3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page i 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 GALILEO 9 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 40 41 42R Folio 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page ii 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page iii 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 GALILEO 9 WATCHER OF THE SKIES 10 ∂ 1 2 3 4 DAVID WOOTTON 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 40 YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS 41 NEW HAVEN AND LONDON 42R Folio 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page iv 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 Copyright © 2010 David Wootton 1 Published with assistance from the foundation established in memory of 2 Oliver Baty Cunningham of the Class of 1917, Yale College 3 All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form (beyond 4 that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by 5 reviewers for the public press) without written permission from the publishers. 6 7 For information about this and other Yale University Press publications, please contact: U.S. Office: [email protected] www.yalebooks.com 8 Europe Office: [email protected] www.yaleup.co.uk 9 30 Set in Arno Pro by IDSUK (DataConnection) Ltd Printed in Great Britain by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall 1 2 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. 3 Wootton, David, 1952– 4 Galileo: Watcher of the Skies/David Wootton. 5 p. cm. 6 ISBN 097–8300125368 (cl:alk. paper) 7 1. Galilei, Galileo, 1564–1642 2. Astronomers—Italy—Biography. I. Title. 8 QB36.G2W66 2010 9 520.92—dc22 40 [B] 2010027620 41 42R 10987654321 Folio 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page v 1 2 3 4 5 For Alison 6 7 8 9 10 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 40 41 42R Folio 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page vi 1 2 3 4 5 6 . For, all the night, 7 I heard the thin gnat-voices cry, 8 Star to faint star, across the sky. 9 10 Rupert Brooke, ‘The Jolly Company’ (1908) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 40 41 42R Folio 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page vii 1 2 3 4 5 Contents 6 7 8 9 10 List of illustrations ix 1 Acknowledgements xi 2 3 Introduction: Conjectural history 1 4 5 Part one: The mind’s eye 6 7 1. His father’s son 9 8 2. Florence 14 9 3. Galileo’s lamp 18 20 4. Eureka! 22 1 5. Seeing is believing 25 2 6. A friend in need 30 3 7. Juvenilia 33 4 8. The Leaning Tower 36 5 9. Inertia 43 6 10. Nudism 46 7 8 Part two: The watcher of the skies 9 30 11. Copernicanism 51 1 12. Money 67 2 13. Fields of fire 70 3 14. The experimental method 76 4 15. The telescope 87 5 16. Mother 93 6 17. The Starry Messenger 96 7 18. Florence and buoyancy 106 8 19. Jesuits and the new astronomy 114 9 20. Sunspots 125 40 21. The Catholic scientist 132 41 42R vii Folio 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page viii CONTENTS 1 Part three: The eagle and the arrow 2 3 22. Copernicus condemned 137 4 23. Comets 157 5 24. The death of Gianfrancesco Sagredo 171 6 25. Urban VIII 176 7 26. Family Ties 182 8 27. Permission to publish 191 9 28. Alessandra Buonamici 201 10 29. A river floods 203 1 30. Publication 206 2 31. The Dialogue 208 3 4 Part four: Prisoner to the Inquisition 5 6 32. Maria Celeste and Arcetri 215 7 33. Trial 218 8 34. The Two New Sciences 229 9 35. Vincenzo, son of Galileo 235 20 36. Galileo’s (un)belief 240 1 37. The cosmography of the self 251 2 3 Coda: Galileo, history and the historians 259 4 5 Notes 268 6 Bibliography 308 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 40 41 42R Folio viii 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page ix 1 2 3 4 5 Illustrations 6 7 8 9 10 Frontispiece Portrait of Galileo by Domenico Crespi da Passignano 1 (1559–1638), 1624. Private Collection. 2 1 Frontispiece of Niccolò Tartaglia’s New Science, 1537. The Thomas Fisher 3 Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 4 2 Ptolemaic universe, in Mattei Mauro’s commentary on the Sphere, 1550. 5 The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 6 3 Copernican system, in Thomas Digges’s Prognostication Everlasting, 1596. 7 Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering & Technology. 8 4 Geometric and military compass. Institute and Museum of the History of 9 Science, Florence. 20 5 Sketch from Thomas Seget’s Liber Amicorum. By permission of the 1 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. All rights reserved. Vat. lat. 9385 p. 79. 2 © 2010 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. 