Hernández Pérez, Azucena, Astrolabios en al-Andalus y los reinos medievales hispanos, Madrid, La Ergástula, 2018, 244 pp., and Catálogo razonado de los astrolabios de la España medieval, Madrid, La Ergástula, 2018, 405 pp (original) (raw)
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Medieval Encounters, 2017
This article analyses the relationship between text and image in one of the most important scientific manuscripts commissioned by Alfonso X the Learned, El Libro del Saber de Astrología (Ms. 156 BH Complutense University, Madrid). The main topic deals with the depiction of astrolabes in the four treatises devoted to this instrument in the codex, and the connexion established between the real astrolabes, the depicted ones, and the written sources used by the Alfonsine team.
Academia, 2024
The critical study of 50 astrolabes from Muslim and Christian Spain published by Azucena Hernández Pérez in 2018 is here supplemented by a few 'new' examples. We draw attention to that monumental publication, at once a work of art history and history of science, and demonstrate the need for continued research on these primary sources by historians of science, of course, but also by art historians. Each item of the corpus is a historical 'document' for those who understand the language of instruments, and each one a scientific work of art.
Astrolabes in Medieval Cultures
2019
Co-Editors: Josefina Rodríguez-Arribas, Charles Burnett, Silke Ackermann and Ryan Szpiech First published as a special issue of the journal Medieval Encounters (vol. 23, 2017), this volume brings together fifteen studies on various aspects of the astrolabe in medieval cultures. Contributors are Silke Ackermann, Emilia Calvo, John Davis, Laura Fernández Fernández, Miquel Forcada, Azucena Hernández, David A. King, Taro Mimura, Günther Oestmann, Josefina Rodríguez-Arribas, Sreeramula Rajeswara Sarma, Petra G. Schmidl, Giorgio Strano, Flora Vafea, and Johannes Thomann.
Artistic and Cultural Dialogues in the Late Medieval Mediterranean, 2021
An exploration of the cross references, the travel back and forth of ideas, innovations and traditions generated at both sides of the Islamic Mediterranean Sea during the Middle Ages is addressed herein, from the double perspective of art and science. The study focusses on the relations between the extant Almohad astrolabes manufactured in Seville, the Nasrid ones made in Granada, and those made in Egypt and Syria under the Ayyubid rule. Attention is also given to the important invention, in al-Andalus, of the Universal Astrolabe, a challenge for the Islamic astronomers since the 8th century, resolved by means of a set of different instruments, all of them designed to be used everywhere, irrespective of the latitude, as desired. Universal instruments, in general, and universal astrolabes in particular are those that aim at providing their functions for all terrestrial latitudes, disassociating the use of the instrument from the geographical position of the user. The universal astrolabes themselves as much as the ideas behind their invention moved through the Mediterranean basin during the Middle Ages, together with other transfers and exchanges of cultural goods. They qualify to be considered a relevant part of the cultural legacy of al-Andalus and exponent of the interaction of this Western Islamic society with both Islamic and non-Islamic medieval societies elsewhere.
The successful symbiosis of art and science accomplished by the astrolabes made them play a remarkable transcultural role across the communities living along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea in the Middle Ages. The astrolabe, a two-dimensional model of the Universe, caught the attention of royalty and the religious elites as a sumptuary object, expression of wisdom and symbol of prestige. The commercial and political relationships between al-Andalus and the Middle East across the Mediterranean Sea involved also the scientific instruments and, in particular, the astrolabe, a device that combined its functionalities connected to astronomy, geometry and time reckoning with aesthetic features. The study addresses the cross references, the travel back and forth of ideas, the innovations and traditions generated at both sides of the Islamic Mediterranean Sea during the Middle Ages. The issue is approached from the double perspective of art and science, looking at the astrolabe as a material object, which contributed to shaping the visual culture of astronomy.
IBERIAN APPROACHES TO ASTRONOMY DURING THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
2018
The aim of this work is to describe different kinds of astronomical and astrological works written in the sixteenth century, with special emphasis on Portuguese and Spanish texts. This period is especially relevant in the development of astronomical culture in Portugal and Spain, since this was the age of the great overseas explorations, when astronomical navigation became of fundamental importance. The astronomical culture of that time involved ancient and new concepts, and old revisited narratives about the cosmos and its influence in many facets of the sublunary world. The present research describes the influence and transformation of the classical and medieval astronomical culture in the specific context of sixteenth century Iberian texts. There were different publics involved in the production and study of those works, such as navigators, priests, physicians, farmers, astrologers and scholars. Those different aspects of astronomical and astrological knowledge were not distinct, there was a significant overlap between them; and the educated public required some broad acquaintance with those several approaches. Some popular treatises, called Chronographia, or Reportorio dos tempos, provided astronomical and astrological information required by the general public. This overview of those sources can contribute to a better and more comprehensive understanding of the astronomical culture in that period.
The successful symbiosis of art and science accomplished by the astrolabes enabled them to play a remarkable transcultural role between al-Andalus and the medieval Christian Kingdoms in the Iberian Peninsula and Western Europe. The astrolabe, a two-dimensional model of the Universe, caught the attention of royalty and religious elites, at both sides of a blurred and permeable border as a sumptuary object, expression of wisdom and symbol of prestige. This study addresses astrolabes made in al-Andalus from the 10th to the 15th centuries, highlighting the “crossroad role” played by these instruments between the Oriental Islamic territories and the Medieval Occidental Kingdoms along the Mediterranean Sea. Special attention will be given to the production of astrolabes in al-Andalus during the 11th century, focussing on the one signed by Muḥammad ibn Sa’īd al-Sahlī in Valencia in 483 H /1090-1091. Unusual inscriptions in Cufic script were engraved in the space devoted to the unequal hours in its five plates, designating the odd hours as male and the even hours as female. These inscriptions seem not to belong to the original manufacturing phase of the astrolabe, because the script is rather different from that in the other pieces. A similar approach regarding the male/female designation of time divisions has been found in the book The Tree of Science written in 1296 by Ramon Llull, one of the more important philosophers, scientist and writer of the Medieval Crown of Aragon in Spain. The male/female designations established by Llull associate action and daytime to male nature and passion and night-time to female nature.This case could be considered as yet another of the cross references and exchanges found between al-Andalus and the Mediterranean oriental and occidental territories.
Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry, 2018
The aim of this work is to describe different kinds of astronomical and astrological works written in the sixteenth century, with special emphasis on Portuguese and Spanish texts. This period is especially relevant in the development of astronomical culture in Portugal and Spain, since this was the age of the great overseas explorations, when astronomical navigation became of fundamental importance. The astronomical culture of that time involved ancient and new concepts, and old revisited narratives about the cosmos and its influence in many facets of the sublunary world. The present research describes the influence and transformation of the classical and medieval astronomical culture in the specific context of sixteenth century Iberian texts. There were different publics involved in the production and study of those works, such as navigators, priests, physicians, farmers, astrologers and scholars. Those different aspects of astronomical and astrological knowledge were not distinct, there was a significant overlap between them; and the educated public required some broad acquaintance with those several approaches. Some popular treatises, called Chronographia, or Reportorio dos tempos, provided astronomical and astrological information required by the general public. This overview of those sources can contribute to a better and more comprehensive understanding of the astronomical culture in that period.