Musical Sympathy and Occult Knowledge
Read More![Sometimes referred to as ‘the last Renaissance man’, the German Jesuit Athanasius Kircher extended the boundaries of knowledge through his researches into a diverse range of subjects. His encyclopaedic <i>Musurgia universalis</i> presents music as a reflection of the divine cosmos but assimilates into this scholastic view elements of natural magic and experimental science. For Kircher the harmonic universe comprised a network of unseen correspondences linking different parts of the natural world. By decoding symbols and allegories to be found in ancient texts and nature, man could gain a deeper understanding of God’s creation. The areas Kircher covers include sound and voice as found in nature, acoustical science, and the ‘magic’ of consonance and dissonance. His discussion of the origins of human music in Greece and Egypt leads to a comparison of ancient and modern music together with explanations for the different effects music can have on listeners. The final chapter portrays the Creation of the world in terms of a pipe organ. <br><br>
Kircher’s illustrated title-page incorporates Catholic doctrine into a cosmic scheme that focuses on the Trinity in the form of a triangle. Nine choirs of angels sing a complex part song in thirty-six parts. Through the art of part song (polyphony) man imitates cosmic harmony.
<br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Musurgia universalis </i> [The complete science of music] (Rome, 1650) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586140680003606"> D.4.22</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-fSVtnzt/0/cb084593/M/D-004-022-004-M.jpg)
Sometimes referred to as ‘the last Renaissance man’, the German Jesuit Athanasius Kircher extended the boundaries of knowledge through his researches into a diverse range of subjects. His encyclopaedic Musurgia universalis presents music as a reflection of the divine cosmos but assimilates into this scholastic view elements of natural magic and experimental science. For Kircher the harmonic universe comprised a network of unseen correspondences linking different parts of the natural world. By decoding symbols and allegories to be found in ancient texts and nature, man could gain a deeper understanding of God’s creation. The areas Kircher covers include sound and voice as found in nature, acoustical science, and the ‘magic’ of consonance and dissonance. His discussion of the origins of human music in Greece and Egypt leads to a comparison of ancient and modern music together with explanations for the different effects music can have on listeners. The final chapter portrays the Creation of the world in terms of a pipe organ.
Kircher’s illustrated title-page incorporates Catholic doctrine into a cosmic scheme that focuses on the Trinity in the form of a triangle. Nine choirs of angels sing a complex part song in thirty-six parts. Through the art of part song (polyphony) man imitates cosmic harmony.
Author: Athanasius Kircher
Title: Musurgia universalis [The complete science of music] (Rome, 1650)
Shelfmark: D.4.22
![Sometimes referred to as ‘the last Renaissance man’, the German Jesuit Athanasius Kircher extended the boundaries of knowledge through his researches into a diverse range of subjects. His encyclopaedic <i>Musurgia universalis</i> presents music as a reflection of the divine cosmos but assimilates into this scholastic view elements of natural magic and experimental science. For Kircher the harmonic universe comprised a network of unseen correspondences linking different parts of the natural world. By decoding symbols and allegories to be found in ancient texts and nature, man could gain a deeper understanding of God’s creation. The areas Kircher covers include sound and voice as found in nature, acoustical science, and the ‘magic’ of consonance and dissonance. His discussion of the origins of human music in Greece and Egypt leads to a comparison of ancient and modern music together with explanations for the different effects music can have on listeners. The final chapter portrays the Creation of the world in terms of a pipe organ. <br><br>
Kircher’s illustrated title-page incorporates Catholic doctrine into a cosmic scheme that focuses on the Trinity in the form of a triangle. Nine choirs of angels sing a complex part song in thirty-six parts. Through the art of part song (polyphony) man imitates cosmic harmony.
