Albertus Magnus 'On Animals': A Medieval 'Summa Zoologica' by Kenneth Kitchell, Jr., Irven Michael Resnick

Abstract

500 Reviews scholastica; the analysis is supported by a detailed table of textual correspondences. As regards the Historiebijbel van 1360, Sherwood-Smith additionally edits a number of passages omitted from de Bruin's edition (1977-78). One conclusion from these analyses is that Comestor's work appealed so much to later writers because it was often clearer than the Vulgate. This study provides a rich contribution to our knowledge of the way vernacular adaptations of Comestor's Historia scholastica prefigured the Reformation urge to translate the Bible itself,and its application of scholarly analytical methods is impeccable . University of Leeds Richard F. M. Byrn AlbertusMagnus 'On Animals': A Medieval 'Summa Zoologica'. Trans. by Kenneth Kitchell, Jr, and Irven Michael Resnick. (Foundations of Natural History) Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. 1999. Vol. 1: xlii + 856 pp., 16 plates; vol. 11:xxii + 971 pp., 8 plates. $250. ISBN 0-8018-4823-7 (hbk). This firstcomplete English translation of the monumental De animalibus of Albert the Great, a labour of many years forits translators, fillsa gap which has long been bemoaned in medieval studies. In any serious discussion ofthe rich tradition of medieval bestiaries, of creatures fantastic and familiar as motifs in late medieval literature or art, or of the dawning of a modern awareness of human and animal physiology, there is no avoiding Albertus Magnus. Undoubtedly the most learned and prolific scholar ofthe thirteenth century, an authority on almost every field of human knowledge, he took the zoological treatise of Aristotle, which had recently been rediscovered in an Arabie version after centuries of oblivion and translated into Latin by Michael Scotus, and reworked and expanded it into the textbook which greatly influenced the subsequent centuries. De animalibus is therefore of the greatest interest to readers from a variety of disciplines. However, it is formidably long, and the Latin is so convoluted and so riddled with problematic technical terms that the original text is virtually inaccessible to scholars outwith the field of classical languages. That it should finally be available in English is a welcome development which will certainly yield great returns for the scholarship of the coming years. The series in which it appears, Foundations of Natural History, is not primarily a medieval one. It focuses on materials forthe study ofthe history of science, including works by Darwin and other nineteenth-century fathers of modern scientific enquiry, but includes also editions ofworks by Copernicus. In reaching back even further,from the sixteenth to the thirteenth century, the series editors clearly have the same focus in mind, the presentation of milestones in the development of natural philosophy, and not surprisingly itis the sense ofprogress fromAristotle through the Middle Ages and on towards the Enlightenment which is highlighted in the translators' introduction. The introduction is very readable. It includes a good, detailed survey of Albert's life, with maps of his journeys, and a full discussion of his contribution to science, especially of his tentative groping towards the beginnings ofscientific method. He was the firstproponent since classical times ofthe empirical study ofnature, ofthe idea that observation of natural phenomena might take priority over library study, and when passive observation did not produce results he would contrive experiments to test received theses. The dissection of moles 'while they were still squirming' may suggest an investigator motivated more by a love of knowledge than by a love of nature, yet it is precisely the liberation of nature as a subject worthy of study in its own right, not merely as an exegetical tool, which is the great achievement of Albert's book. All this is elucidated with interesting examples in the introductory pages of the firstvolume. MLRy 98.2, 2003 501 De animalibus, the translators explain, fails into three parts. Books 1-19 are an exposition of Aristotle's Historia animalium, De partibus animalium, and De generatione animalium', confusingly, Aristotle's works were also known collectively as De anima? libus in the Middle Ages. Books 20-21 contain Albert's synthesis and are therefore particularly important. Books 22-26 are the dictionary of animals, or rather dictionaries , since quadrupeds, birds, aquatic animals, serpents, and 'vermin' are each given a general discussion before being listed alphabetically...