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Saturn and MelancholyStudies in the History of Natural Philosophy, Religion, and Art |
eBook Available
An augmented edition of the famed Warburgian interdisciplinary study on saturnine melancholy.
Saturn and Melancholy remains an iconic text in art history, intellectual history, and the study of culture, despite being long out of print in English. Rooted in the tradition established by Aby Warburg and the Warburg Library, this book has deeply influenced understandings of the interrelations between the humanities disciplines since its first publication in English in 1964.
This new edition makes the original English text available for the first time in decades. Saturn and Melancholy offers an unparalleled inquiry into the origin and development of the philosophical and medical theories on which the ancient conception of the temperaments was based and discusses their connections to astrological and religious ideas. It also traces representations of melancholy in literature and the arts up to the sixteenth century, culminating in a landmark analysis of Dürer's most famous engraving, Melencolia I. This edition features Raymond Klibansky's additional introduction and bibliographical amendments for the German edition, as well as translations of source material and 155 original illustrations. An essay on the complex publication history of this pathbreaking project - which almost did not see the light of day - covers more than eighty years, including its more recent heritage.
Making new a classic book that has been out of print for over four decades, this expanded edition presents fresh insights about Saturn and Melancholy and its legacy as a precursor to modern interdisciplinary studies.
This new edition makes the original English text available for the first time in decades. Saturn and Melancholy offers an unparalleled inquiry into the origin and development of the philosophical and medical theories on which the ancient conception of the temperaments was based and discusses their connections to astrological and religious ideas. It also traces representations of melancholy in literature and the arts up to the sixteenth century, culminating in a landmark analysis of Dürer's most famous engraving, Melencolia I. This edition features Raymond Klibansky's additional introduction and bibliographical amendments for the German edition, as well as translations of source material and 155 original illustrations. An essay on the complex publication history of this pathbreaking project - which almost did not see the light of day - covers more than eighty years, including its more recent heritage.
Making new a classic book that has been out of print for over four decades, this expanded edition presents fresh insights about Saturn and Melancholy and its legacy as a precursor to modern interdisciplinary studies.
Details
632 Pages, 7 x 10.75
155 images
ISBN 9780773559493
November 2019
Formats: Cloth, eBook
“The majestic Saturn and Melancholy represents a unique interdisciplinary collaboration among three leading humanists of the twentieth century. One of the most venerable and momentous books ever written in the field of Renaissance studies, this new edition is a cause for celebration by scholars and interested readers alike.” Laurinda Dixon, Syracuse University
“The reissue of Saturn and Melancholy is a major event that scholars worldwide have long been waiting for: almost as great an achievement as its original publication.” Davide Stimilli, University of Colorado Boulder
“I do not believe that the Warburgian spirit has ever been better illustrated.” Robert Klein, Mercure de France
"A fascinating look at how humans have always looked to categorize humanity and make sense of their own fate by means that might seem arbitrary but contain great poetry and rich metaphor." Spectrum Culture
"This classic of collaborative scholarship, long out of print, has been reissued with supplementary materials, including updated bibliographies and translations of its Latin quotations. More than six hundred pages in its newest version, a trove of cosmological, physiological, and psychological learning and lore, the book comes to us as a precious gift because it reflects on a question seldom posed today: not that of art's destination - its uses and purposes - but rather of art's origin." Artforum
