Transcriber’s Notes
Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations in hyphenation and accents have been standardised but all other spelling and punctuation remains unchanged.
On Chapter 52 page 313 “sees no reason why divination in darkness, in a wall, or in sunlight, or by potions and incantations,” while well seems more likely than wall the original text is unchanged.
Footnote 1477: century, fols. 156-74 has been replaced by 56-74.
The table of contents lists the contents of volume 2 as well as volume 1.
The footnotes have been placed at the end of the book.
Italics are represented thus italic, and superscripts thus y^{en}.
A HISTORY OF MAGIC AND EXPERIMENTAL SCIENCE
VOLUME I
A HISTORY OF MAGIC AND EXPERIMENTAL SCIENCE
DURING THE FIRST THIRTEEN CENTURIES OF OUR ERA
BY LYNN THORNDIKE
VOLUME I
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS NEW YORK AND LONDON
Copyright 1923 Columbia University Press First published by The Macmillan Company 1923
ISBN 0-231-08794-2 Manufactured in the United States of America 10 9 8 7
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE ix
ABBREVIATIONS xiii
DESIGNATION OF MANUSCRIPTS xv
LIST OF WORKS FREQUENTLY CITED BY AUTHOR AND DATE OF PUBLICATION OR BRIEF TITLE xvii
CHAPTER
1. INTRODUCTION 1
BOOK I. THE ROMAN EMPIRE
FOREWORD 39
2. PLINY’S NATURAL HISTORY 41
I. Its Place in the History of Science 42 II. Its Experimental Tendency 53 III. Pliny’s Account of Magic 58 IV. The Science of the Magi 64 V. Pliny’s Magical Science 72
3. SENECA AND PTOLEMY: NATURAL DIVINATION AND ASTROLOGY 100
4. GALEN 117
I. The Man and His Times 119 II. His Medicine and Experimental Science 139 III. His Attitude Toward Magic 165
5. ANCIENT APPLIED SCIENCE AND MAGIC: VITRUVIUS, HERO, AND THE GREEK ALCHEMISTS 182
6. PLUTARCH’S ESSAYS 200
7. APULEIUS OF MADAURA 221
8. PHILOSTRATUS’S LIFE OF APOLLONIUS OF TYANA 242
9. LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL ATTACKS UPON SUPERSTITION: CICERO, FAVORINUS, SEXTUS EMPIRICUS, LUCIAN 268
10. SPURIOUS MYSTIC WRITINGS OF HERMES, ORPHEUS, AND ZOROASTER 287
11. NEO-PLATONISM AND ITS RELATIONS TO ASTROLOGY AND THEURGY 298
12. AELIAN, SOLINUS, AND HORAPOLLO 322