Ideas in the Mind: Gender and Knowledge in the Seventeenth Century

Abstract

“Neither doth our Sex delight or understand Philosophy.” (Margaret Cavendish, 1664)

Sidereal Messages: Print Letters in Restoration Astronomical Writing

“…22 In scientific print letters, the nature of the community at issue is originally limitedthe res publica literaria is very much in the process of self-definition in the second half of the seventeenth century, and epistolary form was one medium of self-fashioning, internally as well as externally. 23 Next to differences in erudition, such as the classic master-student relationship familiar from the dialogue genre, differences of estate and relationships of patronage mattered, 24 as did differences of gender 25 and nationality. 26 Epistolary form mediated between the intersectional sub-stratifications of the emerging republic of letters, and it became a means for the community of virtuosi 'to fashion themselves […] as exemplary of the courtesy and conduct required for the prosecution of collaborative investigative projects and discussions in the virtual world'.…”

Materia medica in the seventeenth-century Paper Museum of Cassiano dal Pozzo

“…Heck wrote several manuscripts on this topic and in 1604 wrote to the physician Thomas Mermann in Cologne, on behalf of the Academy as 'lovers of science and investigators of the spagiric art' (Gabrieli 1938(Gabrieli -1942Olmi in Cadei 2002, p. 49). 4 Both Cesi and Faber had many occult and alchemical treatises in their libraries, while Heck's experience from his sojourn at Rudolf II's court in Prague ensured access to Paracelsian medicine (Baldriga 2002;Findlen 2004). Indeed, the three German Lincei, Faber, Schreck and Müller, 5 compiled c. 1614 their own clear and useful Paracelsian compendium which, although never published, served for their therapeutic application of alchemy 3 Details of these individuals and their achievements can be found elsewhere (Scott & Freedberg 2000;Freedberg 2002;Brevaglieri 2009); individual academicians are identified hereafter as Linceo, plural Lincei.…”

“…1.18;Clayton 2004, p. 110;Moore & Larkin 2006, p. 59. probably reflects the Lincei's interest in Paracelsian beliefs in the influence of stars on human affairs and disease: within a month of their initial meeting in 1603, 'they cast the academy's horoscope to assure themselves that the heavens favored their enterprise' (Siraisi 1997;Freedberg 2002, pp. 67, 200, 443, n. 3;Findlen 2004). 'All the astrological data which were of use to medical science' were assembled in a document by Heck, and Van Kessel (1976, p. 112) reproduces his 1596-1597 drawing showing the astrological relation of different constellations to various human organs, senses and capacities.…”