<br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Musurgia universalis </i> [The complete science of music] (Rome, 1650) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586140680003606"> D.4.22</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-fSVtnzt/0/cb084593/Ti/D-004-022-004-Ti.jpg)
![In Book I Kircher focuses upon sound as found in ‘nature'. In this illustration he attempts to realise in musical notation domestic bird song. The nightingale's song comes first, followed by those of the cock, the hen laying eggs and calling her chicks, the cuckoo and quail. The parrot is shown to be imitating humans as it says "Hello" in Greek. The cockerel's music has the familiar portamento at the end of each phrase; as might be expected, the cuckoo's call is notated as a falling minor third.<br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Musurgia universalis </i> [The complete science of music] (Rome, 1650) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586140680003606"> D.4.22</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-f7N9p77/0/35b6ae3d/Ti/D-004-022-005-Ti.jpg)
![Like many in the seventeenth century, Kircher was interested in the then emerging science of acoustics. Here he illustrates experiments undertaken in acoustic spaces. <br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Musurgia universalis </i> [The complete science of music] (Rome, 1650) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586140680003606"> D.4.22</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-7w2wm6Z/0/69f51f8f/Ti/D-004-022-003-Ti.jpg)
![Diagram of a piazza-listening device: sound from voices in the piazza below travels via a large horn that enables words to be heard emanating from the mouth of the statue in the room above.<br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Musurgia universalis </i> [The complete science of music] (Rome, 1650) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586140680003606"> D.4.22</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-8SBwTjn/0/51cad536/Ti/D-004-022-008-Ti.jpg)
![Kircher’s ‘Harmony of the Birth of the World’ represented in terms of a cosmic organ with six stops corresponding to the six days of creation. The Latin inscription under the keyboard reads: ‘Thus plays the wisdom of the everlasting God in the earthly orb’.<br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Musurgia universalis </i> [The complete science of music] (Rome, 1650) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586140680003606"> D.4.22</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-4M3NxWn/0/8f8c4b01/Ti/D-004-022-002-Ti.jpg)
![The early sixteenth-century occult writings of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa proved useful to Athanasius Kircher, Robert Fludd and other later philosophers, as a means to understand music and its effects. The fact that this volume entered Queens’ library in the seventeenth century suggests the ongoing currency of magic as a component of philosophy in seventeenth-century England. Agrippa’s conception of magic as a universal philosophy and systematic route to a better understanding of the world gave prominence to music. Binding together Agrippa’s magical cosmos were the principles of harmony and sympathy which operate throughout all levels of being. In his view, knowledge of these harmonies and correspondences offered the philosopher (or magus) the means to manipulate different parts of the cosmos. The scientific revolution marks the period when the most powerful aspects of this occult tradition were absorbed into mainstream natural philosophy, above all in the experimental physics of Isaac Newton and his contemporaries in the Royal Society.
<br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim <br>
<b>Title:</b><i> De occulta philosophia </i> [On occult philosophy] (Lyon, c.1550) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21392131110003606"> H.20.30</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-t8HXr7J/0/6d04dad9/Ti/H-020-030-012-Ti.jpg)
![In a chapter of his treatise on magnets, Kircher explored the correspondences between music and magnetism. He argued that magnetism is present in musical modulations as evidenced in Orpheus’ skill in attracting animals, trees and even stones to the sound of his lyre. Music could attract – harmonious songs would calm a man – but also repulse – inharmonious songs cause agitation. According to Kircher, music did not affect the soul directly because the soul is immortal and immaterial; instead it moved the spirit. As the instrument of the soul, the spirit was light and thin and thus easily moved by harmonious music. Kircher also cites the example of ‘tarantism’ whereby a man bitten by a spider would go mad and dance until death. According to Kircher there was, however, a cure for tarantism in certain kinds of music, an example of which is shown here. This had the effect of forcing anyone afflicted with the condition to dance until the poison had sweated out through the skin. By ‘drawing out’ the poison, music acted like a magnet owing to the fact that the ratios inherent in the music matched those of the poison.
