Die Embryologie im Spannungsfeld zwischen Tradition und Empirie

Already in classical antiquity people dealt with the principle of formation, developing different theories. Researchers in the renaissance, working in the conflict zone between tradition and experience, tried to prove one or the other of these theories by the means of new observations, especially of chicken development. Aldrovandi was the first to see the real principle of formation of the hen's egg, i. e. the blastodisc, but he didn't recognize the importance of his discovery due to his close adherence to Aristotle in the theoretical field. Fabricius even thought that traditional knowledge was of more importance than his own excellent observations. Parisano was the first to succeed in making a correct interpretation of the function of the blastodisc, but only by holding to a ‘false’ classical theory. Harvey combined his attempt to restore the developmental theory of Aristotle with a religious interpretation postulating God's intervention in all development. Subsequent to atomism, Highmore evolved a two seed theory of development, which in his view made a permanent engagement of God superfluous. Also the first observations using the microscope did not contribute to any improvement in developmental theory. Malpighi used them to confirm the theory of epigenesis, whereas Croone attributed to a piece of blastoderm the proportion of a whole embryo to demonstrate his ovistic theory of preformation. The founder of animalculism Leeuwenhoek, an amateur researcher, was at first not influenced by the trends of the scientific community. He postulated that the spermatozoa, which he discovered, contained perfect miniature animals. His investigations are a good example of where prejudices can lead, even when the observations are excellent. In the 17th century the tension between experience and tradition shifted in favour of experience, but a final solution had not by any means been reached.     

Die Komnenen und die Kaiserkrone des westens

The opening decades of the thirteenth century witnessed the birth of historical writing in Old French prose, marking a decisive evolution in the historical tastes of the lay aristocracy, whose interest in the past had until then been satisfied by chanted verse histories and chansons de geste. The earliest products of the movement toward vernacular prose historiography were the first translations of the Pseudo-Turpin chronicle, of which no fewer than six independent versions were made within the confines of the French realm between 1200 and 1230. The translation of Pseudo-Turpin, and with it the creation of vernacular prose historiography, was the work of a small group of Franco-Flemish lords circulating in the orbit of the count of Flanders. This extreme chronological and geographical concentration suggests that vernacular historiography in general, and Pseudo-Turpin in particular, addressed itself with special urgency to the needs of the French aristocracy at a moment of crisis and that historiographical innovation was, at least in part, a response to changes taking place in the social and political conditions of noble life experienced at that moment. The substitution of prose for verse, and of history for legend, would seem to be the product of an ideological initiative on the part of the French aristocracy, whose social dominance in French society was being contested by the rise of royal power during the very period which witnessed the birth of vernacular prose historiography. By appropriating the inherent authority of Latin texts and by adapting prose for the historicization of aristocratic literary language, vernacular prose history emerges as a literature of fact, integrating on a literary level the historical experience and expressive language proper to the aristocracy. No longer the expression of a shared, collective image of the community's social past, vernacular prose history becomes instead a partisan record intended to serve the interests of a particular social group and inscribes, in the very nature of its linguistic code, a partisan and ideologically motivated assertion of the aristocracy's place and prestige in medieval society.     

Syntax des relativsatzes und pluralischer instrumental im avestischen

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Die historia francorum senonensis und der Aufstieg des Hauses Capet

In this inquiry the author confronts the historiographical view of the rise of the Capetians to power, as represented by the Historia Francorum Senonensis, with historical reality. He comes to the conclusion that the medieval historian, writing in the thirties of the eleventh century, sought by the selection, combination, interpretation, and presentation of his passages to propagate a view which had originated at the archbishop's court at Sens. The actual political motive was the dispute of Sens with Reins over coronation rights; it was this that explains the anti-Capetian tendency of the author's account of the dynastic change in 987. Moreover, it is possible to discern a political consciousness which was able to consider the West-Frankish/French monarchy as independent from dynastic considerations. We are thus dealing not with a historiographical statement of the Carolingian point of view, but with the reaction to a particular situation in ecclesiastical politics combined with a non-personal theory of the state.     

Die Pansophie des Comenius und der Baconismus der Royal Society

The specific comprehension of the subject of the modern times in the 17th century articulates itself in the pretension to be the master of the world of nature and human beings. This pretension, however, was not longer legitimated in a theological or biblical argumentation, but with the philosophical hint on a special qualification of the human being: knowledge and science. In this view, the philosophical reflections of Francis Bacon of Verulam, which were culminating in the well-known judgement of the coincidence of knowledge and power, became the very important philosophy of science of the most prominent academy of sciences in the 17th century: The Royal Society of London. This “Baconism” distincted himself strictly from all questions belonging to religion, politics, social or moral problems. This distinction was the reason for its opposition to the “Pansophie” of Johann Amos Comenius, whose main intention was the general reformation of the whole world, including a reform of science, religion and politics. The insistence of Comenius for the social responsibility of science is still up-to-date.     

