The Search for Antediluvian Astronomy: Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century Astronomers' Conceptions of the Origins of the Science

Herodotus , Historiae II, 50; II, 82; II, 143; Plato , Timaeus 22b; Plutarch , De Iside et Osiride X, 35E; Plutarch , De animae procratione in Timaeo 33, 103A—B; Laertius Diogenes , Vitae philosophorum, Proemium, VIII, 2–3; III, 6; Siculus Diodorus , Bibliotheca historica I, 69, 3–4; I, 98, 1–4. Cf. Zhmud Leonid , The origins of the history of science in classical Antiquity (Berlin and New York, 2006), 228–75.

Flavius Josephus , Antiquitates judaicae I, 2, 68–71; Flavius Josephus , Jewish antiquities I—IV, transl. by Thackeray H. St. J. (London and Cambridge, MA, 1961), 32.

Flavius , Antiquitates judaicae I, 143, Jewish antiquities, 70.

Flavius , Antiquitates judaicae I, 167–8, Jewish antiquities, 82. Cf. Feldman L. H. , “Abraham, the Greek philosopher in Josephus”, Transactions and proceedings of the American Philological Association, xcix (1968), 143–56.

Adler W. , Time immemorial: Archaic history and its sources in Christian chronography from Julius Africanus to George Syncellus (Washington, DC, 1989), 108–12; Assmann J. , “Das gerette Wissen: Die Flutkatastrophen und gemeihe Archive”, in Sintflut und Gedächtnis: Erinnern und Vergessen des Ursprungs, ed. by Mulsow M. Assmann J. (Munich, 2006), 291–301, pp. 291–3.

A more detailed interpretation of Flavius's strategy is provided by Reed A. Y. , “Abraham as Chaldean scientist and father of the Jews: Josephus, Ant. I, 154–168, and the Greco-Roman discourse about astronomy/astrology”, Journal for the study of Judaism , xxxv (2004), 119–58. Cf. Van Kooten G. H. , “Enoch, the ‘Watchers’, Seth's descendants and Abraham as astronomers: Jewish applications of the Greek motif of the first inventor (300 BCE — CE 100)”, in Recycling biblical figures, ed. by Brenner A. Van Henten J. W. (Leiden, 1999), 292–316.

Flavius , Antiquitates judaicae I, 104–6; Jewish antiquities, 50.

See, for example, Bacon Roger , Opus maius , part II, cap. IX, ed. by Bridges J. H. (London, 1900), ii, 45.

See, in general, Burke P. , The Renaissance sense of the past (London, 1969); see also Allen D. C. , The legend of Noah: Renaissance rationalism in art, science, and letters (Urbana, 1949).

See Blumenberg H. , The legitimacy of the modern age (Cambridge, MA, and London, 1985), 309–23; Blumenberg H. , “Augustins Anteil an der Geschichte des Begriffs der theoretischen Neugierde”, Revue des études augustiniennes, vii (1961), 35–70. Cf. Oberman H. , Contra vanam curiositatem: Ein Kapitel der Theologie zwischen Seelenwinkel und Weltall (Zürich, 1974); Bös G. , Curiositas: Die Rezeption eines antiken Begriffs durch christlichen Authoren bis Thomas von Aquin (Paderborn, 1995).

de Viterbo Annius , Berossi sacerdotis Chaldaici Antiquitatum libri quinque (Antwerp, 1545), fol. 6r. Cf. Schmidt-Biggemann W. , “Heilsgeschichtliche Inventionen: Annius von Viterbos ‘Berossus’ und die Geschichte der Sintflut”, in Sintflut und Gedächtnis (ref. 5), 85–111.

Vergilius Polydor , On Discovery / De inventionibus rerum, ed. and transl. by Copenhaver B. (Cambridge, MA, and London, 2002), 140–2.

Walker D. P. , The ancient theology: Studies in Christian Platonism from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century (London 1972); Hankins J. , Plato in the Italian Renaissance, 2nd edn (Leiden, 1991), i, 282–8; ii, 460–4; Tambrun B. , Pléthon: Le retour de Platon (Paris, 2006), 60–93.

Pirovano G. , Defensio astronomiae (Milan, 1507), fol. B 4v: “quia nulla scientia potest haberi tota ab homine viatore: Nisi per gratiam: & sic haec est impossibilis homo viator habet totam scientiam astronomiae…”.

