This week’s guest blogger is Hannah DeWitt, from the University of Edinburgh, School of Languages, Literatures and Cultures.

Francesco Barozzi, Admirandvm Illud Geometricum, (Venice:  Apud Gratiosum Perchacinum, sumptibus Io. Baptistæ Fantini Patauini, [1586]  (Edinburgh University Library *O.21.3 and *O.21.4)

 

This week’s look at Venetian Images encounters mathematical figures that have remarkable continuity with modern textbooks.

This text, Admirandum Illud Geometricum, was written by the influential Italian mathematician and astronomer Francesco Barozzi (1537-1604). Barozzi was born in Crete. He studied at the University of Padua and later lectured at the university. He is known for his efforts revive science and maths through re-examining the work of ancient mathematicians and philosophers. His work includes new interpretations and applications of ancient theories, particularly those of Euclid. Previous to Admirandum Illud Geometricum, Barozzi translated and added commentary to Euclid’s Elements in Procli Diadochi (1560). He also translated texts by Archimedes and Hero.

Barozzi led a tumultuous private life. At university, he was accused of taking someone’s hair without consent, an act that has been suggested to be linked with occult practices. Later in his life he was convicted by the Inquisition of an unknown charge. He was accused and tried for causing a terrible rainstorm in Crete. Eventually he was convicted and fined for sorcery. His translations of Nostradamus and interest in predictions contributed to his reputation for engaging in occult practices and his final conviction essentially ended his academic career.

Admirandum Illud Geometricum is an exhaustive instructional text detailing thirteen different methods for producing parallel lines on a plane. While Barozzi more typically worked on translation or commentary, this work is original, though it does frequently reference ancient mathematicians and classical theories.

While the more interesting images are the mathematical figures, the title page printer’s device belonging to Gratioso Perchacino of Venice is worth mentioning. This woodcut of a winged serpent on a pole is most immediately associated with the caduceus, the staff of Hermes with two snakes and wings that is commonly misused to represent medical practices. The staff of Asclepius, the god of medicine, is meant to have one snake and no wings it the symbol which is appropriately meant to represent medicine. But as in the Barozzi image, it is often mixed with characteristics of the caduceus. Included in the device is “SALVS VITÆ” or “The Help of Life.” This phrase is frequently associated with the Roman goddess, Salus, the goddess of health and well-being.

.

The most impressive images in the book are full page renderings of mathematical compasses. These are simple images with enough detail and exacting scale to elicit a startling recognition of similarities between and lack of change in the depicted compasses the modern versions of the same tool. It is also very likely that the exact dimensions of the woodcuts themselves were created by tracing the figures with similar tools.

 

All other images in the text are mathematical diagrams. Some of the figures appear more than once, with identical figures appearing up to four times. The image below appears three times, but is made by two seperate woodcut blocks.  It appears on two sides of one leaf and again on a leaf printed separately. In order to duplicate the images this way, the printing block would have needed to be painstakingly carved a second time. This suggests that the printer expected to print the images at least twice on the same side of the same sheet, but it wasn’t necessary. This effort emphasises the importance the author attributed to having the image visible for each point made about the diagram.This process is duplicated throughout the text, but the difference in these particular images is made obvious through an error. The first and third image were printed using a block with an error, a backwards ‘K,’while the second image is identical in scale and precise measurement, but has a correctly facing ‘K.’

 

A second set of figures has a similar error. The three images appear on the same sheet in this instance, making the use of two blocks necessary. In these figures, a ‘N’ is inverted.

 

While a majority of the images had the lettering carved into the woodcut, a few used type. This can be seen in diagrams labeling the names of the shape.

 

As the text progresses, the complicity of the figures and lessons increase. These more complex shapes frequently build on a simpler figure. In order to achieve the precision of these diagrams, the first image would have needed to be traced or carefully measured and redrawn before adding the new elements of the second, more complex printing block.

 

The variety and replication of the diagrams attest to Barozzi’s particular dedication to images as part of his teaching method.

