Centre, Circle, Circumference: Giordano Bruno's Astronomical Woodcuts by Hiro Hirai

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CENTRE, CIRCLE, CIRCUMFERENCE: GIORDANO BRUNO'S ASTRONOMICAL WOODCUTS CHRISTOPH LUTHY, Radboud University Nijmegen Imroducl;oll

A discussion of Renaissance &lstronomical imagery can hardly &llford to omit Giordano Bruno (1548-1600). This h&ls to do, first, with Bruno's p&lrticul&lr role in the history of &lstronomy and cosmology. At a time when most astronomers continued to be geocentrists, Bruno not only embraced heliocentrism, but he also made it an integral P&lrt of his own cosmology, which postul&lted innumerable solar systems within an infinite universe. Secondly, Bruno illustrated his astronomical works with his own, iconographically often striking wom!cuts, to which he attributed a particular epistemic status. Finally, Bruno was quite exceptional among Renaissance thinkers in developing a theory of image-making, even though it is more than questionable whether his theory explains much about his own images. Importantly, these three aspects are interrelated. Bruno's inlinitist cosmology is linked to his theories of both imagination .md image-making. Conversely, Bruno crafted his own woodcuts - despite his obvious lack of craftmanship - because of his belief that in the act of image-making, the mind manages to capture higher truths. NOli esl philosoplms, II;S; qlli jil/gil el p;lIgil ("You cannot be a philosopher unless you write and paint"), Bruno maintained, Giving a decidedly visualist turn to Aristotle's utterances in De al/;ma, he insisted that ime/legae eSI plUlIIlClSlllaltl specular;, Ihat is, "one understands by exploring menial images", manipulating concepts as images and vice versa.' In this short essay, and by means of a sl1mll set of examples, I shall attempt to say something about the visual logic behind some of Bruno's cosmological nOlions. Celllre, eire/f' ami Circumferellce

In the summer of 1583, Bruno began to deliver a series of lectures at Oxford, but was shooed away after his third lecture, on charges of having plagiarized Marsilio Ficino. Twenty years later, recalling Ihis episode, an important eyewitness described Bruno as an "ltalian Didapper" (a 'didapper' being a dabchick, a waterfowl with a characteristic up-and-down diving motion), who was wildly gesturing behind the lectern: ... stripping up his sleeves like some Iugler, and telling us much of ('!lel/lmm & ('!l;rclIlus & circlImferell('hia (after the pronunciation of his Country language), he undertook among very many other mallers to set on foole Ihe opinion of Copernicus. thai Ihe earth did goe round, and Ihe heavens did sland slill: whereas in IrUlh it was his owne head which rather did run round, & his braines did not stand slil. 1

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Why the audience should have regarded a defence of Copernicus as an "almost verbatim" recitation of Ficino's De ('oelillls C011lpllrwu/ll. as the same eyewitness reports, remains a matter of scholarly debate. Despite the undoubtedly political overtones of the 1583 Oxford amlir and the anti-Catholic intent of the recollection just cited. the image of little Bruno gesticulating before his audience with rolled-up sleeves, his hands drawing centres and circles and circumferences in the air. is deeply compel1ing to those who are acquainted with his writings. This is because centres. circles and circumferences feature in all of his works, irrespective of whether they deal with the geometrical growth of minima. the unfolding of the soul. the contraction of the divinity, or the turning of Lul1ist memory wheels. A few months later. when Bruno put his cosmological convictions to paper, in The Ash Wedl/esday slipper. the gestured geometry of his unsuccessful Oxford lectures appe<lred for the first time in typeset words and illustrations. Take that famous composite ligure showing the difference - as wel1 as the structural similitude - between the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems (Figure I). which is about nothing if not about centres. circles. <lnd circumference. For the reader. it nHlY <It first sight be intriguing to find thut it is Torquato. a

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"barbarous doctor". Oxonian pedant and Bruno's fictional adversary. to whom the dialogue attributes the crafting of this image. In the middle of their polemical exchange over cosmology. Torquato - so the dialogue tells us - takes pen and paper in an attempt to silence Bruno by means of his didactic drawing: "Watch. be silent and learn: I shall teach you Ptolemy and Copernicus!" However. Bruno is quick to usc Torquato's drawing as an argument against its own maker. claiming that it yields the ultimate proufthat Torquato has not understood Copernicus. us the respective plnces of Eurth and Moon nre drawn incorrcctly.' As Bruno and Torqunto begin to quarrel over this issuc. onlookers rush to fetch n copy of Copernicus's [)(' 1"('I路ollltiolliIJIIs. opening it at folio 9 verso (Figure 2). When Torquato interprets the black dot on the fifth sphere (visible, in Figure 2. betwccn the word 'Terra' nnd the symbol of the Moon) to indicute the place of the Earth, and the circle around it as the Moon's orbit. Bruno bursts into laughter. claiming that the Engl ish pedant has mistaken the imprint of the needle of the dividers for the position of our planet. When Bruno invites the onlookers to read Copernicus's own text - the dialogue tells us - "they read and found that he said that the Earth and the Moon nre contained as if in the same epicycle. etc:' J In fact, the figure in The Ash Wed1lesday slipper (Figure I ) corrects for Torquato's mistake. by placing the Enrth on the same epicycle as the Moon. One of the participnnts in Bruno's dialogue therefore comments: "The source of his fuilure was that Torqunto had contemplated thc figures of [Copernicus's1 book without reading the chnpters: or if he had read them. he had not understood thcm."~ Embarrassingly enough. it is of course Bruno, not Torqunto. who misunderstood Copernicus. in whnt constitutes a "particulnrly bad slip". to use Ernan McMullin's appropriatc rcmark." The first words nppeuring nt the top of the smne folio 9v that contnins Copernicus's diagram are indeed slightly ambiguous ("the place in which we have said that the Earth is contained. with the orbit of the Moon. as if in an epicyclc"7); but the inscription on Copernicus's diagram itself ("the nnnual revolution of the Earth with the lunnr orb") is as obvious as is the rest of his text. Once again. then. we find Bruno at the centre of a polemic involving chelltrum & chirclIllIs & cirCltll,(ere1lchia. nlthough these are drawn this time on paper rather thnn in air. Now. given the didactic usefulness of this well-known woodcut. it is at tirst sight doubly paradoxical to find that Bruno's text ascribes its invention to an inept opponent and furthermore uses it merely to document (and moreover mistakenly) his adversary's lack of understanding of cosmological theory. Frances YUles has proposed an influential. albeit ill-founded, way of expluining mvay this appnrent paradox: "The truth is that for Bruno the Copernican diagram is a hieroglyph. a Hermetic seal hiding potent divine mysteries of which he h.IS penetrated the secret."s Fortunntcly. the once widespread view thut Bruno was uninterested in astronomy but passionnte about Hermetic emblematics has been successfully refuted. Dario Tessicini, who has recently subjected the Copernican 'slip' in TIl(' Ash Hhlllesday slipper to a detailed analysis. has convincingly argued that Bruno's reinterpretation must be understood in the light of a current within Pythagorean ism that identified the so-called Counter-Earth with

