Abstract
Huarte de San Juan’s Examen de ingenios (Examination of men’s wits') of 1575 is one of tire most significant Spanish contributions to Renaissance thought. The treatise reached an enormous popularity in Europe during the 16th and the 17th century as demonstrated by numerous translations in Italian, French, Portuguese, English, German or Dutch. However, it is barely known in modern times. Huarte’s doctrine illustrates the Renaissance attempt to restore the purity of ancient medicine, while proposing a “scientific” basis for the project of a systematic professional orientation. By means of the ancient theory of humours and that of the philosophical reflection on the genius, Huarte articulates a new pattern for the intellectual ability, seen as highly individual, but also deeply rooted in the biological nature of the human being.The intellectual fecundity is explained by recourse to humoural physiology with a special focus on the traditional image of the melancholic temperament, redefined in the spirit of the pre-modern anthropology of the variety.
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