 

Two copies of this edition of the book are owned by the University of Edinburgh. One is bound in a light vellum binding and the other in a dark, ornate leather binding. The first copy (*O.21.3) bears no indication of ownership previous to the university. It has an 18th century Edinburgh shelfmark suggesting that it arrived in the second half of the century.

The second copy (*O.21.4) is more expensively bound and is stamped with a gilded owner’s stamp belonging to Sir John Rivers, 1^st Baronet, who died in 1651.  Rivers’ books, with this memorable stamp are scattered among a number of libraries in the U.K. and U.S.A.  The signature of a second owner, C Hutton 1785, can be found on a flyleaf. Hutton was Professor of Mathematics at the Royal Military Academy in Woolwich, and would have had an obvious interest in .

The precision and frequent duplication of images are unique to the care Barozzi shows in having this text printed. His dedication to what he believed was the superiority of mathematical certainty is evident in the attention to detail and effort placed in producing his diagrams.

 

Hannah DeWitt

University of Edinburgh

For references and further reading:

https://www.maa.org/press/periodicals/convergence/mathematical-treasures-francesco-barozzis-procli-diadochi

http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Barocius.html

https://www.encyclopedia.com/science/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/barocius-franciscus

http://data.cervantesvirtual.com/manifestation/289947

https://www.british-history.ac.uk/no-series/court-of-chivalry/559-rivers-bowton

http://emlo-portal.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/collections/?catalogue=charles-hutton

Time has passed, so inevitably we have said goodbye to some and hello to others on the Research Data Support team. Amongst other changes, all of us are now based together in Library & University Collections – organisationally, that is, while remaining located in Argyle House with the rest of the Research Data Service providers such as IT Infrastructure. (For an interview with the newest team member there, David Fergusson, Head of Research Services, see this month’s issue of BITS.)

So two teams have come together under Research Data Support as part of Library Research Support, headed by Dominic Tate in L&UC. Those of us leaving EDINA and Data Library look back on a rich legacy dating back to the early 1980s when the Data Library was set up as a specialist function within computing services. We are happy to become ‘mainstreamed’ within the Library going forward, as research data support becomes an essential function of academic librarianship all over the world*. Of course we will continue to collaborate with EDINA for software engineering requirements and new projects.

Introducing –

Jennifer Daub has worked in a range of research roles, from lab-based parasite genomics at the University of Edinburgh to bioinformatics at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute. Prior to joining the team, Jennifer provided data management support to users of clinical trials management software across the UK and is experienced managing sensitive data.

As Research Data Service Assistant, Jennifer has joined veterans Pauline Ward and Bob Sanders in assisting users with DataShare and Data Library as well as the newer DataVault and Data Safe Haven functions, and additionally providing general support and training along with the rest of the team.

Catherine Clarissa is doing her PhD in Nursing Studies at the University of Edinburgh. Her study is looking at patients’ and staff experiences of early mobilisation during the course of mechanical ventilation in an Intensive Care Unit. She has good knowledge of good practice in Research Data Management that has been expanded by taking training from the University and by developing a Data Management Plan for her own research.

As Project Officer she is working closely with project manager Pauline Ward on the Video Case Studies project, funded by the IS Innovation Fund over the next few months. We have invited her to post to the blog about the project soon!

Last but not least, Martin Donnelly will be joining us from the Digital Curation Centre, where he has spent the last decade helping research institutions raise their data management capabilities via a mixture of paid consultancy and pro bono assistance. He has a longstanding involvement in data management planning and policy, and interests in training, advocacy, holistic approaches to managing research outputs, and arts and humanities data.

Before joining Edinburgh in 2008, Martin worked at the University of Glasgow, where he was involved in European cultural heritage and digital preservation projects, and the pre-merger Edinburgh College of Art where he coordinated quality and accreditation processes. He has acted as an expert reviewer for European Commission data management plans on multiple occasions, and is a Fellow of the Software Sustainability Institute.

We look forward to Martin joining the team next month, where he will take responsibility as Research Data Support Manager, providing expertise and line management support to the team as well as senior level support to the service owner, Robin Rice, and to the Data Safe Haven Manager, Cuna Ekmekcioglu – who recently shifted her role from lead on training and outreach. Kerry Miller, Research Data Support Officer, is actively picking up her duties and making new contacts throughout the university to find new avenues for the team’s outreach and training delivery.

