Abstract
In this handsomely produced book, Volker Remmert impresses, fascinates, and delights the reader with his vast knowledge of the way mathematics evolved into a leading scientific enterprise over the course of the seventeenth century. His careful analysis of the frontispieces of mathematical (astronomical, optical, and treatises about the art of war and garden architecture) books presents an expose of the early modern symbiosis between mathematics and art. It is a model of an interdisciplinary investigation in which history, art history, and the history of science join in an act of mutual enlightenment. Remmert explicates in minute and instructive detail the surprisingly subtle interactions of word and image implicit in the iconotexts (Peter Wagner) of the title pages, revealing mathematics' iconographic connections to mythology, art, theology, and philosophy and demonstrating how they were employed to communicate changing scientific assumption while holding on to theological orthodoxy. Starting with a detailed review of the controversy over the Copernican cosmology and Galilei's role in it, Remmert outlines mathematics' move from the periphery, as a handmaiden to astronomy, to the center of scientific teaching. Moving back and forth between mathematics as theory and mathematics as a science of practical application, Remmert reviews the struggle for supremacy between science and technology, war and peace, and mathematics' contributions to the structure and design of war machines and fortifications. Remmert also devotes a detailed exposition to its importance in the design and building of the formal gardens of typical of absolutist Europe.
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