Diligent Observers of Natural Things

Diligent observers of natural things Lay observations and the natural philosophy of earthquakes in the Royal Society of London 1665-1755 Kerrewin van Blanken/ 4262514 Supervisor: Dirk van Miert Second Reader: Daan Wegener Utrecht University Research Master History 21-06-2019 Abstract Eighteenth-century seismology primarily relied on lay observers to provide empirical evidence. This methodological commitment did not come out of nowhere. Since the mid-seventeenth century, the testimonies of contemporary earthquake observers became increasingly prominent sources of knowledge for natural philosophers. Their observations, as well as the specific lay-expert relation that formed as the result of this interaction formed the building blocks of eighteenth- and nineteenth- century seismology. The aims of this thesis are twofold. First, to tell the untold stories of these observers and evaluate their contribution to early modern earthquake science, taking the early Royal Society as a focus point. This historical argument serves to explain how and why seismology emerged in the eighteenth century with the specific epistemological and theoretical commitments that it had. Secondly, to develop an analytical method informed by the ‘history of knowledge’ that integrates different epistemologies, social relations and scientific theories. This method is geared to explain how the interactions between specific actors and practices shaped new knowledge about earthquakes in ways that transcend modern disciplinary classifications. Acknowledgements Admittedly, writing an acknowledgements section seemed a little overdoing it for a master’s thesis. Yet even in the course of such a relatively small project I have incurred quite some debts to many people, whom I would like to thank. First of all I would like to thank Dirk van Miert for supervising the work and providing me with helpful and thoughtful feedback in all phases of the research process. I would also like to thank Michiel van Groesen, in whose research project Covering the Ocean I encountered news about earthquakes as a research topic. In addition, I would like to thank Esther Baakman for setting me on the trail of the 1692 Port Royal earthquake. I received much help from the kind staff at the special collections departments at Utrecht University Library and Manchester University Library (especially Anne Anderton), and the archives of the Royal Society. Lastly I want to show my gratitude to everyone who at some point read one or more chapters and helped me on my way when I got stuck. The ‘thesis lab’ sessions led by Willemijn Ruberg were always very fun and productive, and I would like to thank my fellow students in the History Research Master for sharing their time and their ideas. I would also like to thank Johann Post, Naud Berkhuizen, Arjen van Blanken and Merel Blok for their helpful comments and/or conversations about the topic and the research process. I dedicate this to my mother. Clarifications Note on dating and names. In Great Britain the Julian calendar remained in use until 1752. In the text I have kept the dating consistent with the sources. This means that English references generally refer to Julian or Old Style dates, while continental or post-1752 dates refer to the Gregorian or New Style dates. In cases where this may lead to confusion, I have explicitly noted both calendar dates. I have maintained proper names according to contemporary spelling. In some cases where geographical names have changed I have added the modern name between brackets. Commonly used abbreviations F.R.S.- Fellow of the Royal Society R.S.A.- Royal Society Archives Phil. Trans.- Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society Terminology While the words will occasionally rear their heads in the text, I will generally refrain from relying too much on the terms ‘science’ and ‘scientific revolution’, since these are rather anachronistic when applied to the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century. Instead, I will follow contemporary convention and refer to natural philosophy (roughly analogous to ‘theoretical’) and natural history (analogous to ‘empirical’).1 The practitioners of this form of inquiry will be referred to as natural philosophers, naturalists and earthquake theorists to reflect both their general and specific interests. Doing so partly negates the risk of imposing nineteenth or twenty-first century classifications of science upon an enterprise that appears similar but had fundamental differences. On the other hand, I will deliberately use the similarly anachronistic terms ‘lay’, ‘expert’, ‘gender’, ‘race’ and ‘class’ as analytic tools to trace patterns and connections that would not have been obvious to historical actors (or in different terms) but are of interest to modern historians. 