Physiologie de l'âme

Physiology of the Soul. Mind, Body and Matter in the Galenic Tradition of the Late Renaissance (1550-1630)

F. Bigotti

Brepols publishers 

2019

366p. 

ISBN: 978-2-503-58161-3

A study of how physicians and philosophers at the end of the Renaissance developed Galen's philosophical legacy and in doing so moved beyond accepted patterns and conventions in their reading of classical medical text

This study looks at the ways in which physicians and philosophers developed Galen's philosophical legacy at the end of the Renaissance, and shows how their reading of classical medical texts moved beyond accepted patterns and conventions.

By challenging a traditional historiographical account that described Renaissance Galenism in terms of decline and fall, this study argues for a new assessment of Galen's legacy, also read through the lens of those who opposed or reacted critically to it and thus contributed to the shaping of important aspects of the early modern debate on anthropology, ethics, psychology and even quantified experimentation. Among these many innovations and transformations, the notion of 'ingenuity' (ingenium) deserves particular attention. Hidden within this corporeal, inherent and heritable inclination, two major themes that side disquietingly with the development of modern subjectivity can be identified: the 'corporeality of the body', and the common destiny of humans and animals.

More generally, this study offers a contribution to the ongoing debate on the role and value of medical history, arguing in favour of the concept of 'historical translatability' in balancing the longue durée of traditions with the chaotic interactions of individual thinkers.

Fabrizio Bigotti is Senior Research Fellow at the Institut für Geschichte der Medizin of the Julius-Maximilians University in Würzburg (Germany), and Honorary Research Fellow of the Centre for Medical History of the University of Exeter (UK). He has held postdoctoral and research positions at the Warburg Institute of London, the University of Exeter, the University of Padua and the Folger Institute of Washington D.C., and is the founder and current Director of the Centre for the Study of Medicine and the Body in the Renaissance (CSMBR) in Pisa. His interests cover areas such as metaphysics, history of technology and reconstruction of historical instruments, and history of quantification and applied mathematics, with a particular emphasis on the recovery of classical and medieval philosophy, literature and experimental practices in the early modern period.