There have now been three main stages in the development of this project. In the first phase, from soon before the beginning of my graduate studies at Indiana University (1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002) in the History and Philosophy of Science (ca. 1993Science (ca. ) until ca. 2005 to focus as clearly and exclusively as possible on astrology qua natural knowledgeespecially its configurations with mathematics, natural philosophy and medicine-while keeping its relationship to magic and the other so-called "occult sciences" strictly to one side. I focused primarily on astrology's relation to mathematics and natural philosophy, but I also treated medicine at times where it seemed most relevant. Likewise, I paid some attention to the theological dimension, especially concerning astrology's status as legitimate knowledge and practice in relation to theologico-religious (primarily Roman Catholic) orthodoxy.The second phase began in Spring 2006 when Irven M. Resnick kindly asked me to write the essay "Astrology and Magic" in the work of Albertus Magnus for a volume of invited essays, 20 which finally forced me to deal at least to some extent with astrology's relationship to magic. It quickly became obvious that the most interesting and illuminating way to approach this subject for my interests would be to focus on astrological images (imagines astronomicae) or talismans. Fortunately, a brilliant work of scholarship had recently appeared on precisely this subject, greatly facilitating my work: Nicolas Weill-Parot's penetrating and massive, Les "images astrologiques" au Moyen Age et à la Renaissance: Spéculations intellectuelles et pratiques magiques (XIIe-XVe siècle). 21 Furthermore, my originally one-volume study split into two volumes while I was a Dibner Fellow at the Huntington Library in 2008-09, and then again into three in
In this essay I will survey a broad range of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola's explicit mentions of Ptolemy in his long, dense and influential attack on astrology, the Disputationes adversus astrologiam divinatricem of 1496. 2 Searching the text, I have found that Pico explicitly mentioned Ptolemy's name 376 times in various contexts. We know fully well, however, that Pico was not always explicit or straightforward in how he used Ptolemy, as I have shown elsewhere. 3 Furthermore, Pico's use of Ptolemy is located at the intersection of two larger issues: [1] The full range of Pico's complex and interested use of authorities overall (mainly astrological, philosophical and theological) in the Disputations, 4 and [2] the increasing knowledge of Ptolemy's Greek text in the Renaissance.Although Pico was long dead by the time that the brilliant humanist scholar, Joachim Camerarius, published the Editio Princeps of the Greek text of Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos in 1535, we know that Pico was one of the first scholars to systematically use the Greek manuscripts that Lorenzo de' Medici had collected to philologically critique the earlier Arabo-Latin translations and their associated commentaries. 5 In this essay, I will explore Pico's explicit mentions of Ptolemy in the Disputations in relation to the authentic Tetrabiblos and Almagest, and the pseudonymous Centiloquium, which Pico thought was authentic. These are 1 I would like to acknowledge that this article was completed as part of a project that has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (GA n. 725883 EarlyModernCosmology), as well as support from the University of Sydney while I was an Honorary Associate in History of Science at its School of History and Philosophy of Science.2 I use the Latin text that Eugenio Garin edited for the National Edition of Pico's works: Garin, Giovanni Pico. The translation is mine, and will ultimately appear in the I Tatti Renaissance Library. My thanks to the organizers of this marvelous and memorable conference, and especially to David Juste and Dag Nikolaus Hasse for their very helpful responses to a range of queries, and for their valuable comments on the submitted first draft of this essay.3 Rutkin, 'The Use and Abuse '. 4 See (e.g.) Caroti, 'Le fonti medievali'.
What is the relationship between astrology and divination? In particular, is astrology a type of divination, as is often asserted or assumed? In both astrology and divination, knowledge and prediction of the future are primary goals, but does this warrant calling astrology a form of divination? I approach these questions by exploring the response of Thomas Aquinas, which was to be extremely influential for many centuries. First I analyze in some detail Thomas’s answer in his Summa theologiae 2-2.92–95; then I discuss two significant sixteenth-century examples of its influence: the 1557, 1559, 1564, and later indexes of prohibited books; and Pope Sixtus V’s anti-divinatory bull, Coeli et Terrae Creator (1586). In this way, we can explore some of the complex historical dynamics at play in the construction of a legitimate astrology in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
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