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H'I COL A l e o ~ JIll II I C I nit In quo tcrram cum orbc lunm ranquam epicyclo contlnm diximus •Q.uiolo loco VCIlUS nono menfc rcduelcur.;Scxtum dcniqJ 10(\lm Mucur/us cCllCl,oCluaginca dicrum fpaelo arcii ~.In medio ucro,omniumrdidCl Sot. ~iscnimin.hoc

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FIG. 2. Nicolaus Copernicus. I),. ""I'olm/Olli/",., orhill/II coe/es/ill", (Nuremherg. 1543). 9\'. Library uf Trinily College. Cmnbridge. SA, II. By kind permission of Ihe M:lster ,lIId Fellows of Trinity College. Camhridge.

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the Moon." Nonetheless, it is undeniable that in The Ash l\hll/ese/a." .\'IIppa. Bruno commits a numher of technical hlunders in expounding Copcrnicus. which he subsequently avoidcd in his Frankfurt dialogues of 1591. 11I Abovc all. it is important to recognize that Bruno's self-set task in T"e Ash Wee///ese/a." sllppa was not to defend Copernicus's heliocentric model, even though Alexandre Koyrc considered it the best refutation of the tmditional objections against the Earth's motion before Galileo's." As Bruno puts it to Torquato in clear enough terms: "1 care little about Copernicus. and care little about whether you or others understand him: I only wish to inform you that before you return once more to teach me something. you should study better."" Once Torquato and his colleague Nundinio have left the scene abashed. Bruno in fact swiftly changes topic and moves on to explain his own cosmology. which transcends Copernicus's almost as much as it does Plolemy's. by postulating an infinile universe inhabited by myriads of animated suns and planets. The crucial point about Figure I. then, and one that most commentators have mysteriously failed to grasp. is that from Bruno's point of view. which considers the universe slIb specil' i//ji//itatis. not just one. but both halves of the dmwing arc mistaken. Indeed. if Figure I has any heuristic function beyond documenting Torquato's inadequacy. it is that of demonstrating the structural similarity between Copernicus and Ptolemy. whose systems visibly share the same structure of '\;entre. circles. and the ultimate circumference" of the fixed stars. II Bruno in factnevcr tires of repeating Ihat Copernicus. despite his undeniablc grcatness, in the end suffers from the same limitation as Ptolcmy: both astronomcrs have approached nature mathematically. not physically. therehy ignoring the causes behind the structure of the cosmos and its motions. Even Copernicus. while understanding the structure of our solar systcm correctly. though mostly for the wrong reasons. fails to grasp that the system to which our own planet belongs is only one among infinitely many solar systems. It is precisely because Bruno views nature, as he himself insists. "Ihrough the eyes of neither Copernicus nor Ptolemy. bUI his own". that it makes sense for him to ascribe the crafting of Figure I to Torquato. and why it is aberrant 10 think that he viewed either Figure I 01':2 as a sacred hieroglyph. 'l His dismissive slance towards Torquato's drawing and the odd litemry debate in which it is embedded shed therefore much light on Bruno's astonishingly arrogant claims that Copemicus was a mere "dawn. sent by the gods. which had to precede the emergence of that sun of the ancient, true philosophy". and that he himself was exactly "that sun" pre-announced by Copcrnicus.!~ Ci rc/es Wi ["0/11 Ene/

While acknowledging a number of predecessors - "Copernicus. Niceta of Syracuse the Pythagorean. Philolaos. Heraklides of Pontos. Ekphantus the Pythagorean. Plato in the Tilllaclls. and the divine Cusanus in the second book of his Ll'amee/ igl/oIWlce" - Bruno explains that his own cosmology is erected on "his own. different and more solid principles".!' These principles are set out in his next treatise, De la nllISa, pri//cipio l'[ 111/0. puhlished in same year. 1584. which laler generalions of