3 6 Peter Paul Rubens, Self-Portrait in a Circle of Friends from Mantua, c.1604. 4 Rheinisches Bildarchiv Köln. 5 7 Galileo’s notebook. By kind permission of the Ministero per i Beni e le 6 Attività Culturali della Repubblica Italiana/Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, 7 Florence. All rights reserved. Gal 72 fol. 166v. 8 8 & 9 Galileo’s telescope. Institute and Museum of the History of Science, 9 Florence. 30 10 Moon illustration from Galileo’s Starry Messenger, Venice, 1610, f.10v. 1 Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering & Technology. 2 11 Moon illustration from pirated version of Starry Messenger. The Thomas 3 Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 4 12 Lodovico Cigoli, The Immaculate Virgin, 1612, Rome, Santa Maria 5 Maggiore. Photography by Alessandro Vasari, Rome. 6 13 Francesco Villamena, engraving of Galileo, frontispiece to Galileo’s Assayer, 7 1623. The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 8 14 Francesco Villamena, engraving of Cardinal Bellarmine, 1604. © Trustees 9 of the British Museum. 40 15 Pietro Facchetti, Prince Federico Cesi. Photograph courtesy of the 41 Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. 42R ix Folio 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page x ILLUSTRATIONS 1 16 Attributed to Leandro Bassano, painting of Gianfrancesco Sagredo, 2 ‘Procurator of San Marco’. Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford. 3 17 Francesco Furini, Astronomy Shows Cosimo I the Satellites of Jupiter, 4 Florence, Casino Mediceo. © 2010. Photo Scala, Florence. 5 18 Justus Sustermans, portrait of Cosimo II with his wife and son. Florence, 6 Galleria degli Uffizi. © 2010. Photo Scala, Florence, courtesy of the 7 Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali della Repubblica Italiana. 8 19 Jacopo Zucchi, fresco of the Villa Medici. Author’s photograph. 9 20 Title page of Assayer, 1623. The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, 10 University of Toronto. 1 21 Maffeo Barberini, engraving in his Poemata. The Thomas Fisher Rare Book 2 Library, University of Toronto. 3 22 Andrea Sacchi, Divine Wisdom, 1629–33. Photograph courtesy of John 4 Beldon Scott. 5 23 Frontispiece to Galileo’s Dialogue, 1632. The Thomas Fisher Rare Book 6 Library, University of Toronto. 7 24 Title page of Melchior Inchofer’s Summary Treatise, 1633. The Thomas 8 Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 9 25 Illustration depicting bone thickness, from Galileo’s Two New Sciences, 20 1638. The Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 1 26 Illustration concerning structural failure, from Two New Sciences. The 2 Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 3 27 Illustration investigating equilibrium, from Two New Sciences. The Thomas 4 Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto. 5 28 Nineteenth-century construction of Galileo’s pendulum clock, based on 6 drawings by Vincenzo Viviani. Science Museum/SSPL. 7 8 9 30 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 40 41 42R Folio x 3198_00_FM.qxp 7/27/10 6:10 PM Page xi 1 2 3 4 5 Acknowledgements 6 7 8 9 10 Numerous Galileo scholars, historians of science and historians of the late 1 Renaissance have responded to my enquiries, amongst them Ugo Baldini, Silvio 2 Bedini, Domenico Bertoloni Meli, Mario Biagioli, Christopher Black, Horst 3 Bredekamp, Massimo Bucciantini, Michele Camerota, Linda Carroll, Miles 4 Chappell, David Colclough, Pietro Corsi, Nicholas Davidson, Peter Dear, 5 Simon Ditchfield, Germana Ernst, Dinko Fabris, Federica Favino, Maurice 6 Finocchiaro, Steve Fuller, John Henry, Michael Hunter, Mary Laven, Peter 7 Machamer, Ian McLean, Edward Muir, Ronald Naylor, Paolo Palmieri, Isabelle 8 Pantin, Pietro Redondi, Eileen Reeves, Jürgen Renn, John Beldon Scott, 9 Richard Seargentson, Michael Shank, Michael Sharratt, William Shea, A. Mark 20 Smith, Roberto Vergara Caffarelli and Nicholas Wilding. I thank them for their 1 patience. I also thank Rick Watson of W. P. Watson for generously lending me 2 his copy of Giovanni Battista Stelluti’s Scandaglio. 3 I am also grateful for a number of opportunities to try out my ideas before an 4 audience: to the British Association for the History of Philosophy meeting in 5 York; to David Cram and Robert Evans of the History Faculty of the University 6 of Oxford; to Jim Bennett and Stephen Johnston of the Oxford Museum of the 7 History of Science; to David Lines of the Centre for Renaissance Studies at the 8 University of Warwick; to Knud Haakonssen of the Centre for the History of 9 Ideas at the University of Sussex; and to the Renaissance Society of America 30 meeting in Venice in 2010.