20190726T160020190726T1800Europe/AmsterdamTexts and Contexts of Medieval Astronomy and Astrology: Structures, Instructions, and Teaching Strategies
In scholarship on the transmission of knowledge across different cultures in the medieval period, historians--most notably George Makdisi--have identified evidence of pedagogical similarities and differences. However, very little attention has been afforded to pedagogies associated with particular disciplines such as astronomy and astrology, and even less to how astronomy and astrology were taught together. It is through these disciplinary building blocks that we may reconstruct the broader pedagogical trends in the circulation of knowledge before the printing press. In this panel, we will examine genres of texts associated with instruction-including introductions and canons to astronomical tables-in order to better understand how knowledge passed both across cultures and to subsequent generations of learners. We look specifically at the internal structures of texts, including organizational decisions, diagrams and tables, and the syntax of instructional language, to determine how texts were used as pedagogical tools. We also consider how different genres of texts were intended to be read together as part of an emerging curriculum of study, in order to better articulate the relationship between technical astronomy, mathematical astrology, and theoretical astrology in medieval Byzantine, Islamic, and European traditions.
Organized by Margaret Gaida
Drift 25, Rm. 204History of Science Society 2019meeting@hssonline.org
In scholarship on the transmission of knowledge across different cultures in the medieval period, historians--most notably George Makdisi--have identified evidence of pedagogical similarities and differences. However, very little attention has been afforded to pedagogies associated with particular disciplines such as astronomy and astrology, and even less to how astronomy and astrology were taught together. It is through these disciplinary building blocks that we may reconstruct the broader pedagogical trends in the circulation of knowledge before the printing press. In this panel, we will examine genres of texts associated with instruction-including introductions and canons to astronomical tables-in order to better understand how knowledge passed both across cultures and to subsequent generations of learners. We look specifically at the internal structures of texts, including organizational decisions, diagrams and tables, and the syntax of instructional language, to determine how texts were used as pedagogical tools. We also consider how different genres of texts were intended to be read together as part of an emerging curriculum of study, in order to better articulate the relationship between technical astronomy, mathematical astrology, and theoretical astrology in medieval Byzantine, Islamic, and European traditions.
Organized by Margaret Gaida
Firm Content, Fluid Forms: Al-Farghānī’s Elements of Astronomy as a Recasting of Ptolemaic AstronomyView Abstract Organized SessionPhysical Sciences04:00 PM - 04:30 PM (Europe/Amsterdam) 2019/07/26 14:00:00 UTC - 2019/07/26 14:30:00 UTC
In the 9th century, al-Farghānī composed a work on the elements of astronomy which remained well-known for centuries during the medieval period. Through thirty chapters, he presented Ptolemaic astronomy in a way whose “rearrangement” and “rewording” was praised by medieval readers. Not bearing a particular title, this book spread the popularity of Ptolemy’s ideas by being referred to as a “compendium” and a “summary” of the Almagest in its later reception. In excluding diagrams, tables and mathematical calculations, al-Farghānī delivers a descriptive exposition of Ptolemaic astronomy which claims to be “adequate” and “concise”. The main goal of this paper is to explain the structure of al-Farghānī’s exposition and the overall format of the book. In my explanation, I will provide a textual analysis which situates al-Farghānī’s book in broader trends of medieval Islamic astronomical writing. I also consider the audience of his book, which focuses a pedagogical lens on the Elements of Astronomy. Through this analysis, I explore the interaction between the text, script and context of scholarly writing in the Islamicate world in the 9th century.
Presenters Raziehsadat Mousavi Predoctoral Fellow, Max Planck Institute For The History Of Science
Comparing Latin and Islamic Contexts of Teaching and Learning Astrology in the Medieval PeriodView Abstract Organized SessionPhysical Sciences04:30 PM - 05:00 PM (Europe/Amsterdam) 2019/07/26 14:30:00 UTC - 2019/07/26 15:00:00 UTC
What was the role of astronomical tables as pedagogical tools for the teaching of astrology in the medieval period? In considering the genres of texts used for teaching astrology in Islamic contexts, the introductory text (mudkhal) was a central component of study. Oftentimes these introductions make reference to a table of planetary motion (zīj), where one may find explanations for performing technical calculations of mathematical astrology. Similarly, in the medieval Latin tradition, planetary tables included sets of instructions or canons (canones) which provide details on astrological calculations. European students would also read Latin renditions of the Arabic introductions. This paper examines John of Saxony’s canons to the Alfonsine Tables and his commentary to Alcabitius’s Introduction to Astrology in order to reconstruct how astrological techniques were taught in the fourteenth-century at the University of Paris. By comparing this analysis with the relationship between introductory texts and tables in the Islamic world, we may better assess the importance of astronomical tables in the teaching and learning of technical astrology in both cultures. Furthermore, this comparison also raises the question of the impact of the institutional setting of universities on the formalization of some aspects of astrological pedagogy.
On Transmitting, Transcribing, and Arranging Astronomical Knowledge in 14th/15th Century Byzantine ManuscriptsView Abstract Organized SessionPhysical Sciences05:00 PM - 05:30 PM (Europe/Amsterdam) 2019/07/26 15:00:00 UTC - 2019/07/26 15:30:00 UTC
Byzantine scribes and copyists working with manuscripts stemming from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries employed several strategies on arranging and presenting knowledge with regard to astronomy and astrology, especially reworking Greek-Ptolemaic astronomy and incorporating Islamic astronomical materials. From manuscript evidence we are able to reconstruct some significant cases of strategies that lead to cases of circulation of knowledge, as well as learning, teaching, comparing, and studying. Scribes and copyists carefully crafted their instructions on how to use astronomical tables and arranged quires thematically in manuscripts. Writing astronomy is thus learning how to be able to master a stylistic code. To explore these topics, I will examine the 14th/15th century Greek manuscripts Vaticanus graecus 1059, Vaticanus graecus 792, Marcianus graecus Z 323 and Z 333, which illustrate important decisions about textual arrangement and selection of manuscripts in single volumes with regard to astronomical and astrological texts.
Commentary: Texts and Contexts of Medieval Astronomy and Astrology: Structures, Instructions, and Teaching StrategiesView Abstract Organized Session05:30 PM - 06:00 PM (Europe/Amsterdam) 2019/07/26 15:30:00 UTC - 2019/07/26 16:00:00 UTC
Raziehsadat Mousavi