Zur Faksimile-Ausgabe eines alten blockdruckes des Bka' gdams glegs bam

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Die verwendung des part. präs. als konditional im pali

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Zum sogenannten Nominativus Absolutus im Lateinischen: Neue Auslegungen zu einem alten Problem

Der vorliegende Aufsatz ist dem Gebrauch des sog. Nominativus Absolutus im Latein gewidmet. Es handelt sich dabei um ein partizipiales Syntagma im Nominativ, dessen grammatikalisches Subjekt anders als das des übergeordneten Satzes ist (z.B. Fulg. myth. 3,8 quam arborem pater gladio percutiens, Adon exinde natus est). Obwohl diese Konstruktion in zahlreichen, v.a. das Substandard- und Spätlatein betreffenden Studien Erwähnung fand, ist sie seit fast hundert Jahren keiner analytischen Besprechung unterzogen worden. Unsere Untersuchung verfolgt zwei mit einander eng verknüpfte Ziele: (a) zum einen sollen die kennzeichnenden Merkmale des Syntagmas besprochen werden, unter besonderer Berücksichtigung von pragmatischen, semantischen und syntaktischen Aspekten; (b) zum anderen soll dessen Evolution in Diachronie dargelegt werden, wobei eine allmählich ausgeprägtere Unabhängigkeit gegenüber der übergeordneten Prädikation nachgewiesen werden soll.     

Die Centrosophia des Athanasius Kircher SJ: Geometrisches Paradigma und geozentrisches Interesse

The main subject of the paper is to give an example of what could be called, in the history of philosophy and science, reinforcement of traditional topics or paradigms of explanation in order to give explanatory support to or to coooborate the defence of old or the solution of new problems. In the 17th century nearly all positions in the natural science are dependent from theological and philosophical (metaphysical) presuppositions, especially all positions which belong to types of the scientia universalis (Yves de Paris, S. Izquierdo, A. Kircher). To defend the finiteness of the world and the geocentric position of the earth, the Jesuit A. Kircher (1602–1680) returns to an old topic of cosmological speculation, to the geometria speculativa, in order to demonstrate the absolute perfect and finite structure of the world as an analogon of the absolute perfect and finite structure of the cercle or, better, the sphere (globe). He shows this in his Iter exstaticum (Rome 1656) and in his Mundus subterraneus (Amsterdam 1665). The paper discusses only a central part of the Mundus subterraneus titled ‘Centrosophia’: here we find all typical arguments for the phenomenon of reinforcement of old topics and paradigms. God is the center or the non-dimensional point (punctum) of the cosmic sphere (which is the sphere of all being) and he is in consequence the principle of all geometrical (ontological) parts of this figure. Kircher transmits the evidence of the perfect geometric relation between center and circumference modo analogico to the relation God (creator) and world. Together with this well known and often used analogy he develops a new theory: the theory of the dignity of the subterranean parts of the earth and the earth as earth, as the unic and ideologically exclusive place in all reality that gives mankind the fundament to develop its own implications. The high estimation of the earth sets free an unprejudiced view of what the subterranean area really is: Kircher thinks here in organologic categories — the subterranean world is an analogon of the world as such and this world is a great animal. Kircher develops in the limits of his traditional geocentric position an new non-traditional theory of the inner side of the world.     

Zwischen investitur und testament beobachtungen zur rezeption des josuabuches im liber antiquitatum biblicarum

Bible scholars feel the sexual heat of Jael's assassination of Sisera but deny the fire. Victor Matthews says these verses are about hospitality, not sex. Mieke Bal says they are about maternity, not sex. Yair Zakovitch says they used to be about sex, but the sex has been censored out. My close reading evidences that the Jael-Sisera episode is indeed about sex—about a woman's sexual dominance over a man. Using more of the text than other explications, this understanding reveals the bawdy ridicule of Sisera and resolves the difficulties that adhere to previous analyses. Arguing the synchronicity of Judges 4 and 5, it illuminates these chapters' correspondence and agreement, their identical style of ironic humor, and their unifying linguistic craftsmanship.     

Überlieferungs- und Verständnisprobleme im medizinischen Latein des frühen Mittelalters

In most instances, knowledge is passed on through the medium of language. The author tries to demonstrate to what extent the Latin present in early medieval Latin medical treatises failed to fulfill its role as an efficient medium of communication, which factors may account for this failure and how scholars in the middle ages strove to restore sense in texts in various stages of corruption, an attempt that was bound to be unsuccessful in many cases owing to a lack of reliable dictionaries.