"With epigrammatic fervor, T.S. Eliot once defined a "living tradition" as "the good New growing naturally out of the good Old." Noble as the sentiment is, one of the most important lessons to have emerged from the Warburg Institute's work over the years is the degree to which the amorphous mass of ideas and sentiments that we call a "tradition" are dependent on the physical transmission of texts. There is no cultural tradition without copies, reprints, ultimately, the availability of sources. We now have this first-rate new edition to thank for the promise that work of this kind may continue into the future, under the sign of Saturn." Los Angeles Review of Books
“Saturn and Melancholy contains such a wealth of accumulated scholarship, over multiple fields, covering the whole of the Western intellectual tradition, that it would be better to describe this publication as an archival event, an encyclopedia, or even an ad hoc attempt at library construction … Saturn and Melancholy is a beautiful book with its many illustrations and appurtenances. One can only imagine the editorial and typesetting efforts that went into its production.” Science et Esprit
“The reissue of Saturn and Melancholy is a major event that scholars worldwide have long been waiting for: almost as great an achievement as its original publication.” Davide Stimilli, University of Colorado Boulder
“I do not believe that the Warburgian spirit has ever been better illustrated.” Robert Klein, Mercure de France
"A fascinating look at how humans have always looked to categorize humanity and make sense of their own fate by means that might seem arbitrary but contain great poetry and rich metaphor." Spectrum Culture
"This classic of collaborative scholarship, long out of print, has been reissued with supplementary materials, including updated bibliographies and translations of its Latin quotations. More than six hundred pages in its newest version, a trove of cosmological, physiological, and psychological learning and lore, the book comes to us as a precious gift because it reflects on a question seldom posed today: not that of art's destination - its uses and purposes - but rather of art's origin." Artforum
"With epigrammatic fervor, T.S. Eliot once defined a "living tradition" as "the good New growing naturally out of the good Old." Noble as the sentiment is, one of the most important lessons to have emerged from the Warburg Institute's work over the years is the degree to which the amorphous mass of ideas and sentiments that we call a "tradition" are dependent on the physical transmission of texts. There is no cultural tradition without copies, reprints, ultimately, the availability of sources. We now have this first-rate new edition to thank for the promise that work of this kind may continue into the future, under the sign of Saturn." Los Angeles Review of Books
“Saturn and Melancholy contains such a wealth of accumulated scholarship, over multiple fields, covering the whole of the Western intellectual tradition, that it would be better to describe this publication as an archival event, an encyclopedia, or even an ad hoc attempt at library construction … Saturn and Melancholy is a beautiful book with its many illustrations and appurtenances. One can only imagine the editorial and typesetting efforts that went into its production.” Science et Esprit
Philippe Despoix is professor of comparative literature at Université de Montréal and co-editor of Raymond Klibansky and the Warburg Library Network: Intellectual Peregrinations from Hamburg to London and Montreal.
Georges Leroux is emeritus professor in the Department of Philosophy at Université du Québec à Montréal, co-editor of Raymond Klibansky and the Warburg Library Network: Intellectual Peregrinations from Hamburg to London and Montreal, and author of Partita for Glenn Gould: An Inquiry into the Nature of Genius.
Georges Leroux is emeritus professor in the Department of Philosophy at Université du Québec à Montréal, co-editor of Raymond Klibansky and the Warburg Library Network: Intellectual Peregrinations from Hamburg to London and Montreal, and author of Partita for Glenn Gould: An Inquiry into the Nature of Genius.
Foreword
Bill Sherman / ix
Editors’ Note and Acknowledgments / xi
Raymond Klibansky’s Preface to the German Edition (1990) / xiii
Preface to the First English Edition (1964) / xxix
List of Illustrations / xxxi
List of Abbreviations / xxxvii
Part I The Notion of Melancholy and Its Historical Development
Chapter I Melancholy in the Physiological Literature of the Ancients
1 The Doctrine of the Four Humours / 3
2 The Notion of Melancholy as Revolutionised by the Peripatetics: Problem XXX, 1 / 15
3 The Development of the Notion of Melancholy after the Peripatetics / 41
(a) Melancholy as an Illness / 42
i The Stoic View / 43
ii Asclepiades, Archigenes and Soranus / 44
iii Rufus of Ephesus / 48
(b) Melancholy in the System of the Four Temperaments / 55
Chapter II Melancholy in Medieval Medicine, Science and Philosophy