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<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Magnes sive De arte magnetica opus tripartitum </i>[Magnets and the magnetic art] (Cologne, 1643) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586142350003606"> D.20.32</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-548HMFJ/0/ec02dfcf/Ti/_MG_4742-1-Ti.jpg)
![<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Magnes sive De arte magnetica opus tripartitum </i>[Magnets and the magnetic art] (Cologne, 1643) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586142350003606"> D.20.32</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-RbsJ6gQ/0/9a859892/Ti/_MG_4744-3-Ti.jpg)
![Here Kircher states: 'The tarenti in fact employ certain fixed melodies, which they therefore call a tarantella, because it might be disposed especially to affecting the tarantism, to which it is approximately adapted in that melody which you see in the figure here'. <br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Athanasius Kircher<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> Magnes sive De arte magnetica opus tripartitum </i>[Magnets and the magnetic art] (Cologne, 1643) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586142350003606"> D.20.32</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-PLFmLjx/0/5c6c8038/Ti/_MG_4750-9-Ti.jpg)
![Music played an essential part in this treatise on Hebrew accentuation and spelling published by the German-born Catholic humanist Johann Reuchlin (1455–1522). He was one of those who inspired Athanasius Kircher and other seventeenth-century music theorists in their quest to discover the hidden forces underlying the operation of universal harmony. Reuchlin’s synthesis of magic and religion as the means to explore nature was stimulated by his disaffection with medieval philosophy, which he believed to be outworn. In its place he had promoted a Christianised form of the Kabbala, an ancient Jewish mystical cult rooted in Hebrew scriptures. As the language in which God had spoken to man, Hebrew was essential to Reuchlin’s search for new spiritual depths and hidden meanings in the scriptures. It was partly with this in mind that Reuchlin and other Christian humanists became interested in Jewish chant as sung in synagogues. In it they hoped to establish an authentic link with practices adopted by early Christians for whom, they argued, correct accentuation of Hebrew had played an essential part in worship.<br><br>
This page displays the printer's device of Thomas Anshelm.<br><br>
Johann Reuchlin<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> De accentibus et orthographia linguae Hebraicae </i> [On the accentuation and spelling of Hebrew] (Haguenau, 1618) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586141880003606"> K.14.13</a><br>
<b>Provenance:</b> Formerly owned by N. Cartwright](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-cswsMSr/0/cfe29254/Ti/_MG_4782-10-Ti.jpg)
![The final nine pages of Reuchlin’s treatise on Hebrew accentuation and spelling contain a Hebrew text and chant set for four voices in the style of Christian music of the period (the musical notation runs backwards together with the Hebrew from right to left). Reuchlin’s careful use of fermata signs bring out the meaning of the text.
<br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Johann Reuchlin<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> De accentibus et orthographia linguae Hebraicae </i> [On the accentuation and spelling of Hebrew] (Haguenau, 1618) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586141880003606"> K.14.13</a><br>
<b>Provenance:</b> Formerly owned by N. Cartwright](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-sq6T4wf/0/b5c97f6f/Ti/_MG_4773-1-Ti.jpg)
![Inscription in Hebrew on rear flyleaf of Reuchlin's <i>De accentibus et orthographia linguae Hebraicae</i> (c. seventeenth-century). The presence of grammatical errors suggests that the inscription was entered by a non-jewish scholar who was perhaps self-taught in Hebrew. (See the erroneous use of the pronoun 'him' rather than 'her'). <br><br>
'Good luck<br>
My daughter Esther was born to me in the land of England (b'eretz Anglia) on Wednesday (Yom Daled) after midnight (Layla) on the 14th day of the month (chodesh) of December. May God (hashem) bring him [i.e. her] up to the Torah, the chuppah and good works (l'ma atzim tovim). Amen.<br>
My son Hieronymus was born to me on Monday (yom sheni)'. <br><br>
Many thanks to David Hulbert for the translation. <br><br>
<b>Author:</b> Johann Reuchlin<br>
<b>Title:</b><i> De accentibus et orthographia linguae Hebraicae </i> [On the accentuation and spelling of Hebrew] (Haguenau, 1618) <br>
<b>Shelfmark:</b> <a href="http://idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk/permalink/f/1nnjft8/44CAM_ALMA21586141880003606"> K.14.13</a><br>
<b>Provenance:</b> Formerly owned by N. Cartwright](https://photos.smugmug.com/Exhibitions/Heavenly-Harmony/Sympathy-Occult-Gallery/i-qLc4xVM/0/9e5d62e7/Ti/_MG_4784-12-Ti.jpg)