*The past and present rise of data librarianship within academic libraries is traced in the first chapter of The Data Librarian’s Handbook, by Robin Rice and John Southall.

Robin Rice
Data Librarian and Head, Research Data Support
Library & University Collections

The previous post on Scotland’s food and drink highlights the fact that what people ate was very much dependent on what people could grow, according to climate, topography and soil type.

In Kilbride, County of Bute, “the soil is hard and stony. Most of the farms lying on the declivity of hills, the best prepared land scarce yields two returns. To supply the deficiency of corn, the inhabitants plant great quantities of potatoes, which are their principal food for 9 months in the year.” (OSA, Vol. VIII, 1793, p. 578)

In contrast, the soil in the parish of North Berwick, County of Haddington, was “, in general, rich, fertile, and well cultivated, producing large crops of all the different grains sown in Scotland, as wheat, barley, oats, pease and beans. No hemp is raised, and the quantity of flax is inconsiderable, being only for private use. Turnips are cultivated, but not to a great extent, as the farmers reckon the ground to be in general too strong and wet for that useful plant, and on that account commonly prefer sowing wheat upon their fallows. Potatoes are raised in considerable quantities, and, during the winter, form a principal part of the food of the poorer classes of the people.” (OSA, Vol. V, 1793, p. 441)

You can really sense from reading the parish reports that there was a real understanding of what crops could be successfully cultivated and how best to grow them. For example, in Ferry Port-on-Craig, County of Fife:

“The crops that are best adapted for the clay, to produce the greatest profit, are, wheat, beans, barley, grass, and oats. Flax is sown to very good advantage; but, on the whole, it is rather an uncertain crop; it likewise produces potatoes, but the quality is generally not so good as in light soils. The strong loam stands on a whin rock; and, where there is sufficiency of soil, it produces wheat, oats, beans, barley, grass and potatoes, in great perfection. Flax is sometimes sown on this soil, but seldom proves a good crop.” (OSA, Vol. VIII, 1793, p. 458)

In the parish report for Kinloch, County of Perth, several varieties of potatoes cultivated in that parish are mentioned, including the London Lady, the red-nosed-white kidney potato and the dark red Lancashire potato. Some advice is even given on “the best method of preventing potatoes from degenerating, and of rendering them more prolific”. (OSA, Vol. XVII, 1796, p. 472)

It seems that the widest range of produce was grown in the north of Scotland. In Unst, County of Shetland, the list of what was cultivated is very impressive:

“Black oats, bear, potatoes, cabbages, and various garden roots, and greens which grow in great perfection, are the most common vegetables in this island. Artichokes, too, of a delicate taste, are produced here, with some small fruit, and most of the garden flowers that grow in the north of Scotland. There is little or no sown grass, but the meadows are rich in red and white clover, and in the seasons of vegetation, are enameled with a beautiful profusion of wild flowers. The pasture grounds, in the commons, are generally covered with a short, tender, flowering heath. Some curious and rare plants have been discovered in this island by some gentlemen skilled in botany. The common people gather scurvy grass, trefoil, and some other plants that grow in the island, for their medicinal qualities. The roots of the tormentil are used in tanning bides.” (OSA, Vol. V, 1793, p. 186)

Reay, County of Caithness, was another parish which produced “an abundance of all provisions necessary for the use of the inhabitants. The exports are in general bear, oatmeal, beef, mutton, pork, geese, hens, butter, cheese, tallow, malt, whiskey, to the market of Thurso; black cattle, sold to drovers from the south; horse colts, sent to Orkney; lambs, to the lowlands; geese, sometimes to Sutherland and Ross; as also hides, skins, goose-quills, and other feathers.” (OSA, Vol. VII, 1793, p. 575)

This knowledge extended to the preservation and transportation of food. One “adventurer” from the parish of Dyke and Moy, County of Elgin, “cured a quantity [of cod] in barrels, like salted salmon, carried them to London, and made no loss by the adventure, though they sold heavily, and must have been but unpleasant food. But had these cod been parboiled, and cured with vinegar at the boil-house, like kitted salmon, it is believed, such soused fish would have excelled the salted, as much as the kitted salmon exceeds the salted, in quality and price.” (OSA, Vol. XX, 1798, p. 209)