Ibid., fol. B 5r.

Witekind H. , De sphaera mundi (Neustadt an der Weinstrasse, 1590), 9: “Quapropter hoc tantum Dei donum tam utile & necessarium tueri, retinere, & ad posteros propagare studeant illi praesertim…”.

I follow the transcript of a manuscript provided by Jesse Kraai in her Ph.D. thesis, “Rheticus' heliocentric providence: A study concerning the astrology, astronomy of the sixteenth century”, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, 2000 (available at http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/3254/ 2 January 2013), ii, 35f: “Astronomia est doctrina divinitus hominibus tradita qua per Geometriam et Arithmeticam inquirit et declarat motus coeli et temporum coelestium…. Efficiens causa est Deus, deinde ratio mens humana, Deus enim excitavit ingenia praestantissimorum virorum ut se conferrent ad considerationem et inquisitionem naturae”.

Rheticus J. , Georgio Hartmanno , in Georg Joachim Rhetikus, 1514–1574: Eine Bio-Bibliographie , ed. by Burmeister K. H. (Wiesbaden, 1968), iii, 46: “Sed quia artes vitae utiles, praecipua Dei dona sunt, res ipsa ostendit non humana ope, sed quodam singulari Dei beneficio, utcumque eas conservari et interdum rursus ceu flammam excitari, ne funditus intereant”.

Reinhold E. , Oratio de Iohanne Regiomontano , in Corpus Reformatorum , ed. by Bretschneider C. G. , xi (Halle, 1834), 817–26, p. 820: “Sed Deum autorem oremus, ne sua munera perire sinat.” Cf. Reinhold E. , Prutenicae tabulae coelestium motuum (Tubingen, 1551), fol. 3r—v: “Adfirmo etiam dei ope inter tantas imperiorum ruinas & barbaricas confusiones, non humana diligentia, sed divinitus has artes conservatas, et subinde restitutas, et illustratas esse”.

Mästlin M. , Epitome astronomiae (Tubingen, 1588), fol. 3r–5v.

Goulding R. , “Method and mathematics: Peter Ramus's histories of the sciences”, Journal of the history of ideas , lxvii (2006), 63–85. A more detailed account is available in Goulding's Defending Hypatia: Ramus, Savile, and the Renaissance rediscovery of mathematical history (Dordrecht, 2010), 19–73.

Ramus P. , Collectaneae preaefationes, epistolae, orationes (Paris, 1577), 167 f.

Ramus P. , Scholae mathematicae (Basel, 1596), 109: “Ergo artes mathematicae divinitus vel oblatae vel inventae, quae Dei potentiam in mundi creatione, sapientiam in administratione, pietatem ex infinita bonorum omnium erga genus humanum largitate demonstrarent”.

Ibid., 29f: “habuisset enim posteritas praestantis ingenii non theoremata solum eruditionis altae prorsusque reconditae, sed ipsorum theorematum longe gratiorem humanae vitae & optabiliorem fructum”.

Hugonnard-Roche H. , “Problémes méthodologiques dans l'astronomie au début du XIVe siècle”, in Studies on Gersonides: A fourteenth-century Jewish philosopher-scientist , ed. by Freudentahl G. (Leiden and New York, 1992), 55–70; Krafft F. , “Der Mathematikos und der Physikos”, Alte Probleme — Neue Ansätze (Würzburg, 1965), 5–24; Goldstein B. R. , “Saving the phenomena: The background to Ptolemy's planetary theory”, Journal for the history of astronomy, xxviii (1997), 1–12; Barker P. Goldstein B. R. , “Realism and instrumentalism in sixteenth century astronomy: A reappraisal”, Perspectives on science, vi (1998), 232–58.

Petrus Ramus to Rheticus, 25 August 1563, in Georg Joachim Rheticus 1514–1574 (ref. 18), 176. Regarding Ramus's ideal of an astronomy free of hypotheses see esp. Jardine N. Segonds A. , “A challenge to the reader: Ramus on astrologia without hypotheses”, in The influence of Petrus Ramus: Studies in sixteenth and seventeenth century philosophy and science, ed. by Feingold M. (Basel, 2001), 248–66.

