Athanasius Kircher

Athanasius Kircher (sometimes spelt Kirchner) (May 2 1601?–27 November 1680) was a 17th century German Jesuit scholar who published around 40 works, most notably in the fields of oriental studies, geology and medicine. He made an early study of Egyptian hieroglyphs. He was ahead of his time in proposing that the plague was caused by an infectious microorganism and in suggesting effective measures to prevent the spread of the disease. A scientific star in his day, towards the end of his life he was eclipsed by the rationalism of René Descartes and others. In the late 20th century, however, the aesthetic qualities of his work have again begun to be appreciated. One scholar, Edward Schmidt, has called him "the last Renaissance man".

Works

Kircher published a large number of substantial books on a very wide variety of subjects, such as Egyptology, geology, and music theory. His syncretic approach paid no attention to the boundaries between disciplines which are now conventional: his Magnes, for example, was ostensibly a discussion of magnetism, but also explored other forms of attraction such as gravity and love. Perhaps Kircher's best-known work today is his Oedipus Aegyptiacus (1652-54) a vast study of Egyptology and comparative religion. His books, written in Latin, had a wide circulation in the 17th century, and they contributed to the dissemination of scientific information to a broader circle of readers.

Related Topics:
Egyptology - Geology - Music theory - Syncretic - Magnetism - Gravity - Love - Oedipus Aegyptiacus - Comparative religion - Latin - 17th century

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Egyptology

Kircher was acknowledged as his era's greatest student of the mysteries of Ancient Egypt. While some of his notions are long discredited, portions of his work have been valuable to later scholars and Kirchner helped pioneer Egyptology as a field of serious study.

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Kircher's interest in Egyptology began in 1628 when he became intrigued by a collection of hieroglyphs in the library at Speyer. He learned Coptic in 1633 and published the first grammar of the language in 1636, the Prodromus coptus sive aegyptiacus. In the Lingua aegyptiaca restituta of 1643 he argued correctly that Coptic was not a separate language, but the last development of ancient Egyptian. He also recognised the relationship between the hieratic and hieroglyphic scripts.

Related Topics:
1628 - Speyer - Coptic - 1633 - 1636 - 1643 - Ancient Egyptian - Hieratic

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In Oedipus Aegyptiacus he argued that ancient Egyptian was the language spoken by Adam, that Hermes Trismegistus was Moses, and that hieroglyphs were occult symbols which "cannot be translated by words, but expressed only by marks, characters and figures." This led him to translate simple hieroglyphic texts now known to read as dd Wsr ("Osiris says") as "The treachery of Typhon ends at the throne of Isis; the moisture of nature is guarded by the vigilance of Anubis." Kircher apparently fooled himself (as well as some contemporaries) into believing that he could read the hieroglyphics, but his "translations" were largely figments of his own imagination having little to do with the actual text.

Related Topics:
Ancient Egyptian - Adam - Hermes Trismegistus - Moses - Occult - Symbol

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Although his approach to deciphering the texts was based on a fundamental misconception, he did pioneer serious study of hieroglyphs, and the data which he collected were later used by Champollion in his successful efforts to decode the script. Kircher himself was alive to the possibility of the hieroglyphs constituting an alphabet: he included in his proposed system (incorrect) derivations of the Greek alphabet from 21 hieroglyphs.

Related Topics:
Champollion - Alphabet - Greek alphabet

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Sinology

Kircher had an early interest in China, telling his superior in 1629 that he wished to become a missionary to the country. His China Monumentis (1667) was an encyclopedia of China, which combined accurate cartography with mythical elements such as dragons. The work emphasised the Christian elements of Chinese history, both real and imagined: he noted the early presence of Nestorians, but also claimed that the Chinese were descended from the sons of Ham, that Confucius was Hermes Trismegistus/Moses and that the Chinese characters were corrupted hieroglyphs. In his system, ideograms were inferior to hieroglyphs because they referred to specific ideas rather than to mysterious complexes of ideas, while the signs of the Maya and Aztecs were yet lower pictograms which referred only to objects. Umberto Eco comments that this idea reflected and supported the European attitude to the Chinese and native American civilisations;

