomy and cosmography 7. Astrology and cosmography 8. Cosmographical instruments and astrological theorica: Gerard Mercator’s astrological instrument (1551) 9. Gemma’s familia: mathematics teaching and the medical profession Intermezzo. A few comments on the use and nature of astrological reform 1. Business as usual: Albert Pigghe vs. Gaspar Laet 2. Secrecy, openness, and astrological reform 3. The nature of astrological reform 4. Meanwhile, among the prognosticators Chapter six. Copernican astronomy and Louvain astrology 1. Introduction 2. Copernican astronomy and private astrological practice 3. Patronage, politics, and astrological activity 3.1. Politics and the position of the fixed stars 3.2. The prediction of eclipses 4. Copernican astronomy and astrological physics in Gemma’s familia 4.1. Letter writing, Copernican astronomy, and the virtual familia 4.2. Planetary distances and the systemic virtues of Copernican astronomy 4.3. The Louvain background to Dee’s Propaedeumata aphoristica (1558) 4.4. The interpretive problem of the Propaedeumata 4.5. The Piconian background to the Propaedeumata 4.6. The Louvain connection: astrology, optics, and mathematics 4.7. Pico’s Disputations and planetary distances 5. Astrological reform and the emergence of scientific realism Chapter seven. Ptolemy, parapegmata, mathematics, and monsters. The reform of mundane astrology 1. Ptolemy, politics, and prognostication. Cornelius Gemma’s Ephemerides (1561) 2. Parapegmata and popular errors. Joannes Stadius’ De fixis stellis (1560) 2.1. Stadius’ restoration of ancient parapegmata 2.2. Medical astrology in sixteenth-century Louvain 2.3. Particular experience and ancient authority 2.4. Popular errors and the new Ptolemy 2.5. Emulating Ptolemy’s Phases of the Fixed Stars 3. John Dee’s weather observations: towards a mathematical astrological physics (1548) 3.1. Weather observations at Nuremberg: Werner, Camerarius, and Schöner 3.2. Weather observations at Louvain: John Dee 3.3. Mathematical operationalism, natural philosophy, and astrological reform 4. Strange heavens: teratology, prognostication, and Neoplatonism in the 1570s 4.1. Cornelius Gemma and the new star of 1572 4.2. Neoplatonism, Augustinianism, and the cosmocritical art 4.3. Teratology and astrology in the cosmocritical art 4.4. The political and theological relevance of the cosmocritical art Chapter eight. Prorogations, houses, and natal astrology 1. Horoscope collections and astrological expertise 1.1. Joannes Stadius and the art of prorogation 1.2. Particular experience and the reform of natal astrology 2. House division, prorogation, and the search for Ptolemaic authority 2.1. Regiomontanus’ restoration of Ptolemaic prorogations 2.2. Prorogation and astrological house division 2.2.1. Abandoning the standard method: Regiomontanus and Ptolemy 2.2.2. Coexisting traditions. Gemma Frisius on house division 2.2.3. The collapse of textual authority as a token of expertise 3. The collapse of empirical success as a token of expertise 3.1. Sixtus of Hemminga’s Astrologiae refutatae liber (1583) 3.2. Experience, the art, and the artists Conclusion 1. Antecedents 2. Problems 3. Solutions 4. Results Bibliography Indices Index of persons Index of places Index of subjects MEDIEVAL AND EARLY MODERN SCIENCE This Book Provides A New Level Of Detail To The History Of Astrology. It Also Establishes Important New Links With The History Of Universities, Humanism, Astronomy, Medicine, And Instrument Building.--book Jacket. Ch. 1. Some Preliminary Remarks On Astrology -- Ch. 2. Astrology And Late Medieval Academic Culture. Louvain, 1425-1516 -- Ch. 3. Between Astrological Reform And Rejection: Giovanni Pico's Disputations (1494) -- Ch. 4. Humanism And Court Astrology: The 1524 Conjunctions At Louvain -- Ch. 5. Astrology And The Louvain Cosmographical Tradition -- Ch. 6. Copernican Astronomy And Louvain Astrology -- Ch. 7. Ptolemy, Parapegmata, Mathematics, And Monsters. The Reform Of Mundane Astrology -- Ch. 8. Prorogations, Houses, And Natal Astrology. By Steven Vanden Broecke. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [271]-304) And Indexes. Historians of science often acknowledge the academic status of astrology in the early modern period, but mostly fail to explore its relation with other disciplines and its role in society. This book seeks to fill that gap. The first part of the book examines the practices and functions that shaped late medieval astrology, and relates how its academic status became discredited, both in northern Italy and the Low Countries. The second part of the book examines various counter-strategies of astrological reform, and shows how these ultimately failed to restore public trust in academic astrology. This book provides a new level of detail to the history of astrology. It also establishes important new links with other fields, like the history of universities, humanism, astronomy, medicine, and instrument building.