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readers would consider his most importunt work. Bruno's "own. different und more solid principles" arc of a metaphysical. not an astronomical. nature. derived as they are from the concept of a single. active. divine and unlimited cause that animntes the universe throughout and unfolds in seed-like fashion everywhere. 11 As scholars have pointed out. this notion of a ubiquitous cosmic intelligcncc has many sources. several of which were separatcly translatcd and also conceptually condenscd by Marsilio Ficino - which may hclp explain the Oxonians' impression that in his lectures. Bruno was merely rehashing passages from De !'ita coeUtlls compctrlmc/a. In thattexl. the world soul was described as a principle of universal life. being "everywhere equally prcsent路路. "radiating out particularly from the Sun". allowing the "body of the world to bc cverywhere alivc".'> Bruno is clearly influenced by this terminology. "The spirit. the soul. the life which penetrates all. is in all. and movcs all malleI'''. he tells us. and furthcr: "The world soul is the formal constitutive principle of the universe and ull it contains." Indeed. "there is not the least corpuscle thut docs not contain within itself some portion that may ani mute it". Joining an unlikely und motley crowd of early modern theologians. Neoplatonists and Neoatomists. who werc equally fond of that citation. Bruno invokes Virgil's couplet, totalllCJlle ;11/i,SCI 1'('1" ClrtIlS. /lIIellS ag;tal 1II01elll. e/ toto se corpore lII;sce/ - "pervading its members. mind stirs the whole mass and mingles with the whole body".IQ But Bruno mdicalizes (or abandons) Ficino on the same point where he also radicalizes (or abandons) Copernicus. by stretching his notions. too. to infinity. Once the universe is conceived as infinitely extended and our own solar systcm is reduced to the stntus of one among innumerably many. the world soul governing our system becomes a mere local representative of the universal spirit. A woodcut dmwn by Bruno for his De /';lIjill;to 1I11;"erso ('t m01/(!i (published at London in same year. 1584. as the other two works mentioned so far) providcs us with a crudc representation of thc way in which thc solar systems (III01U!i) can be aggregated so as to fill up space (Figurc 3). Bruno limits himself in this woodcut to seven circlcs. with the understanding that infinitely many further circles could bc added on all sidcs. Indccd. very much the samc woodcut. but with an additional wrcath of twelve circlcs. is contained in Bruno's IdiolCl trilllllplu/lls of 1586.:n The white dots in the middle of the circles of Figurc 3 are this time definitely not just the marks left by the dividers. but arc intended to represent the place of the central fire around which the respective planets perform their orbits. The circles. in turn. designate thc outermost circumferences of thesc worlds. although Bruno docs not clarify complctely how. in the absence of a concluding crystalline sphere. this circumfcrence must be interpreted physically. But then. Figure 3 derivcs its logic not so much from physical. let alone astronomical reasoning. but from a perplcxing piece of geometrical argumentation. Interestingly cnough. it is once more a fictional interlocutor. this timc onc called Albcrtino. who is made to introduce the drawing. Albertino argues that if we assume Bruno's numerous worlds to be equully large. thcn not more than six worlds will be

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1'1(;.3. Giordano Bruno. I),> /';'!/;lIiIO IlIIil'l''''\o ('/lIIolI/1i (London. I58路H. 145. A ,illlilar figure is found in Bmno', V/' illllllll'l'I""bililJIIs. illllll("'''O /'1 illfigllmbili (Frankfurt. 159 II. 589 and 610.

contiguous to our own: because. without any penetration of hodies. not more than six spheres can be contiguous to [a centrally placed] one. just as no more than six equal circles can touch each other, without intersection of Iines. 21 The nonchalance with which Albertinomoves from a correct assertion about the geometry of circles to a false one concerning the three-dimensional case of spheres is astonishing. Much more baffling. indccd shocking, is howcvcr thc enthusiasm with which Bruno's spokesman, Filoteo, cmbraces Albcrtino's rcusoning. Taking up Albertino's reasoning where the latter had left off. he argues that "if we imagine the many and infinite world uccording to the mode of composition thut you have wished to imagine ... in such a way that we intend others and yet others. similurly spherical and cqually mobilc".then the question will urise as to how these worlds can maintuin their own identity und motion in the middle of the infinite cosmic spucc. The answer he givcs to his own question is that cach world has its own soul. which allows it to move according to its own inclinations. 22 Like Figure I. thcn. Figure 3 is a woodcut cngraved by Bruno himself; but in the rcspective dialoguc in which it appcars, it is attributed to a fictional interlocutor: it is thereupon rhetorically udjusted to Bruno's own didactic benefit; und tinally. it appears to contain a major blunder. It might thercfore be tempting to vicw Bruno's failurc to distinguish bctwccn two- and three-dimcnsionality in thc light of his upparcnt

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misunderstanding of Copernicus's description of the Earth's motion and to conclude that he was 'scientifically challenged'. However. as I have tried to arguc elsewhere. some mitigating circumstances may be adduced to cxplain Bruno's disregard for three-dimensional properties of stacking spherical worlds. 2.\ One of the more important ones has to do with the legacy of the author Bruno cvokes so promincntly at the end of his list of predecessors in The Ash Wedl/esday supper, namely of "the divinc Cusanus" (1401-64), Poill1s Uncoiling. the COSIIIOS COl/tractil/g

It is wcll known that in several of his writings, Nicholus Cusanus has recourse to mathcmatical arguments to strcngthcn his theological und metaphysicul views. In his De doclll igl/orall1ia ( 1440). which Bruno explicitly citcs in The Ash Wednesday supper, Cusanus dcvclops his well-known doctrine of thc 'coincidence of the opposites' (coincidell1ia o!'!'ositortllll), according to which not only in geometry. thc largest and the smallest may bc shown to coincide formally. but ulso in metaphysics, where God as thc all-embracing measurc of all things, and its contrary, the invisibly small unit-point. may be shown to coincide in various respects. In De II/do gloM (e. 1462), Cusanus furthermore describes the geomctrical point as a dynamic sturting point. capable of "evolving itself' into atom, line and body. and therefore as being present in all things.:~ The unfolding of the point into the All, and its opposite, numely the contraction of the divine All into a point (which is everywhere and anywherc). are routinely illustrated in geomctricalterms. Bruno clcarly emulated Cusanus. not just in writ, but also in his illustrations. The first woodcut he cngraved for J)(' la ('(ll/sa (Figure 4(a», for example. is cleurly inspircd by Cusanus's illustration (Figure 4(b».

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Christoph Liithy

FIG. 5. Giordano Bnlllll. lk Iril,(jci IIIillill'" ('1 III"mllm <Fr,mkrun. 1591 1.18.