Selling of produce

In most cases, what was cultivated or reared by farmers was then sold in the large towns and cities. In the parish of New Machar, County of Aberdeen, its proximity to the city of Aberdeen was seen as a big advantage, as there was “a constant demand, ready market, and a reasonable price for every article which the farms produce.” However, it was also seen as a disadvantage, as it “renders every article sold within the parish, very high priced to those who must buy; and that the country people are so much in the way of attending the weekly market, that they generally lose one day in the week, in order to dispose of an article, which when sold, will scarcely bring them 1 s. 6 d. never considering the loss of time and labour”. (OSA, Vol. VI, 1793, p. 469)

It was not only cities that had to buy food produced elsewhere. In Lochbroom, County of Ross and Cromarty, “with regard to their food, fish and potatoes constitute the principal part. For most years the produce of the soil does not afford them a sufficient supply of meal, and they usually buy a considerable quantity, and that often at a very high rate, from vessels which are sent by meal-mongers to the country.” (OSA, Vol. X, 1794, p. 470)

As a result of growing and raising such produce, farmers themselves began to become more wealthy, as pointed out in the parish report for Cambuslang, County of Lanark:

“The farmer, as well as the merchant, came by degrees to relish the conveniences, and even the luxuries of life; a remarkable change took place in his lodging, clothing, and manner of living. The difference in the state of the country, in the value of land and mode of cultivation, in the price of provisions and the wages of labour, in food and clothing, between the years 1750 and 1790, deserves to be particularly recorded.” (OSA, Vol. V, 1793, p. 251)

However, not all farmers were so hard-working and successful! In a survey, carried out in 1778, it was found that the inhabitants of Auchterarder, County of Perth, were “idle and poor farmers not thinking it necessary to thin their turnip while small, allowing them to grow until they be the size of large kale plants, and then it is thought a great loss to take them up, unless in small quantities, to give to the cow. A few tenants excepted, no family had oat-meal in their houses, nor could they get any. The oat nothing better than bear-meal and a few greens boiled together at mid-day, for dinner, and bear-meal pottage evening and morning.” (NSA, Vol. X, 1845, p. 288)

Vocabulary

In an interesting aside, the peasantry in the parish Cross and Burness, County of Orkney, used “a good many words […] peculiar to the north isles, and some of them are evidently of Scandinavian origin.” Many of these words were farming and food-related. Here are the first few words given:

“Abin, (v.) to thrash half a sheaf for giving horses. –Abir, (n.) a sheaf so thrashed. –Acamy, (adj.) diminutive. –Bal, (v.) to throw at-Been-hook, (n.) part of the rent paid by a cottar for his land is work all harvest; but besides his own labour, he must bring out his wife three days, for which she receives nothing but her food. All the women on a farm are called out at the same time; they work together, and are called been hooks, and the days on which they work been-hook days. –Bull, (n.) one of the divisions or stalls of a stable. –Buily, (n.) a feast. –Buist, (n.) a small box. –Builte, or Buito, (n.) a piece of flannel or home-made cloth, worn by women over the head and shoulders. –Brammo, (n.) a mess of oatmeal and water. –Bret, (v.) to strut. –Brodend, (adj.) habituated to. –Burstin, (n.) meal made of corn parched in a pot or “hellio”…” (NSA, Vol. XV, 1845, p. 95)

(Look out for our posts on Scotland and its languages coming soon!)

Conclusion

It is clear that Scots in the countryside ate what they themselves produced, which was dependent on the climate, topography – and not forgetting knowledge and hard-work! Those in cities, such as Glasgow and Aberdeen, were able to buy this produce in markets. Increased knowledge, new technologies and the exporting of goods from other countries had seen the situation change for the better over the years.

In the next post on Scotland’s food and drink we will look at times of food scarcity, the provision of food as part-payment and the link between food and health as seen by those in the late-eighteenth/early-nineteenth  centuries.