Andreas Kühne; Stefan Kirschner (Editors): Biographia Copernicana: Die CopernicusBiographien des16. bis 18. Jahrhunderts: Texte und Übersetzungen,Biographia Copernicana: Die Copernicus‐Biographien des 16. bis 18. Jahrhunderts: Texte undÜbersetzungen by Andreas  Kühne; Stefan  KirschnerReview by: rev. by Derek JensenIsis, Vol. 97, No. 2 (June 2006), p. 352Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/507365 .

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352 BOOK REVIEWS—ISIS, 97 : 2 (2006)

century Europe and in the intersection of disci-plines in that time and place.

FRANK LINHARD

Andreas Kuhne; Stefan Kirschner (Editors).Biographia Copernicana: Die Copernicus-Bio-graphien des 16. bis 18. Jahrhunderts: Texte undUbersetzungen. (Nicolaus Copernicus Gesamt-ausgabe, 9.) xxxiii � 508 pp., illus., table, bibl.,index. Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2004. (Cloth.)

Since the inception of the German edition of Co-pernicus’s papers, there have been plans for avolume of biographical materials and a pictorialalbum that would enable scholars to move pastLeopold Prowe’s still-valuable three-volume bi-ography (1883–1884). With the completion ofthis volume in the Gesamtausgabe series, thesegoals have largely been realized. The sources in-cluded in this volume consist of accounts of Co-pernicus’s life written during the two centuriesafter his death. Andreas Kuhne and StefanKirschner have chosen material that specificallyincluded dates and a “record of the most impor-tant life events” (p. xiii) of Copernicus, leavingout poetical tributes by authors such as the Ger-man Baroque poet Andreas Gryphius, as well asaccounts by authors such as Ismael Boulliau,who dealt with the astronomical and mathemat-ical work of Copernicus but not necessarily withhis life. Nevertheless, not surprisingly, several ofthe texts in this compilation, including PierreGassendi’s lengthy biography, have a bearing onthe question of Copernicus’s theory of the or-dering of the planets.

The volume’s critical apparatus contains help-ful notes that point out inconsistencies in thesources concerning the dates and events of Co-pernicus’s life. Also of considerable value areanalyses of the differences between the knownbiographical manuscripts and their printed coun-terparts, as well as biographical sketches of eachof the biographers represented in the volume. Inthe prefatory matter to each biography the edi-tors have included references to other editions ofthe biographies as well as registers that recountwhere the biographies may have been referencedor quoted in the secondary literature on Coper-nicus. While these references and registers areextremely valuable, the editors admit that the lat-ter, in particular, “must remain naturally incom-plete” (p. xxix), for they have not done a thor-ough, comprehensive search through all thesecondary literature.

In addition to the original Latin, Italian,French, and Polish texts, Kuhne and Kirschnerhave provided accessible German translations.

While these translations make the volume ex-tremely valuable as a research tool, there are oc-casional questions of judgment, as there alwaysare in translation work. For example, the editorshave included a transcription as well as a trans-lation of the notes Johannes Broscius made inhis copy of the second edition of Copernicus’sbook De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (Ba-sel, 1566). According to the German translationprovided in this volume, Broscius relayed a re-port from Copernicus’s friend Tiedemann Giese,bishop of Kulm, that “Erasmus von Rotterdamhad a very friendly [sehr freundlich] opinion ofCopernicus” (p. 35). It is likely that Erasmus’sopinion was more ambiguous. As Owen Ginger-ich has pointed out with respect to this passagein Broscius’s annotations, the Latin words“valde mansuetam” have the more ambiguousmeaning of “very mild” (see Gingerich, An An-notated Census of Copernicus’ De revolutioni-bus [Brill, 2002], p. 159). Rather than “friendly,”“mansuetam” could also be translated as “tame,”“soft,” “gentle,” “quiet,” or “calm.” At best, onecould translate “mansuetam” as “good natured”or “mildly good natured.” Any translation onechooses, Erasmus’s opinion was enigmatic in-deed.

Questions of translation aside, this volumestands as an important contribution to Coperni-can studies. It brings both well-known and ob-scure biographical accounts together, makingthem highly accessible to scholars. Libraries andscholars alike will find much value in having thisvolume on their shelves, obviating the need tosearch for and gather sometimes arcane and of-ten rare material. Biographia Copernicana in-cludes a catalogue of Copernicus’s portraits,printed on fine paper, that has the virtue of gath-ering all known portraits of Copernicus up to1800 in one place, while offering complete com-mentaries, provenance statements, and descrip-tions of each item. The editors have in largemea-sure succeeded in their goal of providing thegroundwork for the next definitive biography ofCopernicus. We shall see if another LeopoldProwe comes forth to tackle the life of Coper-nicus.

DEREK JENSEN

Jaap Maat. Philosophical Languages in theSeventeenth Century: Delgarno, Wilkins, Leib-niz. (New Synthese Historical Library, 54.) xv� 415 pp., bibl., index. Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2004.€149 (cloth).

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