Petrus Ramus to Rheticus, 25 August 1563, in Georg Joachim Rheticus 1514–1574 (ref. 18), 175: “… videtur non solum logicae legibus non valde contrarium, sed omnino profanum in sacra et coelesti doctrina, commenta praesertim manifeste falsa et absurda permisceri. At hypotheses epicyclorum et eccentricorum commenta falsa et absurda esse….” Ramus here partially draws on Proclus's testimony; see Proclus , Hypotyposis astronomicarum positionum, ed. by Manitius K. (Leipzig, 1909), 18.

Ramus , Scholae mathematicae (ref. 23), 49f.

Ibid., 70f.

Tycho to Rothman , Epistularum astronomicarum liber primus, in Tychonis Brahe Dani opera omnia , ed. by Dreyer J. L. E. (Copenhagen, 1913–29; hereafter TBOO), vi, 88.

Brahe Tycho , De disciplinis mathematicis, TBOO, i, 148; partial English translation by Coon R. H. , “On mathematical studies”, Popular astronomy , xxxvii (1929), 311–20, p. 315. In his Progymnasmata, Tycho associates Flavius's account with Ethiopians as the first astronomers who were descendants of Noah's son Cham, who possessed the astronomical knowledge of his father who, in turn, derived it from Adam (TBOO, ii, 314): Cham “qui procul dubio a NOAH Patre atque Fratribus Astronomiae cognitionem, qualis ante Diluvium inde ab ADAMO, eiusque Filiis, teste IOSEPHO, propagata erat, hauserat, eandemque in Ethiopiam transtulerat”.

Brahe Tycho , Instruments of the renewed astronomy , transl. by Raeder H. (Prague, 1996), 3; TBOO, iv, 5.

Brahe Tycho , Instruments of the renewed astronomy (ref. 32), 10; TBOO, iv, 9: “cum obtinens scientia Astronomica in integrum aliquando restitueretur, Posterisque emendiator, quam unquam antea, traderetur”.

Brahe Tycho , Astronomiae instauratae progymnasata, TBOO, ii, 150, 301.

Ibid., 282f.

Ibid., 151.

Ibid., 312–15. Regarding Tycho's millenarianism see Håkanson H. , “Tycho the apocalyptic: History, prophecy and the meaning of natural phenomena”, Acta historiae rerum naturalium necnon technicarum , viii (2004), 211–36; Håkanson H. , “Tycho the prophet: History, astrology and the apocalypse in early modern science”, in The word and the world: Biblical exegesis and early modern science, ed. by Killeen K. Forshaw P. J. (New York, 2007), 137–56.

Rose P. L. , The Italian renaissance of mathematics: Studies on humanists and mathematicians from Petrarch to Galileo (Geneva, 1975), 1–3, 90f.

Whitney C. , “Francis Bacon's Instauratio: Dominion of and over humanity”, Journal of the history of ideas , l (1989), 371–90; Webster C. , The great instauration: Science, medicine and reform, 1626–1660 (London, 1975), 27f, 87, 505–9. P. Burke emphasizes that “before ca. 1750, rise was generally seen in terms of some kind of return to a better past, as ‘recall’, ‘recurrence’, ‘re-establishment’, ‘reinstatement’, ‘repair’, ‘restoration’, ‘renewal’, ‘regeneration’, ‘resurrection’, ‘resurgence’, ‘revival’…”; see Burke P. , “Renaissance, Reformation, Revolution”, in Niedergang: Studien zu einem geschichtlichen Thema, ed. by Koselleck R. Widmer P. (Stuttgart, 1980), 136–47, p. 139.

Brahe Tycho , Instruments of the renewed astronomy , 95; TBOO, iv, 87: “volente supremo Numine … ut mendis omnia purgata in integrum restituantur”.

The lecture was later published in the Latin translation of al-Farghānī's treatises Rudimenta astronomica Alfragani (1537); here cited according to the edition: Regiomontanus, “Oratio de Alfragano et mathematicis disciplinis”, in Corpus Reformatorum (ref. 19), xi, 531–44, p. 534. The English translation of the lecture is available in Swerdlow N. M. , “Regiomontanus on the critical problems of astronomy”, in Nature, experiment, and the sciences , ed. by Levere T. H. Shea W. R. (Dordrecht, 1990), 165–95. A detailed analysis of the lecture is provided by Swerdlow N. M. , “Science and humanism in the Renaissance: Regiomontanus's oration on the dignity and utility of the mathematical sciences”, in World changes: Thomas Kuhn and the nature of science, ed. by Horvich P. (Cambridge, MA, and London, 1993), 131–68.

