Source: Melita Historica : A Scientific Review of Maltese History. 13(2000)1(95-96)

[95] Reviews 2000

Olaf Hein Die Drucker und Verleger der Werke des Polyhistors Athanasius Kircher S.J. (The printers and publishers of the works of the “polyhistor” Athanasius Kircher S.J.) Boehlau publishing house Cologne, Weimar, Vienna; hardback; pp 435 with colour and black and white photos and plates: plus appendixes with statistics and tables.

            Although today overshadowed by names like Spinoza, Galilei, Descartes and Leibniz, there was hardly a scholar and man of letters who enjoyed greater esteem and fame in 17th century Europe than the German “polyhistor” and Jesuit Athanasius Kircher (1602-1680). Born in 1602 near the town of Fulda, Kircher earned his first merits in universities in Germany and in Provencal Avignon. During the early 1630s he was called to Rome where he stayed until the end of his life in 1680. The only long break of his encyclopedic studies which included mathematics, philosophy, linguistics, ancient languages, archaeology, astronomy, egyptology, geology, natural science and musicology in the eternal city was a half-year sojourn at the island of Malta between June 1637 and February 1638. Given this encyclopeadic interest of his, to study Kircher means always to delve automatically in the multi-faceted history of science in 17th century Europe. Therefore the reconstruction in full of the activities of Kircher and the study of the various aspects of his long scientific life in Germany, France and Rome together with his connections and communication with the scientific celebrities as well as with the clerical and political figures of the time can be truly regarded a Sisyphean, if not impossible, task.

            After more than twelve years of assiduous research and numerous travels to European archives especially to Rome and the Vatican, the German scholar Dr Olaf Hein has now concluded the work on one important aspect which certainly helps to understand better not only Kircher but also the overall 17th century scientific context within which Kircher operated. In 1993 the first volume of Hein’s study of the printers and editors of Kircher’s more than thirty published works - many of them classical and much appreciated by his contemporaries - came out. The other four of this five-volume series are due to be published in the near future. This first volume contains (in part A) an introduction to Kircher’s life and scientific activities and (in part B) analytical essays on the historical background of the time, printing privileges, distribution, censorship, technical aspects of book production and financing of books. One should underline in the first place that this work has to be regarded as a main reference work not only for the study of Kircher but also for that of the editing and publishing of scientific literature during the 17th century in general. Hein’s detailed description of every German, Dutch, French or Italian printer and publisher connected with Kircher includes many names up to now neglected by researchers and forms a most useful tool for students of early modern book-science. We have indeed a comprehensive picture of 17th century scientific crosscurrents with the deeply-rooted internationality of the then contemporary [p.96] literary community. In the profuse and maybe overrich footnotes, Hein not only describes the professionals but also the specimens of the representatives of the various monarchs and aristocratic classes of the time involved in printing and with whom Kircher kept contacts and correspondence. Among them one finds names, Christine of Vasa, queen of Sweden, emperors Ferdinand III and Leopold I and popes Innocent X, Alexander VII and Clement X. Hein furthermore unfolds the manner in which the scientific circles of Catholic Rome were in contact with the leading printing houses and booksellers in Protestant and Reformist countries in northern Europe, such as the Netherlands and parts of Germany, during the period.

            Hein’s scrupulous approach to the subject, his perfectionism in minute detail and his rich apparata of footnotes and appendices - in short the concept and structure of the book - might limit readership to the connosseur and expert. However, for this group, Hein’s work is a treasure and a major reference work. For libraries or archives somehow connected with the history of book science or the history and culture of the 17th century in general, this work, which has been a desideratum for such a long time, is now available. For Malta research on Kircher has a special significance. Besides his sojourn on the island Kircher spent a period of time as a confessor to Landgrave Friedrich of Hessen-Darmstadt who, (later) became Captain General of the Galleys of the Order of St John) and as a teacher of mathematics to the Order’s novices. Moreover he wrote no less than four books which are somewhat connected with this sojourn. In his Mundus Subterraneus (first edition Amsterdam, 1665) and in Ars Magna Lucis et Umbrae (first edition Rome, 1646) Kircher presents scattered proofs of his investigations of Maltese folldore, geology and mineralogy. Some of the observations in astronomy for Kircher’s Iter Exstaticum Coeleste (first edition Rome, 1656) are supposed to have been composed in Malta. Even more interesting is the background of the rare book Specula Melitensis Encyclica (first edition, Naples 1638), a work which seems to have been conceived by Kircher himself but finalised by the Maltese historian and prior of St John’s, Salvatore Imbroll. The National Library of Malta owns a copy of this controversial book. As Dr Hein will show in a forthcoming publication, Kircher took the fourth vow of the Jesuits in Malta. It cannot be doubted that there is much more to discover for Hein and other scholars in Malta. How useful and interesting for Malta it would be to have such an authority on Kircher as Dr Hein, to go deeper into the subject of Kircher’s relation with Malta. Then it might emerge from the neglected facts that for example the Maltese physician, poet and traveller Gio. Francesco Buonamico kept correspondence with Kircher and that whilst in Malta, Kircher informed European scholars like professor Johannes Buxtorf from Basle about his experiences on the island. For his previous works and achievements in the study of Kircher and the natural sciences during the 17th century Dr Hein merits our deep gratitude. May he succeed in his role as the president of the International Athanasus Kircher research society, [thus] encouraging further studies of Kircher’s relations with Malta.

Thomas Freller