1 The Survival of the Aristotelian Notion of Melancholy in the Middle Ages / 67
2 Melancholy as an Illness / 75
(a) Melancholy in Theology and Moral Philosophy / 75
(b) Melancholy in Scholastic Medicine / 82
i Early Arabic Medicine and its Translation to the West: Constantinus Africanus / 82
ii Attempts at Systematisation on the Basis of Humoral Pathology: Avicenna’s Doctrine of the Four Forms / 86
iii Attempts at Classification on a Psychological Basis: Averroes and Scholastic Medicine / 90
3 Melancholy in the System of the Four Temperaments / 97
(a) The Galenic Tradition, particularly among the Arabians and Constantinus Africanus / 98
(b) The Revival of Humoral Characterology in Western Natural Philosophy during the First Half of the Twelfth Century / 102
(c) The Popular Doctrine of Temperaments in the Later Middle Ages, and its Effects / 112
Part II Saturn, Star of Melancholy
Chapter I Saturn in the Literary Tradition
1 The Notion of Saturn in Arabic Astrology / 127
2 Saturn in Ancient Literature / 133
(a) Kronos-Saturn as a Mythical Figure / 133
(b) Kronos-Saturn as a Planet / 136
i Kronos-Saturn in Ancient Astrophysics / 137
ii Kronos-Saturn in Ancient Astrology / 140
iii Kronos-Saturn in Neoplatonism / 151
3 Saturn in Medieval Literature / 159
(a) Saturn in the Controversies of the Church Fathers / 159
(b) Saturn in Later Medieval Speculation / 165
i Saturn in Moral Theology / 165
ii Saturn in Medieval Mythography / 170
iii Saturn in Medieval Astrology: Astrological Elements adopted by Scholastic Natural Philosophy / 170
Chapter II Saturn in the Pictorial Tradition
1 Saturn in Ancient Art and the Survival of the Traditional Representation in Medieval Art / 196
2 Text-illustration and Oriental Influence / 200
3 The Picture of Saturn and his Children / 204
4 Saturn in Mythographical Illustrations of the Late Middle Ages / 207
5 Saturn in Humanism / 209
Part III “Poetic Melancholy” and “Melancholia Generosa”
Chapter I Poetic Melancholy in post-Medieval Poetry
1 Melancholy as a Subjective Mood in Poetry / 217
2 “Dame Merencolye” / 220
3 Melancholy as Heightened Self-awareness / 228
Chapter II “Melancholia Generosa”
The Glorification of Melancholy and Saturn in Florentine Neoplatonism and the Birth of the Modern Notion of Genius / 241
1 The Intellectual Background of the New Doctrine / 241
2 Marsilio Ficino / 254
Part IV Dürer
Chapter I Melancholy in Conrad Celtes
Dürer’s Woodcut on the Title-page of Celtes’s “Quattuor Libri Amorum” The Doctrine of Temperaments in Dürer’s Writings / 277
Chapter II The Engraving “Melencolia I”
1 The Historical Background of “Melencolia I” / 284
(a) Traditional Motifs / 284
i The Purse and the Keys / 284
ii The Motif of the Drooping Head / 286
iii The Clenched Fist and the Black Face / 289
(b) Traditional Images in the Composition of the Engraving / 290
i Illustrations of Disease / 290
ii Picture Cycles of the Four Temperaments. I: Descriptive Single Figures (the Four Temperaments and the Four Ages of Man) - II: Dramatic Groups: Temperaments and Vices / 291
iii Portraits of the Liberal Arts / 306
2 The New Meaning of “Melencolia I” / 317
(a) The New Form of Expression / 317
(b) The New Notional Content / 321
i Symbols of Saturn or Melancholy / 322
ii Geometrical Symbols / 327
iii Symbols of Saturn or of Melancholy combined with Geometrical Symbols: in Relation to Mythology and Astrology-in Relation to Epistemology and Psychology / 331
iv Art and Practice / 339
(c) The Significance of “Melencolia I” / 345
(d) The “Four Apostles” / 366
Chapter III The Artistic Legacy of “Melencolia I”
1 Portraits of Melancholy as a Single Female Figure in the Manner of Dürer / 376
2 Typical Portraits of Melancholy in Late Medieval Almanacs / 393
3 Melancholy in Portraits of Saturn or of his Children / 397
Appendices
I The Polyhedron in “Melencolia I” / 400
II The Meaning of the Engraving B70 / 403
III Lucas Cranach’s Depictions of Melancholy (1990) / 407
Additions to the Notes from the 1990 German Edition, with Supplemental Translations of Quotations / 413
Supplemental Bibliography for the German Edition (1990) / 429
Addendum on the Text History of [Ps-] Aristotle, Problem XXX, 1 / 443
Afterword: The Long and Complex History of a Warburgian Publication Project / 449
Index of Manuscripts / 467
Index (1964) / 469
Illustrations / 491
Bill Sherman / ix
Editors’ Note and Acknowledgments / xi
Raymond Klibansky’s Preface to the German Edition (1990) / xiii
Preface to the First English Edition (1964) / xxix
List of Illustrations / xxxi
List of Abbreviations / xxxvii
Part I The Notion of Melancholy and Its Historical Development
Chapter I Melancholy in the Physiological Literature of the Ancients
1 The Doctrine of the Four Humours / 3