1 Daston, Lorraine & Park, Katherine - ‘Introduction: The Age of the New’, in : Daston, Lorraine; Park, Katharine (Eds.)- The Cambridge history of science. Vol. 3, Early modern science (Cambridge University Press, 2006), 1-20. p. 4, also 12-16. Contents Introduction 1 Chapter One: The Rise of the Earthquake Observer 20 How did the epistemic challenges confronting the New Natural Philosophy give rise to the use of eye-witness reports? Chapter Two: How to Recognize an Earthquake 47 How were credibility and truth constructed in the accounts of earthquake observers? Chapter Three: Earthquakes on the Move 73 How were the contributions of earthquake observers turned into Natural Philosophy? Chapter Four: Subject to Shaking 101 How did earthquake observers become lay subjects? Conclusion 126 Appendix A: Reproductions of sources 133 Appendix B: Primary sources 137 Appendix C: Bibliography 144 Appendix D: List of Figures 154 Introduction In 1666, the first earthquake was reported to the recently established Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge.1 It was a minor shock that hit a major center of English learning: the university town of Oxford. The reporters were two eminent members of the Royal Society itself: the mathematician John Wallis and the chemist Robert Boyle. Wallis’s account was arguably the first recorded observation of an earthquake that included instrumental data (he noted the state of his thermometer and barometer), while Boyle wrote his account to provide independent confirmation of Wallis’ observations.2 A straightforward case of the improvement of natural knowledge, you might say. Yet upon closer reading, something strange comes to light: neither of these two men actually observed the earthquake. Although Wallis noticed ‘some kind of odde shaking or heaving’, he apparently thought nothing of it.3 Only after hearing others speak of an earthquake did he consult his daily meteorological notes ‘to see if any alternations considerable had then happened’. Robert Boyle confessed that he had been ‘busied enough on other matters’, and that he would not have known of the earthquake at all if ‘one, that you know, whose hand is employed in this paper, and begins to be a diligent observer of natural things, had not advertis’d me of it; as being taken notice of by him and the rest of the people of the house’.4 In both cases, the actual observations of the earthquakes were made by the unnamed and barely acknowledged apprentices and servants in the households of these two gentleman scientists. It is their contributions that this thesis investigates. 1 Phil. Trans., Vol. 1, no. 10, pp. 166-171; Phil. Trans., Vol. 1, no. 11, pp. 179-183. According to the old style calendar the earthquake occurred on 19 January 1665. This corresponds to 29 January 1666 in the Gregorian calendar. 2 See: Roger Musson, ‘A history of British seismology’, in: Bull Earthquake Eng., Vol. 11, 715–861 (2013), p. 729: ‘They also mark what is almost certainly the first ever attempt to gather instrumental data in an earthquake investigation’. See also: Oldenburg to Boyle 1 february 1667/8, asking Boyle to confirm Wallis’ observation, in: Alfred Rupert Hall & Marie Boas Hall (Eds.), The Correspondence of Henry Oldenburg (Taylor and Francis, 1986), Vol. III, p. 48, Vol. IV, p. 170. 3 Wallis, Phil. Trans., Vol. 1, no. 10, p. 166. 4 Boyle, Phil. Trans., Vol. 1, no. 11, p. 180. 2 Introduction Little more than a year later, on 27 June 1667, another (former) apprentice of Boyle named Robert Hooke proposed an ambitious research agenda to the members of the Royal Society: the systematic study of earthquakes. ‘The subject is large’, Hooke wrote, ‘and doth look very like an impossibility to be undertaken even by the whole world, to be gone through within an age, much less to be undertaken by any particular society, or a small number of men.’5 In opposition to the highly speculative theories on the shape and history of the earth that were floating around in mid seventeenth-century Europe, Hooke’s proposed methodology was explicitly empirical. The central problem of this endeavor was a lack of quality observations. Recognizing this fact, Hooke not only argued that those interested in earthquakes should employ a wide range of methods to gather evidence; he also postulated that this was chiefly an age to collect observations (guided by working hypotheses), so that future generations may use their cumulative accounts as an empirical basis for their theories: The number of Natural Histories, Observations, Experiments, Calculations, Comparisons, Deductions and Demonstrations necessary thereunto, seeming to be incomprehensive and numberless: And therefore a vain Attempt, and not to be thought of till after some Ages past in making collections

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