Regiomontanus , “Oratio de Alfragano” (ref. 41), 535.

Byrne J. S. , “A Humanist history of mathematics? Regiomontanus's Padua oration in context”, Journal of the history of ideas, lxvii (2006), 41–61, p. 54.

Rose P. L. , The Italian renaissance of mathematics (ref. 38), 95–8.

Gaurico L. , Oratio de inventoribus & laudibus astronomiae , in Varii , Sphaerae tractatus (Venice, 1531), fol. aiiii r—v.

Cardano G. , Opera omnia (Lyons, 1663), x, 118a. My outline of Cardano's approach to the idea of antediluvian astronomy in many respect draws on the article by A. Grafton, “From apotheosis to analysis: Some late Renaissance histories of classical astronomy”, in History and the disciplines: The reclassification of knowledge in early modern Europe, ed. by Kelley D. R. (Rochester, 1997), 261–75.

Cardano , Opera omnia , iv, 442a–b. Cf. Goulding , Defending Hypatia (ref. 21), 13f.

Cardano , Opera omnia, v, 35a.

Frischlin N. , De astronomicae artis … libri quinqe (Frankfurt, 1586), 12.

Ibid., 13.

Grafton A. , Joseph Scaliger: A study in the history of classical scholarship (Oxford and New York, 1983), i, chap. 7.

See esp. Scaliger J. , Prolegomena de astrologia veterum Graecorum, in Manili Astronomicon a Iosepho Scaligero … repurgatum (Lyons, 1599), pp. i–iii.

Grafton , Joseph Scaliger (ref. 51), i, 212. On other pages (pp. 213–19), Grafton notes that Scaliger resolutely objected to Ramus's idea of ancient astronomy as free of hypotheses and, on the contrary, drew on Disputationes adversus astrologiam divinatricem by Pico della Mirandola.

Copernicus N. , The commentariolus, in Three Copernican treatises , transl. by Rosen E. , 3rd edn (New York, 1971), 57. Cf. Granada M. A. Tessicini D. , “Copernicus and Fracastoro: The dedicatory letters to Pope Paul III, the history of astronomy, and the quest for patronage”, Studies in the history and philosophy of science, xxxvi (2005), 431–76.

See esp. Copernicus N. Dedicatora Epistula , De revolutionibus, in Nicolai Copernici Opera omnia , ed. by Gansiniec R. (Warsaw and Cracow, 1975), ii, 4. See for example: Barker P. , “Copernicus and critics of Ptolemy”, Journal for the history of astronomy, xxx (1999), 343–58; Goddu A. , Copernicus and the Aristotelian tradition: Edition, reading, and philosophy in Copernicus's path to heliocentrism (Leiden and Boston, 2010).

Copernicus N. Dedicatora Epistula , De revolutionibus (ref. 55), 4: “… pleraque tamen interim admiserunt, quae primis principijs de motus aequalitate videntur contravenire. Rem quoque praecipuam, hoc est mundi formam, ac partium eius certam symmetriam, non potuerunt invenire vel ex illis colligere…”.

Grafton A. , “The Middleman (review of D. Danielson, The first Copernican)”, American scientist, March—April 2007, online: http://www.americanscientist.org/bookshelf/pub/the-middleman; 3 January 2013.

Kraai , “Rheticus' heliocentric providence” (ref. 17), i, 12, 91.

Rheticus J. , Prooemium … in libros Ioannis Verneri , in Georg Joachim Rheticus 1514–1574 (ref. 18), iii, 139, transl. by Kraai J. , “Rheticus' heliocentric providence” (ref. 17), ii, 298.

Bruno G. , La cena delle ceneri , in Bruno G. , Oeuvres complètes , ii, ed. by Aquilecchia G. (Paris 1994), 41, 175–9. Cf. Blum R. , Giordano Bruno (Munich, 1999), 117–29.