Bruno, following Cusanus, explains: "Don't you sec th.1I the circle, the larger it gets, the more it approaches a straight line'?" The idea is that when the circle AA is mude to expand, it becomes lirst BB, then CC, and subsequently DO, "upproaching ever more the straightness of the inlinite line of the inrinite circle indicated by IK", so that the infinite circle and the inrinite straight line coincide.~~ The slightly more elaborate woodcut (Figure 5), crafted by Bruno forthe De triplici mil/imo et mel/sura (1591), resembles Cusanus's Figure 4(b) even more. The idea is once more that circle AB, when stretched into CD, EF, GH, and subsequently to infinity, will eventually become the line IK. where straight line and curve coincide. But note that into the centre of AB. Bruno has now placed what appears to be a miniature version of Figure 3. But whut might that cosmological ligure have to do with the logic of Figure 5'1 And yet, the forging of such a link is precisely whm Bruno, muster of mnemonic devices, is uttcmpting to do here. This link is best explained by mcans of yet another woodcut. In thc same treatise, in which Figure 5 occurs, Bruno mukes much of what he culls an 'archctype' and which he baptizes Area Democriti (Figure 6). This is in essence the sume composition as Figure 3 (and as the minuscule core of Figure 5). Indeed, once more uppealing to our mnemonic understanding, Bruno has pluced stars in the four corners of this figure so as to remind us of its astronomical origin and implications. But what docs this archetype teach us? According to Bruno. it shows us that the spherical minima of matter, or atoms, will produce a similar figure when gathering. or. put differently. that the same shape is generated when minima gather into larger entities. ~h "We uttribute the same figure to the maximum and to the millimum", Bruno declares, und he entitles the chapter in which the urchetype features as follows: "The minimum is visible again in large things and in the largest."~7 From geometrical points to physical atoms, from atoms to solar systcms (mO/uli), from //Iolldi to the infinite universe: this is the dynamic expansion from the original c/wfltra through a series of ever larger chirculi to the ultimute circumJerel/chia. It is obvious why Bruno considers this no ordinary diagram, but un 'archetype': for it describes u universal growth pattern that applies not only to all dimensions. but also

Cc'lIIre, Cire/c'. Circumference

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FIG. 6. Giordano Brunn. lk 'ril'lici lIIillilllo I"~ IIIl'1lsura (Frankfurt. 1591 I. 50.

to geometrical, physical. cosmological and indeed also numerological and spiritualmonadic entities alike. 2s The archetype's name is furthermore programmatic: Democritus was after all the philosopher of cosmic infinity and atomism alike. 2路/ In the infinite circle. the "centre, which is the ratio of the sphere. is in each of its parts". and both the infinite circle und the ubiquitous centre-point ure dimensionless. 1u This. then. is Bruno's atomislic uddition to Cusanus's original geometry oflhe coincideJltia oppositorum. Once Ihis is understood. the task of the minuscule kernel of Figure 5 becomes as obvious us the task of the four stars in Figure 6: both indicate growth puttems - in the first case thut of Bruno's minima towurds Cusanus's circles: in the second, that of the atoms towurds stars and momli.

II/Utgc' Logic. Imagination. and I'II((l/to.\"io Given what has been argued on the basis of this small sampling of woodcuts, it would uppear that Bruno's approach to cosmology was driven by a visuullogic. Although it c1eurly belongs to the contexi of the sixteenth-century's search for un ars illl'enie/lc/i, Bruno's particular aI's is still little understood. From Bruno's vuriolls writings. it is clear thul he stipulated a fornml correspondence between the world und the soul; that he believed in un analogy between Ihe soul's and the world's capacity to bring about new things through acts of combining basic elements anew, combinatorics being the world's und the sours art alike: and finally, that he attributed to the mentul facul-

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tics I'lulIIlllsia and imaginatill the capacity to bring ubout such ncw combinutions. und thereby not only to 'imaginc' things, but also to 'image' thc basic ontological structures of reality. This is why Bruno not only defines Aristotlc's plulIItasmllta as 'inner imagcs', but practises thc urt of "speculating on plulIIta.\'IIwla Iplu/l/tasmata SIJl'cII/adj" as a craft by carving woodcuts. While all of this seems fairly evident. the technical details behind his imaginative and image-making labours remain obscure and controversial. Some of the rcasons for this obscurity must be attributed to Bruno himself. The first reason has to do with the recurrent mismatch between images and text. Several of Bruno's Latin texts - certainly the Articllii celltllm el sexagil/ta acl\'erslls Iwills tempestatis llIalhemllticlIs (ltqlle phi/lJ.'iOpIIOS (1588) and the Fmnkfurt trilogy - contain a number of highly mysterious figures that are not explained in the text. and which have led to the most disparate interpretations:" Irrespective of what they may possibly signify. I am inclined to vicw them in terms of publicity and the quest "Jr patrons. It is known that early modcrn mathematicians in search of patrons or disciples would publish treatises giving mathematical problems together with their solutions. but without furnishing either the method or the proof, which they would only teach orally and against payment. ~2 I think it is no coincidence that the mismatch between image and text occurs notably in books printed in times when Bruno was in search of a patron. The second reason for the obscurity of some of Bruno's woodcuts has to do with his mostly unexplained mixing and blending of different and ill first sight incompatible iconogmphical conventions. Among his woodcuts. we find geometrical diagrams belonging to the Euclidean tradition: magically 'efficient images' of the astrological type that becume respectable once more with Marsilio Ficino: combinatorial wheels and trees of the Lullian tradition: mnemonic charts and architcctural maps; sacred symmetries and roses taken from Charles de Bovelles; numerological constellations and symbols; Cusunus's metuphysicul geometry and astronomical and cosmological representutions taken from a number of traditions. It hus becn said with rcspect to the latter category that Bruno's images do not differ much from those commonly uvailable in the Renaissance. I ' Admittedly, many of Bruno's astronomicul und cosmological woodcuts resemble standard iconography.'~ But the examples that we have been discussing in this paper c1eurly dcpurt from the available types, notably by introducing into cosmology 'archetypul reasoning' und infinitist geometrics. The third and last reason has to do with the fact that, ulthough Bruno speaks on several occasions about imagination und image-making. hc ncvertheless leaves the reader quite empty-handed. Both his lirst extant work (De IIll1b,.is iclea,."m. 1582) and his last published book (De imagillllll/ ('ompositiol/e. 1591) uddress questions of mental imagery, Indeed. distinguishing himself from other imugc-driven philosophers and scientists, he was not only awurc of the mental role of imuges, but his finultreatise 01/ II1ÂŁ' compositiol/ (~filllllg('S purports to subject imuge-making in the mind and on paper to a careful unalysis." Thc trcmise opens in a very promising way. Acutely aware of the dependence of onc 's undcrstanding of images on one's image theory and

