Because of their spectacular, naturalistic pictures of plants and the human body, Leonhart Fuchs’s De historia stirpium and Andreas Vesalius’s De humani corporis fabrica are landmark publications in the history of the printed book. But as Picturing the Book of Nature makes clear, they do more than bear witness to the development of book publishing during the Renaissance and to the prominence attained by the fields of medical botany and anatomy in European medicine. Sachiko Kusukawa examines these texts, as well as Conrad Gessner’s unpublished Historia plantarum, and demonstrates how their illustrations were integral to the emergence of a new type of argument during this period—a visual argument for the scientific study of nature. To set the stage, Kusukawa begins with a survey of the technical, financial, artistic, and political conditions that governed the production of printed books during the Renaissance. It was during the first half of the sixteenth century that learned authors began using images in their research and writing, but because the technology was so new, there was a great deal of variety of thought—and often disagreement—about exactly what images could do: how they should be used, what degree of authority should be attributed to them, which graphic elements were bearers of that authority, and what sorts of truths images could and did encode. Kusukawa investigates the works of Fuchs, Gessner, and Vesalius in light of these debates, scrutinizing the scientists’ treatment of illustrations and tracing their motivation for including them in their works. What results is a fascinating and original study of the visual dimension of scientific knowledge in the sixteenth century.

Picturing the Book of Nature: Image, Text, and Argument in Sixteenth-Century Human Anatomy and Medical Botany

History

Kusukawa, Sachiko

Europe

University of Chicago Press

This book examines the genesis of Lutheran interest in natural philosophical issues by focusing on the reform of natural philosophy initiated by Philip Melanchthon. It suggests that Melanchthon transformed traditional natural philosophy into a specifically Lutheran one in an effort to refute civil disobedience and promote Luther's cause. It argues that an approach to natural philosophy by a dichotomy of "science" vs. "religion" is hazardous: natural philosophy should be understood as a study of nature, understood as God's creation, undertaken for Christian purposes.

The Transformation of Natural Philosophy: The Case of Philip Melanchthon (Ideas in Context, Series Number 34)

Politics & Social Sciences

Philosophy

Cambridge University Press

Gregor Reisch's The Philosophical pearl (Margarita Philosophica), first published in 1503 and republished 11 times in the sixteenth century, was the first extensive printed text which discussed the disciplines taught at university to achieve widespread dissemination. This distinguishes it from printed editions of individual texts of Aristotle and other authorities. It is presented as a dialogue between master and pupil, covering the seven liberal arts, natural philosophy and moral philosophy, and with illustrations throughout. It has received remarkably little attention in its own right as a work of education which helped shape the world view of sixteenth-century educated men. Its author was a Carthusian monk. This volume presents an edited translation and an extensive introduction, of the four books which deal with natural philosophy - the predecessor of modern science. These books clearly show the extent to which for Reisch the study of nature was still primarily undertaken for Christian ends. Not only was nature studied as God's creation, but the study of the soul (a central part of natural philosophy pursued on Aristotelian lines) and its fate was here completely integrated with the salvation or damnation of the individual Christian, as taught in the Bible and by the church fathers, especially Augustine. Natural philosophy for Reisch was a discipline which was as concerned with God and the Bible as it was with Nature and Aristotle.

Natural Philosophy Epitomised: Books 8-11 of Gregor Reisch's Philosophical pearl (1503)

Historical Study & Educational Resources

Routledge

In 1547, a year after Martin Luther's death, the University Library of Wittenberg collected his books and manuscripts and sent them to Weimar. In 1549 John Frederick moved the books from Weimar to Jena, where the majority of the books and manuscripts, as well as the catalogues of Wittenberg University Library, have survived to this day. xli, 258 pages. cloth.. tall 8vo..

Wittenberg University Library Catalogue of 1536

Reference

Writing, Research & Publishing Guides

Mrts

Andreas Vesalius: Anatomy and the World of Books (Renaissance Lives)

Biographies & Memoirs

Arts & Literature

Reaktion Books

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Books by Kusukawa, Sachiko