Regarding its origin and use see especially: Scholder K. , Ursprünge und Probleme der Bibelkritik im 17. Jahrhundert: Ein Beitrag zur Entstehung der historisch-kritischen Theologie (Munich, 1966), 68–107; Bieri H. , Der Streit um das kopernikanische Weltsystem im 17. Jahrhundert: Galileo Galileis Akkommodationstheorie und ihre historische Hintergründe, 2nd edn (Bern, 2008); Howell K. J. , God's two books: Copernican cosmology and biblical interpretation in early modern science (Notre Dame, 2002); Snobelen S. D. , “‘In the language of men’: The hermeneutics of accommodation in the Scientific Revolution”, in Nature and scripture in the Abrahamic religions: Up to 1700, ed. by van der Meer J. M. Mandelbrote S. (Leiden and Boston, 2008), 691–731.

Kepler J. , Tabulae Rudolphinae, in Johannes Kepler Gesammelte Werke , ed. by von Dyck W. Caspar M. (Munich, 1938–99; hereafter KGW), x, 6.

Ibid., 36.

Ibid., 40.

Kepler J. , A defence of Tycho against Ursus , transl. by Jardine N. , in Jardine N. , The birth of history and philosophy of science (Cambridge, 1984), 157 (text in Latin, 101). A new edition of the Latin text with French translation and extensive commentary is available in La guerre des astronomes: La querelle au sujet de l'origine du système géo-héliocentrique à la fin du XVIe siècle, ed. and transl. by Jardine N. Segonds A. , ii: Le Contra Ursum de Jean Kepler (Paris, 2007), Part 2, 275–6.

Grafton A. , “Humanism and science in Rudolphine Prague: Kepler in context”, in Grafton A. , Defenders of the text: The traditions of scholarhip in an age of science, 1450–1800 (Cambridge, MA, and London, 1991), 178–203, p. 202.

Kepler J. , Ein Gespräch von der Reformation des alten Calenders, KGW, xx/1, 368: “dise form (das Jahr in 12 Monat von 30 tagen, und in einem anhang von 5 tagen zuthailen), dem Ersten Menschen Adam von Gott selber gleich anfangs gezaiget worden sey”.

Nothaft C. P. E. , “Noah's calendar: The chronology of the flood narrative and the history of astronomy in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century scholarship”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, lxxiv (2011), 191–211.

Jardine N. , “Kepler as castigator and historian: His preparatory notes for Contra Ursum”, Journal for the history of astronomy , xxxvii (2006), 257–97, p. 293; cf. Eastwood B. , “Kepler as historian of science: Precursors of Copernican heliocentrism according to De revolutionibus I, 10”, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, cxxvi (1982), 367–94.

Kepler J. , Epitome astronomiae copernicanae IV, 1, 3; KGW, vii, 267.

Kepler to Mästlin, 19 April 1597, no. 64, KGW, xiii, 113: “Cum Deus omnia ad quantitatis normas condiderit in toto mundo: Mentem etiam homini datam, quae talia comprehendat … mens hominis non ad quaevis, sed ad quanta intelligenda condita est, remque quamlibet tanto rectius percipit, quanto illa propior est nudis quantitatibus, ceu suae origini.” Regarding the theological basis of Kepler's astronomy see Barker P. Goldstein B. R. , “Theological foundations of Kepler's astronomy”, Osiris , xvi (2001), 88–113; Methuen C. , Kepler's Tübingen: Stimulus to a theological mathematics (Aldershot, 1998); Kusukawa S. , The transformation of natural philosophy: The case of Philip Melanchton (Cambridge, 1995), 127–42.

Kepler to Herwart, 9 and 10 April 1599, no. 117, KGW, xiii, 309.

Gilbert W. , De mundo nostro sublunari philosophia nova (Amsterdam, 1651), 1: “exactam rerum omnium & scientiarum cognitionem, artesve & scientias exultas, desuper infusas”.

Hanegraaff W. J. , “Tradition — Prisca theologia and philosophia perennis”, in Dictionary of Gnosis and Western esotericism , ed. by Hanegraaff W. J. (Leiden and Boston, 2006), 1125–35, col. 1129b; cf. Schmitt C. B. , “Perennial philosophy: From Agostino Steuco to Leibniz”, Journal of the history of ideas, xxvii (1966), 505–32.

Ashworth W. B. Jr , “Light of reason, light of nature: Catholic and Protestant metaphors of scientific knowledge”, Science in context, iii (1989), 89–107.