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thus on one's philosophical theory concerning the interrelation between the world, its ligurative interpretation. and the mind. Bruno starts by delining his own view of the maller, declaring his allegiance to the Neoplatonic distinction between three words. The first world is the divine /l1I/1lt/1IS lI/etaphysicl/s of ideas (idea'). which is responsible for the existence of the second world, the II/lIIull/s physicl/s. which, in turn, contains the traces (l'esti1:i(/) of the iell'a'. Our souls bring into existence the third world, the mllluills ratiollalh. which allempts. by conceptual and logical means and by abstmcting from the \'esti1:ia, to fathom the iell'll:. of which it can. however. only capture the shadows (umbra').'/> The rel'ltion between divine ideas. natuml things and mental images Illay thus be chamcterized as follows: "Ideas are the c.luse of things before these things exist: the tmces are the things themselves or wh'ltever is in them; and the shadows of the ideas are taken from those things or exist after thcm:' Our mind. being "like sOllle living mirror". our mental images are thus derivative. However, whereas a normal mirror can only receive "the images and ligures of things". our mind can do more: it can recognize thc substantial forms and species behind the appeamnces of things, somehow abstracting back to the divine unity undel'lying them. This is where the "art of linding lars i/ll'l'IIielldi)" comes in: the mind can arrive at images that come closer to the primeval. divine plan. 17 That is presumably how an archetype such as the Area Dell/oc";ti obtains its legitimacy. But alas. Bruno docs not discuss the crafting of archetypes. nor does he explain any of his woodcuts. despite the fact that many of them arc in dire need of explanation. Instead. he first offers us. in a separate chapter. a short iconographical typology. which comprises and defines /Iota. character, Si1:/lUIII, sigil/u11I. illdiciu11Iâ&#x20AC;˘ .figura, similitllllo.pruportio, and iII/ago. Regrellably, the types he most often employs - archet.\11l1s,foI"ll11l, atriu11I. rota, area. arbor. idea. \'(Jstigill11l, umbra - are not mentioned there. let alone defined. Even more deplorably, Bruno abandons both his typology and his philosophy of the three worlds and turns instead to u rich, lengthy and technical discussion of the ways of constructing mnemonic illmges nnd maps.'X Just before he turns to these technic.lImallers, however. he utters (in somewhat hasty or even corrupt Latin) a number of important words about the mentnl faculty of the plulIltasia, paraphrasing the view of 'Synesius the Platonist', from the Inlier's D(J .HlIIllliis, which once again he knew through Marsilio Ficino's translation: It is the sense of senses. since the fantastie spirit itself is the most general sense organ nnd prime body of the soul. and while it remains hidden nnd works within us, it possesses the best part of the living organism and is as it were its citadel (for nature has built around it the universal workshop of the heud).... All the while, this inner sense Iof plulIltasia J remains intact in nil its parts; for it hears and sees with the whole spirit. whencc it maps out different things in different places, and, us it were, cnsts from a single centre innumerable lines to the width of the circumference, which go out as if from a common root, to return to it as if to .1 rool. He [Synesius J calls it the first vehicle of the soul. placed in the middle between the temporal nnd the eternal. whereby we live to the greatest degree.

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Christoph LUthy This fantastic spirit is the unique orgun. that alone makes ,md receives nil thnt the senses nre. 39

Unexpectedly, we are back at cllell/l"lI/1/ & chirclIllls & cin·IIII,!"erencll;ll. This time, these terms are neither applied to /1/ol/(li, stars or planets, nor to the infinite agent deity or to its opposite, the m;II;l1Ia, but instead to the human mind, and notably to its l~mtastic spirit. which is suid to radiate out from its indivisible centre in the head to the outmost circumference of the world and to bring back whatever it is that is to be understood and indeed 'imagined' ubout it. The geometric and pictoriul correspondence between the unfolding of the divinity. the cosmos and the human mind is obvious. We may therefore conclude that when. in the context of his discussion of Figure I. Bruno wished to surpass not only Ptolemy. but also Copernicus. it wus not least the visual logic of his plulI//as;a on which he felt he could rely. Nonetheless. what remains quite unclear in Bruno's scultered epistemological considerations are the standards by which the veracity of the plUlI/las;a of one thinker may be judged to be superior to that of others (e.g .• Bruno's to that of the astronomers before him); how the images provided by the plICllltasia must be correlated with empirical observations (suy. in observational astronomy); and whether the images provided by plulII/asia and ;11I11gillllt;o can possibly be lalsified by empirical evidence. There ure moments when Bruno appears to subscribe to un empiricist methodology, stressing the supremucy of the truditionulfive senses, and ubove all of the sense of vision. There ure. however. ulso moments in which the wings of his fantustic spirit ure made to unfold und to carry him to the stars in u mentul state of ufllm,. poe/iclls. rapt"s. or heroic frenzy.oW It is in these stutes, one must presume. that he grabbed his gouges and knives und set ubout to produce his more during astronomical and cosmological woodcuts. a<; a plli/osoplllls jingl'ns e/ p;lIgl'IIS.