Related Topics:
China - 1629 - Missionary - Cartography - Dragon - Nestorian - Ham - Confucius - Chinese character - Ideogram - Maya - Aztec - Pictogram - Umberto Eco

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"China was presented not as an unknown barbarian to be defeated but as a prodigal son who should return to the home of the common father". (p. 69)

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Geology

On a visit to southern Italy in 1638 Kircher was lowered into the crater of Vesuvius, then on the brink of eruption, in order to examine its interior. He was also intrigued by the subterranean rumbling which he heard at the Strait of Messina. His geological and geographical investigations culminated in his Mundus Subterraneus of 1664, in which he suggested that the tides were caused by water moving to and from a subterranean ocean.

Related Topics:
Southern Italy - 1638 - Crater - Vesuvius - Strait of Messina - 1664 - Tide - Ocean

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Kircher was puzzled by fossils. He understood that some were the remains of animals which had turned to stone, but ascribed others to human invention or to the spontaneous generative force of the earth. Not all the objects which he was attempting to explain were in fact fossils, hence the diversity of explanations.

Related Topics:
Fossil - Animal - Earth

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Medicine

Kircher took a notably modern approach to the study of diseases, as early as 1646 using a microscope to investigate the blood of plague victims. In his Scrutinium Pestis of 1658 he noted the presence of "little worms" or "animalcules" in the blood, and concluded that the disease was caused by microorganisms. The conclusion was correct, although it is likely that what he saw were in fact red or white blood cells. He also proposed hygienic measures to prevent the spread of disease, such as isolation, quarantine, burning clothes worn by the infected and wearing facemasks to prevent the inhalation of germs.

Related Topics:
Disease - 1646 - Microscope - Blood - Plague - 1658 - Animalcules - Microorganism - Red - White - Blood cell - Hygienic - Quarantine - Facemask - Germ

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Other

Kircher constructed a magnetic clock, the mechanism of which he explained in his Magnes (1641). The device had originally been invented by another Jesuit, Fr. Francis Line, and was described by an acquaintance of Line's in 1634. Kircher's patron Peiresc had claimed that the clock's motion supported the Copernican cosmological model, the argument being that the magnetic sphere in the clock was caused to rotate by the magnetic force of the sun. Kircher's model disproved the theory, showing that the motion could be produced by a water clock in the base of the device.

Related Topics:
Magnetic - 1641 - 1634 - Copernican - Sun - Water clock

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Other machines produced by Kircher include an aeolian harp, a statue which spoke and listened via a speaking tube, and a perpetual motion machine; he also designed a cat piano which would drive spikes into the tails of cats which yowled to specified pitches, although he is not known to have actually constructed the instrument. He wrote an early description of the magic lantern, and is therefore sometimes believed to have been its inventor.

Related Topics:
Aeolian harp - Speaking tube - Perpetual motion machine - Cat - Piano - Pitch - Magic lantern

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The Musurgia Universalis (1650) sets out Kircher's views on music: he believed that the harmony of music reflected the proportions of the universe. The book includes plans for constructing water-powered automatic organs, notations of birdsong and diagrams of musical instruments. One illustration shows the differences between the ears of humans and other animals.

Related Topics:
1650 - Music - Harmony - Universe - Automatic organ - Notation - Birdsong - Musical instrument - Ear

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Kircher wrote against the Copernican model in his Magnes (supporting instead that of Tycho Brahe), but in his later Itinerarium extaticum (1656, revised 1671) he presented several systems, including the Copernican, as alternative possibilities. In Polygraphia nova (1663) he proposed an artificial universal language.

Related Topics:
Copernican - Tycho Brahe - 1656 - 1671 - 1663 - Universal language

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Kircher received the Voynich Manuscript in 1666; it was sent to him by Johannes Marcus Marci in the hope of his being able to decipher it. The manuscript remained in the Collegio Romano until Victor Emmanuel II of Italy annexed the papal states in 1870.

Related Topics:
Voynich Manuscript - 1666 - Johannes Marcus Marci - Victor Emmanuel II of Italy - Papal states - 1870

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