Bibliographical history of electricity & magnetism : chronologically arranged / Researches into the domain of the early sciences, especially from the period of the revival of scholasticism, with biographical and other accounts of the most distinguished natural philosophers throughout the middle ages, comp. by Paul Fleury Mottelay ; with introduction by the late Prof. Silvanus P. Thompson and foreword by Sir R.T. Glazebrook.

  • Paul Fleury Mottelay
Date:
1922
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Bibliographical history of electricity & magnetism : chronologically arranged / Researches into the domain of the early sciences, especially from the period of the revival of scholasticism, with biographical and other accounts of the most distinguished natural philosophers throughout the middle ages, comp. by Paul Fleury Mottelay ; with introduction by the late Prof. Silvanus P. Thompson and foreword by Sir R.T. Glazebrook. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    “HistoriaeHierosolimitanae,”1 cap. 89 and 91: “ The Magnet [diamant, as shown under the b.c. 321 date] is found in the Indies. . . . It attracts iron through a secret virtue; after a needle has touched the loadstone, it always turns toward the North Star, which latter is as the world’s axis and is immobile, while the other stars turn around it; that is why the compass is so useful to navigators, valde necessarius navigantibus. ’ ’ References.—Azuni, “ Boussole,” p. 140; Venanson, Boussole,” p. 77; Klaproth, pp. 14, 43-44 ; Poggendorff, Vol. II. p. 1184 ; Becquerel, “ Elec, et Magic,” Vol. I. p. 70; Knight, “ Mech. Diet.,” Vol. II. p. 1397. A.D. 1207.—Neckam (Alexander of), 1157-1217, Abbot of St. Mary’s, alludes in his “ De Utensilibus ” to a needle carried on board ship, which, being placed upon a pivot and allowed to take its own position of repose, “ showed mariners their course when the Polar Star is hidden.” In another work, “ De Naturis Rerum ” (lib. ii. cap. 89), he writes: “ Mariners at sea, when, through cloudy weather in the day, which hides the sun, or through the darkness of the night, they lose the knowledge of the quarter of the world to which they are sailing, touch a needle with a magnet which will turn around until, on its own motion ceasing, its point will be directed toward the North (Chappell, “Nature,” No. 346, June 15, 1876; Thomas Wright, “ Chronicles and Memoirs . . . Middle Ages,” 1863). References.—“La Grande Encyclopedie,” Vol. XXIV. p. 898; Hcefer, “ Nouv. Biogr. Generale,” Vol. XXXVII. p. 570. A.D. 1235-1315.—Lully (Raymond) of Majorca (often con¬ founded with Ramond Lull, who is the author of several alchemical books and of whose biography very little is known), was, by turns, a soldier, a poet, a monk, a knight, a missionary and a martyr, and is referred to by Humboldt as “ the singularly ingenious and eccen¬ tric man, whose doctrines excited the enthusiasm of Giordano Bruno when a boy, and who was at once a philosophical systematizer and an analytical chemist, a skilful mariner and a successful propagator of Christianity.” During the year 1272 Lully published his “ De Contemplatione,” which was followed by “ Fenix de las maravillas del orbe ” in 1286, and by his “ Arte de Naveguar ” in 1295. In these he states that the seamen of his time employed instruments of measurement, sea charts and the magnetic needle (tenian, los mareantes, instrument, carta, compas y aguja), and he describes the improvements made in 1 The “ Historiae Hierosolimitanae ” relates all that passed in the king¬ dom of Jerusalem from 1177 to the siege of Ptolemais inclusively (“ History of the Crusades,” Joseph Francis Michaud, translated by W. Robson, Vol. L p. 456)-