ACk'IOII'/edgemellts Research for this article was carried out as a part of the project "Visualizing the Invisible" of the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). REFERENCES I. Giordano Bruno. £lpIiClltiolrigilll" .Iigillorllm lILondon]. 15113). fol. ;IXr (= jonltmi BrIIlli Nolalli Opera latitle cOII.lcri/,'''' cd. hy Francesco Fiorentino ('I "I. (Naples and Florence. 11l71J-91: repr, Stutlgan. 1962). ii/2. 133). Bruno repeatedly ascribes lhe view Ihat lIlulcrslanding isp/llml"sII/tIIa sf1(,CIIt"ri 10 Aristotle (Ihe crucial pass;lges hcing De allima. 42Xa Ill-hI): 431 h2: 432a5: and Dc m('II/ori",450a 1-7). The emlnlionoflhis nolion from Aristotle lo11nmo and heyond is carefully descrihcd in Leen Spruit's magisterial 'S/,,'des itltdligibili.~·: Fmm/"'Il"'f1,itmlo klloll'l<-l1ge (2 VIlIs, Leiden, 1994). 2. George Ahbol, 11,,' r,'IISO".1 lI'ilit'1/ /)oelOlI/' Hill !I"tll Immglll. for II", 1I/'/lOldi"g of /m/,istr)' ... (Oxford, 16(4). !lX-I).qunted hy Rnhcrll\lcNulty, "Bmno at Oxford". Rellt/i.UlIIICt- /lell'.~. xiii (1960). 300-5, pp. 302-3. 3, Giordano Bmnll. l.Ll "('llll <I" /c' n·/I..,-; (London. 15X4). 1)7: "Vide. tace cl disce: ego docebn Ie Ptolomacum cl Copernicum:'

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-I. Bnmo. Cellil (ref. 3).99: "Lcssem c rilrt>\'..mno chc dice.. la terra e la luna csserc contemne eome

d;1 mcde,mo cpiciclo. ecc:' 5. Bnmo. Cellil (ref. 3).99: "La c..usa ddl'errore fu. che il'lorquato avea cuntemplato Ie ligurc di qucl lihm e non ..vea lello gli C'lpiIOli: c se pur Ie hOI lelli. non I'ha intesi:' 6. Eman McMullin. "Bruno and Copernicus",I,\i.\,lx.xviii (19117). 55-7-1. 7. Nkol;llIs Copernicus./k r(,l'O/lIIimli/lll,\ orbillml'ol'l,',\lilll/l (Nuremberg. 15-13). fol.llr-Hv: "Quartam in ordine :Ulima revolulio locum ohtinet. in quo terram cum mhe lunari t;lIlquam epieyclo contineri di.ximus," X. Fr;mce, A. Yates. Giordllllo Br/lllo lImltll,' 1/"1'1//('/;" Ir(/(/ilioll (Chicago. 19M). 2-1 I. 9. D;lrio Tessicini.1 dill/omi deWill}illi",: Gioll/",,,, 111'11I'" e /'lI"rrrmomill tlI'I Cill'I"'·...·lIlo (Pi,a, 20071. ch..p. I. pp. 16-58. 10. Cf. on Ihis point Pietro Daniel Onllldeo. "Giordano Bruno and Nicolau, Copernicus: Thc motion, of Ihe Earth in TIle Ash Wednc,day Supper". N/lII..i1,.\• .xxiv (20091, I07-.~ I. II. Alc.x;mdre Koyre. From II", c10wtl "'''''Id 10 II". ill/illi,,' /llIil','rse (Bahimore. 1957).5-1. 12. Bruno. C"lIl1 (ref. 3).99: "10 cum p'lCO il ('opernicu- dissc il Nolano - c pot.·o mi curt>. ehc voi o altri I'intendano: ilia di queslo ,010 voglio avcrtirvi: ehe. prim;1 che vcngate :Ill in,cgnanni un'..lIm volta. ehe studi;lle mcglio." 13. Scveral aUlhors have poinled oul that lhc diagmm di,plays a numbcr of odditic,. nol Icasl in the numhcr of circles; sec. most rccently, Tcssicini. 1 dill/omi ddl'illjillilo (ref. 9), 14. Bruno. C"lIl1 (ref. 3).5: "AI che rispose iI Nolmlll. ehe lui non vcdca pcr gl'ocehi di ('opernko.nc di Plollllneo: ma per i pmprii lIu;lI1to ;11 giudilio. ella determinatione:' 15. Bruno. Ct'IIII (ref. 3).6-7: .... , ordinalo d.. gli dei cOllie una aUTOm. che dove\,;1 preecdcre I'uscila di lIueslo sole de I'antiqua vera liIosolia...... 16. Bnlllo. C.'IUI (ref. 3). 51: "Cert;lI1l<:llle al Nol:lI1o IltICO so: aggiongc che il Copernko. Nkela Siracu,ano Pilagoricu. Filolao. Emclidc di Ponto. EcI;mto Pitagorico. Platonc ncl'Iilllco (hcnchc timida el inconstalllemcllle. per che I'il\'eil piil per fcde chc per sdenza) et il divino ('U"1I10 nel secondo 'UO Iibm De la dOlla ignormll:l. et ahri in ogni mooo rari soggelli, I' ahhino dellll. inscgnato c conlinllilto prima: perch': lui 10 tiene per ahri proprii ct piu saldi principii. per i quali non per aUloritale. ma per vivo sen"" e raggionc. hOi cossi certo qucsto. comc ogn'altra co,a che possa aver per certa:' Note th;1I very similar 'lisls of prcdeccssors' arc found holh in Copcrnicus himself and in Giovanni Francesco Pico dclhl Mirandola's E\/IlIIe" 1'{lIIilali,"/"l'lrimw gelltilllll of I52(J, 17. For an erudite discussion of thc sources and implications of Bruno's mCI:lphysieal cosmology. scc Giordano Bruno. De /a ('(/lI.\lI. (,ri"d/'io ,'/11"0 / Db..,. die Ur""ch.., tI(/,~ I'rill~;1' /IIld d".\ Eille. lransl. and cd. by ThonJ:ls Leinkauf (1Iamhurg. 2(J07), IX. Marsilio Ficino, De l'ill/libri m'\. Jih, III: 1),0 \'it" ,."..lilll.\ ""lIIl'llnlllet" (Basic. 1521)1. c.g. pp. 118 ;lIld 121: "Praeter cnim id. quod hinc quidem cunlilTlnis esl divinis. indc VCTll caduds. el ad lIIraquc vergil alkelU. [ilnimil mundi Ito!:1 illlerim e'l ,imulubique. Aceedit ad hacc qu,ltl anima mundi lolidcm saltem r....iones renllll 'eminalc, divinitu, habel. quot idcac MIIII in mcnte divina. lIuibus ipsa rationihu, totidem l;lbrical specic' inmateri...... Similitcr anima ll1undi uhique vigens per Solcm pr.tecipuc suam p'ISsill1 explic.1I communis vitac virtulem. Undc quidam anill1am el in uohi, el in mundo. in quolibet mcmhro totam. potissimull1 in cordc colhlCant atquc Solc:' A highly u,eful discussion of 8nnlO', deht 10 Ficino is provided b)' Michele Cilihcrto, Gionltlllo /lnll/o: lI,ealm (leila \'it" (Milan. 20(7). chap. 5. csp. pp. 18-1-7. II). Giord;lIIo Bruno. De III wlI,'a. I'rill";l'io ,'/'11I0 (London. 15841. dialogue 2. -12-50: "II spirito. I'anima. la vila che pcnclra tUllo. C in 111110. e move IUlla la maleria. cmpic il gremio di quella ...... "L'ilnima dumquc delll1ontlo C il pl'incipiu fol'tnalc conslitutivo de I'universo. c di cill chc in '1lIcllo si cOlllicnc:' "". nun c mininlO cnrpusculo ehc non conlenga cotal porzionc in sc. che Illl/I in.lIlill1i:· English translalion fmm Giordano Rruno. C/Il/se.l'rill";(,I.. I/Ilily. Iransl, .1Ild ed, by Robert de Lucca CC:nnhridge. 11)9H l. -14. 45. 44. 38, Thc quolation is fTllm Virgil's t\"IIl'iti. VI, 726-7; Fieino al,o ciles if in 1),0 \'it(/ (ref. IXl. 2-15. 20. Giordano Bruno. Itliow Irillllll,I",II.' (Paris. 15H6). C4r. reproduccd in Gion(1/I1O /lr/ll"'. C"I'(III.,