Pereira B. , Commentariorum et disputationum in Genesim tomi quattuor, 4th edn (Lyons, 1599), i, 528–32, for example p. 531: “Adamum enim rerum omnium etiam coelestium tenuisse scientiam, tam facile & promptum est ostendere & probare”.

Suárez F. , De opere sex dierum , in Suárez F. , Opera omnia , ed. by André A. D. M. (Paris, 1856–78), iii, 228–33; cf. Eustachio a Sancto Paulo, Summa theologiae tripartita (Paris, 1613), i, 801–4.

Kircher A. , Arca Noë (Amsterdam, 1675), 4: “Artes tamen & scientias humano generi necessarias maxime floruisse, quempiam ambigere nolim, cum ab Adamo infusa a Deo ipsi omni rerum naturalium cognitione & scientia, abunde fuerint instructi….” Cf. ibid. 205. Cf. Godwin J. , Athanasius Kircher: A Renaissance man and the quest for lost knowledge (London, 1979), 15–34.

Sizi F. , Dianoia astronomica, optica, physica (Venice, 1611), 17: “Ptolemaeus … Astronomiam ab Aegyptis edoctus, qui eam Moysi, Abrahamo & Noe referunt acceptam (;quos patres ut & ceteras scientias, sic hanc iure optimo habuisse credendum est: Nam eas omnes primo parenti Divinitus infusas ad suos posteros propagatas, quis negabit)?”.

Schott C. , Cursus mathematicus (Frankfurt, 1677), 299: “Adamus, cui omnes scientias a DEO infusas fuisse asserunt Theologi Scholastici…”.

Levera F. , Prodromus universae astronomiae restitutae (Rome, 1663), 32b: “Quis enim dubitare potest primo homini, nimirum Adae, in amplissima illa rerum ominum creatarum, cognitione ei divivinitus data … non solum artes omnes, quae ad victum, & vestitum sunt necessarie, atque instrumenta, quibus hujusmodi artes recte exercentur, fuisse contenta, sed, etima, ut tradunt Theologi, et Salianus … scientiam Astronomiae, & Mathematicarum artium, earumque usum…”.

de Rheita A. M. S. , Oculus Enoch et Eliae sive radius sidereomysticus (Antwerp, 1645), unpaginated Praefatio.

See Harrison P. , The Fall of man and the foundations of science (Cambridge, 2007), 17–34; cf. Bono J. , “The Two Books and Adamic knowledge”, in Nature and scripture in the Abrahamic religions (ref. 61), i, 299–340.

Simpson E. , Chronicon historiam catholicam completens (Oxford, 1652), 16 f; the passage is quoted by Nothaft, “Noah's calendar” (ref. 68), 192.

Alsted J. H. , Scientiarum omnium encyclopaediae (Lyons, 1649), i, 103.

Cellarius A. , Harmonia macrocosmica (Amsterdam, 1661), 85a: “Quippe ante lapsum Sapientiam, scientiam, & prudentiam perfectissimis praeditus, animamque luce Divinam illuminatam possidens proculdubio absolutam Divinorum Operum cognitionem habuit, cuius cognitionis quod aliqua saltem reminiscentia in ipso post lapsum superest fuerit, verisimile videtur”.

Ibid., 85a–86b.

Blumenberg H. , Lebenszeit und Weltzeit (Frankfurt a. M., 1986), 99–129; Blumenberg H. , “On a lineage of the idea of progress”, Social research, xli (1974), 5–27.

See Ptolemy , Almagest , ed. and transl. by Toomer G. J. (Princeton, 1998), VII, 1, p. 321; VII, 3, p. 329; IX, 2, pp. 420–1. Similar thoughts can be found even in Riccioli G.-B. , Almagestum novum (Bologna, 1651), 17.

Annius of Viterbo, Antiquitates (ref. 11), fol. 9r.

Brahe Tycho , Oratio de disciplinis mathematicis, TBOO , i, 148 f; Brahe T. , On mathematical studies (ref. 31), 316: “… iis propterea adeo diutinam aetatem fuisse concessam, quae requirebatur in diligenter perquirendis intricatis illis tardiorum preasertim syderum motibus, ut de fixis stellis, longissimum tempus requirentibus, non dicam.” Cf. similarly in Ramus, Scholae mathematicae (ref. 23), 2.

