Calendrical Astronomy in the Twelfth Century

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Philipp E. Nothaft
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Calendar Reform ◽  
Detailed Picture ◽  
Influential Theory ◽  
Reform Debate

This chapter employs a range of previously untapped sources to paint a detailed picture of how the so-called Renaissance of the Twelfth Century reshaped computistical literature and spawned the first blossoming of a calendar-reform debate in the Latin Christian world. Major points of discussion are the introduction of astronomical tables as instruments for analysing calendrical error, the discovery of the lunar calendars used by Muslims and Jews as potential alternatives to the Church’s own 19-year cycle, and the adoption of a new understanding of the nature of the solar year, in particular the influential theory of the ‘access and recess of the eighth sphere’ and its prediction of a variable tropical year.

The Consolidation of a Calendar-Reform Debate in the Thirteenth Century

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Philipp E. Nothaft
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Calendar Reform ◽  
Reform Debate

This chapter follows the story of calendar reform from the end of the twelfth to the end of the thirteenth century, showing how during this period the problem was popularized via two different categories of computus text: the pedagogically oriented ‘vulgar’ or ecclesiastical computus and the astronomically refined ‘philosophical’ computus. Authors whose contributions to the debate are looked at in greater detail include Alexander Neckam, John of Sacrobosco, Robert Grosseteste, Robert Holcot, Campanus of Novara, Giles of Lessines, and Roger Bacon, who is well known for having directed a reform appeal to Pope Clement IV (1265–8). Attention is also paid to an obscure group of Franciscan scholars active in the 1270s to 1290s, who are noteworthy for their knowledge of the Jewish calendar, and to an anonymous treatise of 1276, which contains the first fully developed proposal to restore the Roman calendar.

Astronomers and the Calendar, 1290–1500

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Philipp E. Nothaft
Keyword(s):  
Central Feature ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Mathematical Astronomy ◽  
Calendar Reform ◽  
Key Questions ◽  
Reform Debate

This chapter identifies three important developments in the field of late medieval computational astronomy and discusses their influence on the calendar-reform debate. First on is the evolution of astronomically ‘enhanced’ calendars and related lunar tables or almanacs, whose dissemination in a variety of forms and different languages became a central feature of astronomical culture between 1290 and 1500. Next in line are some new departures in observational and mathematical astronomy in the 1290s, which led Latin Christian authors to reconsider key questions such as the length and long-term variability of the solar year. Finally, there is the introduction of the Alfonsine Tables in 1320s Paris, which laid the basis for the gradual formation of a European-wide standard for computational astronomy, but also fostered continuing doubts about the accuracy of individual parameters and the Alfonsine theory of precession.

Utopia’s Moorish Inspiration: Thomas More’s Reading of Ibn Ṭufayl

2018 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Regnier
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
The Self ◽  
Latin Translation ◽  
Thomas More ◽  
Philosophical Novel ◽  
Ibn Tufayl

A promising but neglected precedent for Thomas More’s Utopia is to be found in Ibn Ṭufayl’s Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān. This twelfth-century Andalusian philosophical novel describing the self-education and enlightenment of a feral child on an island, while certainly a precedent for the European Bildungsroman, also arguably qualifies as a utopian text. It is possible that More had access to Pico de la Mirandola’s Latin translation of Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān. This study consists of a review of historical and philological evidence that More may have read Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān and a comparative reading of More’s and Ṭufayl’s two famous works. I argue that there are good reasons to see in Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān a source for More’s Utopia and that in certain respects we can read More’s Utopia as a response to Ṭufayl’s novel. L’Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān d’Ibn Ṭufayl consiste en un précédent incontournable mais négligé à l’Utopie de More. Ce récit philosophique andalou du douzième siècle décrivant l’auto-formation et l’éveil d’un enfant sauvage sur une île peut être considéré comme un texte utopique, bien qu’il soit certainement un précédent pour le Bildungsroman européen. Thomas More pourrait avoir lu l’Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān, puisqu’il a pu avoir accès à la traduction latine qu’en a fait Pic de la Miradolle. Cette étude examine les données historiques et philologiques permettant de poser que More a probablement lu cet ouvrage, et propose une lecture comparée de l’Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān et de l’Utopie de More. On y avance qu’il y a non seulement de bonnes raisons de considérer l’Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān d’Ibn Ṭufayl comme une source de l’Utopie de More, mais qu’il est aussi possible à certains égards de lire l’Utopie comme une réponse à l’Ibn Ḥayy Yaqẓān.

Unseen Laws- A Quantitative Approach to Developments in North Korea’s Legal System

2018 ◽  
pp. 22-62
Author(s):  
Martin Weiser
Keyword(s):  
North Korea ◽  
Legal Rules ◽  
The North ◽  
Legal Texts ◽  
Policy Fields ◽  
Policy Agendas ◽  
Broad Policy ◽  
Sophisticated Analysis ◽  
Detailed Picture ◽  
Law Making

The position of law in North Korean politics and society has been a long concern of scholars as well as politicians and activists. Some argue it would be more important to understand the extra-legal rules that run North Korea like the Ten Principles on the leadership cult as they supersede any formal laws or the constitution.1 But the actual legal developments in North Korea, which eventually also mediate those leading principles and might even limit their reach, has so far been insufficiently explored. It is easy to point to North Korean secrecy as a main reason for this lacuna. But the numerous available materials and references on North Korean legislation available today have, however, not been fully explored yet, which has severely impeded progress in the field. Even publications officially released by North Korea to foreigners offer surprisingly detailed information on legal changes and the evolution of the law-making institutions. This larger picture of legal developments already draws a more detailed picture of the institutional developments in North Korean law and the broad policy fields that had been regulated from early on in contrast to the often-assumed absence of legislation in important fields like copyright, civil law or investment. It also shows that different to a monolithic system, various law-making institutions exist and fulfil discernably different legal responsibilities. Next to this limitation in content, scholars in the field currently also have not used all approaches legal developments in the North Korea could be analysed and interpreted with. Going beyond the reading of legal texts or speculating about known titles of still unavailable legislation, quantitative approaches can be applied ranging from the simple counting of laws to more sophisticated analysis of legislative numbering often provided with legislation. Understanding the various institutions as flexible in their roles and hence adoptable to shifts in leadership and policy agendas can also provide a more realistic picture of legal practices in North Korea.

Cowal part of Strathclyde in the early twelfth century

2003 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 230-233
Author(s):  
John Durkan
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century
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