""et

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22.

23.

24. 25.

26.

27. 28.

29, 311, 31. 32. 33. 34.

35.

Christoph Luthy

il.'lI/WJ:rtI/llliclllll: Le illcisiolli 11.../11' 0/'1'11' 1/ Slclllll'lI. ed. and cllnlJJlcnt,lry by Mino Gabriclc (Milml. 20())). 324. Gioro,JJlo Bruno. /)ell' illJillilflllllil'l'rso 1~III/(1I1l/i (London, 15114). 144: ..... nOll pommno pill chc sci JJlondi csscrc cOllligui a qucsto: pcrelu!, scnza penetrazion di corpi, CIISSI 11011 pill chc sci sicre POSSOIIO •.:ssc!"c l."ontiguc a 11I1'1. <.'OJJlC non pill che sci cir<.'Oli 1.'Illmli, scnza illll.'rscl.iollc de 1i1l1.'C. POSSOIIII 10l."carc 11II altro." Bmllo. D,'f/,iIlJillito IIIlil'I'I",WI (ref. 21). 163-4: ..... 5e noi imaginimllo gli lIIolli cd illlilliti mundi. secolldo quclla mggiollc di composizione e1IC solete voi imaginare. quasi dll: ... IlC inlclldialllo allri cd allri simihncnle sferici e pariJJlcnlc JJlobili; allora noi dcremmu dUllilr mggiunc c fcngcrc ill (1IIalmodol'lIno vcrrchc clIlltinualO 0 contiguo aU·;lItm....Tullll avvicllll dal sufliciclllc prillcipio inlcriore Jlcr it (Illaic mlluralmcnlc vicnc ad csagitarsc. c non d;1 principio cSlcriore. eOlIlC \'cggiamn sCJJlpre accaderc a quclle cosc. chc son JJlosse 0 contra 0 eXira 101 propria mllum. Muovcnsi dUllllIIC !:llcrra e gli allri astri sccondole pmpric diITerenze lecali dal principiu inlrinscco. che :11'.lIlinm pmpria." This SOliI is "non solo scnsiliva ... ma anco intellctliva ... c intclleUi\'a non SlIl!l cOJJle 1:1 IIIlslra. nm forse ;IIICO pili." In my "Bnlllll's An'lI /)"I'WI'I"ili and Ihe origins ofatOlllist imagery", Brllllimltl.(: CIIIIII'I/Ildlilllltl. iv (1998),59-92.1 havc altelllpled to el\pl:lin Bruno's geometrical notions in temls of his adherencc to Pythagore'lII nUJJlernlogy. Nicol.llIs CUS:IIIUS. f)jl/f0J:II.f dl'llIdo gloM. cd. by Johann Gerhard Senger (H:llllhurg. 19911),578. Bmnu, Ddtl (·tlll.II' (ref. 19). 133: "Non vedete COlne il eircolo quanto i: pill gmnde. Imllo pill con il SilO arcll si \'a appmssimando alia reltimdine? ... e con questo pill e pill a\'vicinarsi :l1la reUitudine del!:1 linea inlinit:l del circolo infinito signifieata per [KT Giord,lI\o Unll\o, /)"',-iplici IIIillimo ('llIIel/Sllm (Fr.mkfurt. 1591; lacsimile reprilll in Gioro;nm Unll1o. 1'/I('IIIi Jilo.mJici Illlilli. cd. b)' Ellgenio Canone (La Spezia. 2000». 51: "Ergo lihi ilrehetYllus IIlinimi cor.ull obiicialUr, I Multiplici lit minimo circum cecullle "dolelllem I El\pcndit similis generis cOlll1l1etlluC ligurmn I Arc:! Democriti proprio quac nomine dicm est:' BnulO. /)1' tripfid lIIi"illlO (ref. 26).49: "Eandem figur.lmmmdlllO trihllilllus at(IUll minimo.... Rursulll mini ilium in IImguis et mal\illlis esse perspicIIlllll:' Angclik:! Blinkcr-Valton. "Die lIIa1henliltische KOllzeption der Metaphysik nadl De trilllici Illinilllo et llIensura", in /)it' "-mllk/",.,...,. Sdrriftl!lI GionltlllCI B1"I/1I0,~ 1II1l1 ill,.e \1,m/ls.wI:lIIlgl·II, cd. hy Klaus I-Ieipeke. Wolfg:lllg Neuser and Erlmrd Wicke (Weinheim. 1991), 75-94. describes Ihis OIrehetYlle poign;nltly as the milernseopic nlilgnifil.":!tion of i1ll1iemseopically small 'Geslallungsgcselz'. Fur additiollal discussion of this archetype. referlo my essay "Bruno's AI<'llf)mwl'''W'' (ref. 23), Bruno. /)t' tl'ipfid lIIillilllo (ref. 26).49: "In inlinito '" cenlnllll quod eSI nllio splmerae. cst in 1II11ni parte.... III termino nolla esl dilllensio. [n minilllo dimensio eSI originaliter indifferens:' Sec. for il reCcllI cxmnple. Lucia Vi;lIlel!o's valiant allcmpt to understand some of the IIIrill :IS lII:1gie:11 lllilPS slllllln:lrizing Brullo's reasoning. in i.e ",apfle IIIl1gidle de Girmltl/wllrlllW (l'OIdIlOl. 2IK)4). See. Iilr el\a1nplc. 1\'(1 Sehncider. jofrwml!s foilllfllll/ler J580-/635: Recllmllleislt'l" ill I'illl'" 11'1011 d,·.~ UmJmwll.1 (Basic. 19(3), Tessicini. 1dilllllmi dl'11'i"Ji"ilo (ref. 9). 78. For the evolulioll of aslnlllmnical iconogmphy. sec i.a. Marc L1chii:re-Rey .1Ild Jean-Pierre Luminet, I-i'gllll'S dll l'i,'1 (Paris. 1(911); Isabelle Pantin, "L"iI1ustration des Iivres d':!slronOlnic :1 1:1 Relmissancc: I.'cmlutilln d'une discipline atrol\'ers ses images". in IlIIlIIllgilliI'I'rCtlllll,\('('Il': /)1'( Rillmdllll'll/(lllllll Rimhdml<' Scil'/IIi}im. ed. by F. Feroi and C. Pogliano (Aorence, 21K) 1), 3-41 ; Uruce 1~lsI\\'ood 'lI\d Gerd Gmsshoff. "Planetary diagrams - descriptions. models. thenries: Frnm C'lT(I(jngiiln dcplo)'llIelllS to Copemieiln debates", in 7111' f1ou·t'ro/imllg,·s ill ('(Ir/." I/Iod..,,, .Idt'"n'. cd, by Wolfg;lIlg Lefc\'re. Jiirgen Renn and Urs Schocpnin (Bilsle. 2IK)3). 197-227; /)it' SlalU' liig,·" lIid,,: A.II/llfogie 11/,,1 tlslIIlllomie illl Millt'illfler /l1It1 ill d"1" /1";;11,'" Nt,,,:";1 (AIIsstellllngskillillog der Herzog August Bibliolhek Wolfenbiillcl. Nr. 90: Wiesh:lden. 2IK)ll), Gillrd.lIln Brunn, /){, i/lW,lIi""III. SigllOrtllll el it/earl/III COIIII'0Sili(l//{'. 1II1 tllllllia illl't'lI/illlllllll, l/i,~/m.lilimllllll 1'1 /I/(·/Iwrit<· ,lIl!llI'rtI /illl"i III (Frankfun, 1591).