Clavius Ch. , Commentarius in Sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco , in Clavius Ch. , Opera omnia (Mainz, 1611), iii, 3.

Riccioli , Almagestum novum (ref. 89), p. viii: “Haec prima huius artis incunabula apud Hebraeos, quae cum aetate Patriarchum tam longa, ut conversiones Planetarum crebro repetitis experimentis agnosti recognoscique possent…”.

de Rheita , Oculus Enoch et Eliae sive radius sidereomysticus (ref. 82), unpaginated Praefatio.

Hortensius M. , “The oration on the dignity and the usefulness of the mathematical sciences of Martinus Hortensius” (Amsterdam, 1634): “Text, translation and commentary”, ed. and transl. by Immhausen A. Remmert V. R. , History of universities, xxi/1 (2006), 71–150, pp. 102–3.

Vossius G. , De quattor artibus (Amsterdam, 1650), 128.

Gassendi P. , Vita Tychonis, Praefatio, in Gassendi P. , Opera omnia (Lyons, 1658; repr. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt, 1964), v, 363–86, p. 367.

Cellarius , Harmonia macrocosmica (ref. 86), 85b.

De Challes C. F. M. , Tractatus proemialis de progressu matheseos , in: De Challes C. F. M. , Cursus seu mundus mathematicus (Lyons, 1690), 1–108, p. 75b.

Hevelius J. , Machina coelestis (Gdansk, 1673), 11: “… utique credibile est, harum sublimium Rerum Contemplationibus mirifice eum fuisse accensum, & tot continuis seculis, quibus vixit, fine omni dubio plurima ex astris deprehendisse, eaque prolixissime, tanquam Dei maxima Miracula, Prognatos fuos haud leviusculis commentariis docuisse”.

Ibid., 20.

See Ptolemy , Almagest (ref. 89), IV, 6, p. 191f. Besides, Ptolemy himself states that observations do not date further back than to the reign of Nabonassar, around 746 b.c.; see Ptolemy , Almagest III, 7, p. 166.

Gassendi , Vita Tychonis, Praefatio (ref. 97), 371.

Cellarius , Harmonia macrocosmica (ref. 86), 90b–91a.

Curtz A. Brahe Tycho , Historia coelestis (Augsburg, 1666), pp. ii–iv, cf. Praefatio.

De Challes , Tractatus proemialis de progressu matheseos (ref. 99), 75b.

Hevelius , Machina coelestis (ref. 100), 17: “Scientiam Sideream ab Asiaticis, praesertim Chinensibus primam suam duxisse originem; sine dubio ne a se ipsis, sed a Noa, vel Primis Patriarchis eam hauserunt.” Regarding the existence of the Chinese empire before the Flood, see Grafton A. , “Chronology of Flood”, in Sintflut und Gedächtnis (ref. 5), 65–82.

Zedelmaier H. , “Sintflut als Anfang der Geschichte”, in Sintflut und Gedächtnis (ref. 5), 253–64.

Bullialdus I. , Astronomia philolaica (Paris, 1645), 12.

Gassendi , Vita Tychonis , Praefatio (ref. 97), 373. An evident reference to the well-known passage in Almagest (ref. 89), IX, 2, p. 421.

Cellarius , Harmonia macrocosmica (ref. 86), 92a.

Cassini J.-D. , De l'origine et du progrès de l'astronomie (1693), in Mémoirs de l'Academie Royale des Sciences: Depuis 1666 jusquà 1699, viii: Oeuvres diverses de M. I. D. Cassini (Paris, 1730), 1–54, p. 4.

See, for example, a quite detailed overview in Riccioli , Almagestum novum (ref. 89), i, 444–8. Cf. Neugebauer O. , A history of ancient mathematical astronomy (Berlin, Heidelberg and New York, 1975), 618; Krojer F. , Astronomie der Spätantike, die Null und Aryabhata (Munich, 1995), 49–61.

Swerdlow N. M. , “Astronomical chronology and prophecy: Jean-Dominique Cassini's discovery of Josephus's great lunisolar period of the patriarchs”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtald Institutes, liii (1990), 1–13, p. 2.

Cassini , De l'origine et du progrès de l'astronomie (ref. 112), 5.

Ibid., 18f.