2 The Notion of Melancholy as Revolutionised by the Peripatetics: Problem XXX, 1 / 15
3 The Development of the Notion of Melancholy after the Peripatetics / 41
(a) Melancholy as an Illness / 42
i The Stoic View / 43
ii Asclepiades, Archigenes and Soranus / 44
iii Rufus of Ephesus / 48
(b) Melancholy in the System of the Four Temperaments / 55
Chapter II Melancholy in Medieval Medicine, Science and Philosophy
1 The Survival of the Aristotelian Notion of Melancholy in the Middle Ages / 67
2 Melancholy as an Illness / 75
(a) Melancholy in Theology and Moral Philosophy / 75
(b) Melancholy in Scholastic Medicine / 82
i Early Arabic Medicine and its Translation to the West: Constantinus Africanus / 82
ii Attempts at Systematisation on the Basis of Humoral Pathology: Avicenna’s Doctrine of the Four Forms / 86
iii Attempts at Classification on a Psychological Basis: Averroes and Scholastic Medicine / 90
3 Melancholy in the System of the Four Temperaments / 97
(a) The Galenic Tradition, particularly among the Arabians and Constantinus Africanus / 98
(b) The Revival of Humoral Characterology in Western Natural Philosophy during the First Half of the Twelfth Century / 102
(c) The Popular Doctrine of Temperaments in the Later Middle Ages, and its Effects / 112
Part II Saturn, Star of Melancholy
Chapter I Saturn in the Literary Tradition
1 The Notion of Saturn in Arabic Astrology / 127
2 Saturn in Ancient Literature / 133
(a) Kronos-Saturn as a Mythical Figure / 133
(b) Kronos-Saturn as a Planet / 136
i Kronos-Saturn in Ancient Astrophysics / 137
ii Kronos-Saturn in Ancient Astrology / 140
iii Kronos-Saturn in Neoplatonism / 151
3 Saturn in Medieval Literature / 159
(a) Saturn in the Controversies of the Church Fathers / 159
(b) Saturn in Later Medieval Speculation / 165
i Saturn in Moral Theology / 165
ii Saturn in Medieval Mythography / 170
iii Saturn in Medieval Astrology: Astrological Elements adopted by Scholastic Natural Philosophy / 170
Chapter II Saturn in the Pictorial Tradition
1 Saturn in Ancient Art and the Survival of the Traditional Representation in Medieval Art / 196
2 Text-illustration and Oriental Influence / 200
3 The Picture of Saturn and his Children / 204
4 Saturn in Mythographical Illustrations of the Late Middle Ages / 207
5 Saturn in Humanism / 209
Part III “Poetic Melancholy” and “Melancholia Generosa”
Chapter I Poetic Melancholy in post-Medieval Poetry
1 Melancholy as a Subjective Mood in Poetry / 217
2 “Dame Merencolye” / 220
3 Melancholy as Heightened Self-awareness / 228
Chapter II “Melancholia Generosa”
The Glorification of Melancholy and Saturn in Florentine Neoplatonism and the Birth of the Modern Notion of Genius / 241
1 The Intellectual Background of the New Doctrine / 241
2 Marsilio Ficino / 254
Part IV Dürer
Chapter I Melancholy in Conrad Celtes
Dürer’s Woodcut on the Title-page of Celtes’s “Quattuor Libri Amorum” The Doctrine of Temperaments in Dürer’s Writings / 277
Chapter II The Engraving “Melencolia I”
1 The Historical Background of “Melencolia I” / 284
(a) Traditional Motifs / 284
i The Purse and the Keys / 284
ii The Motif of the Drooping Head / 286
iii The Clenched Fist and the Black Face / 289
(b) Traditional Images in the Composition of the Engraving / 290
i Illustrations of Disease / 290
ii Picture Cycles of the Four Temperaments. I: Descriptive Single Figures (the Four Temperaments and the Four Ages of Man) - II: Dramatic Groups: Temperaments and Vices / 291
iii Portraits of the Liberal Arts / 306
2 The New Meaning of “Melencolia I” / 317
(a) The New Form of Expression / 317
(b) The New Notional Content / 321
i Symbols of Saturn or Melancholy / 322
ii Geometrical Symbols / 327
iii Symbols of Saturn or of Melancholy combined with Geometrical Symbols: in Relation to Mythology and Astrology-in Relation to Epistemology and Psychology / 331
iv Art and Practice / 339
(c) The Significance of “Melencolia I” / 345
(d) The “Four Apostles” / 366
Chapter III The Artistic Legacy of “Melencolia I”
1 Portraits of Melancholy as a Single Female Figure in the Manner of Dürer / 376
2 Typical Portraits of Melancholy in Late Medieval Almanacs / 393
3 Melancholy in Portraits of Saturn or of his Children / 397
Appendices
I The Polyhedron in “Melencolia I” / 400
II The Meaning of the Engraving B70 / 403
III Lucas Cranach’s Depictions of Melancholy (1990) / 407
Additions to the Notes from the 1990 German Edition, with Supplemental Translations of Quotations / 413
Supplemental Bibliography for the German Edition (1990) / 429
Addendum on the Text History of [Ps-] Aristotle, Problem XXX, 1 / 443
Afterword: The Long and Complex History of a Warburgian Publication Project / 449
Index of Manuscripts / 467
Index (1964) / 469
Illustrations / 491