Celltre. Circle. Circumference

327

36. On the melllal capluring of shadows. see Giordano Bruno. DI' Illllbri.~ it/earl/m (Paris. 1582). 37. Bruno. De imagillllm compositiolle (ref. 35).1-3: "Idea: sUlll causa rerum ante res. idearum vestigia sUlll ipsa: res seu qme in rebus. ideanlln umbra: sunt ab ipsis rebus seu post res ..."; "mens ... veluti specululllquoddam vivens. in quo est imago rerum naturaliulIl et umbra divinarum". 311. Frances Yates has underslllud Ihis Irealise as a manual lor the "cOIUposilion of magic or talismanic images. signs and ideas" (Giort/allo Hl'/1II0 alld the HerllleTic Tmt/itioll (ref. ll). 331). More sober. detailed and convincing is Rita Sturlese. "Giordano Brunos Schrift De imaginum. signorulll et idearum compositione und die philosophische Lehre del' Gcdachlniskunst". in Heipcke et a/. (cds). Di<路 Fmllkfllrter Schriftell (ref. 28). 51-73. 39. Bruno. De ill/agillltlll cOlI/positiolli' (ref. 35). 26: ..... haec cnim sensus est sensuum. quonialll phantasticus ipse spiritus sensoriulIl est cllllllllunissimum primumque animae corpus, et hoc quidemlatet agitque illlUS, praecipuuJll animalis habet et vellH arcem (circa enimuniversam ipsum capitis fabricam nalUm construxit).... huimus inlcrea sensus in cunctis suis partibus est integer: toto IlOlIJulue spiritu 'llIdit. toto videt. unde aliis alia dislribuit. el quasi a celllro ad amplitudinem circumferentiae innumeras uno eiaculans lineas inde lanquam ex communi radice exeUlIIes. et in quod lanqlmm mdicem reducuntur. Hoc appellat primum animae vehiculum. medium inter tempuralia et aetema. quo plurimum vivimus, spiritus scilicel phanlaslicus: unum individuum olllnia quae sellsus sunl facit et red piC' For my translalion. I have inlerchanged the comma before the expression "spiritus scilicet phalllasticus" with the selllicoion after it. 40. For Bruno's sailing through the heavens ill a state of filmr poeticlls. see his DI' Kii I'mid fllmri (London. 1585) as well as his C()slllo]ogical sonnets.