The Virtues of Animals in Seventeenth-Century Thought

Harrison, Peter

doi:10.2307/3653897

Cited by 12 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 19 publications

(6 reference statements)

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“…One link between these two fields is the traditional idea, dating back at least as far as Augustine, that there are "two books," the book of scripture and the book of nature. My general thesis (and this is the argument set out in Harrison 1989) is that changing approaches to the interpretation of one of these "books" will be linked to changes in approach to the interpretation of the other. 1 In order to see how this might work, it is important to grasp what was entailed in the earlier (that is, patristic and medieval) conceptions of the "book of nature."…”

Section: Words and Things: The Birth Of Modern Taxonomymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Linnaeus as a Second Adam? Taxonomy and the Religious Vocation

Harrison

2009

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Swedish naturalist Carl von Linné (1707-1778) became known during his lifetime as a "second Adam" because of his taxonomic endeavors. The significance of this epithet was that in Genesis Adam was reported to have named the beasts-an episode that was usually interpreted to mean that Adam possessed a scientific knowledge of nature and a perfect taxonomy. Linnaeus's soubriquet exemplifies the way in which the Genesis narratives of creation were used in the early modern period to give religious legitimacy to scientific activities and to taxonomy in particular. Allusions to Adam's work in the Garden of Eden thus became a way of investing the vocation of the naturalist with religious significance.

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Section: Words and Things: The Birth Of Modern Taxonomymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Emblematic readings of nature such as these were premised on the assumption that the purpose of natural things was not merely to serve human physical needs-indeed it was difficult to see how such creatures as the lion could serve such purposes-but to act as symbols of eternal spiritual truths (Ashworth 1990;Harrison 1998).…”

Section: Zygonmentioning

confidence: 99%

Linnaeus as a Second Adam? Taxonomy and the Religious Vocation

Harrison

2009

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“…Due to their communication, the latter's ideas must have been familiar in the Netherlands already since the early years of the seventeenth century. (Koslow, 1995, p. 257;Harrison, 1998, p. 474, Desan, 2007 Pieter van Veen's drawings in his personal copy of Montaigne's Essays (Essais), made between 1602 and 1629, are just one evidence of the Dutch familiriaty with the French text. (Kolfin & Rikken, 2007) In Montaigne's On Cruelty from his Essays we read characteristically: "For my own part, I cannot without grief see so much as an innocent beast pursued and killed that has no defence, and from which we have received no offence at all; and that which frequently happens, that the stag we hunt, finding himself weak and out of breath, and seeing no other remedy, surrenders himself to us who pursue him, imploring mercy by his tears".…”

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The Animal as Agent of the Sublime in Rembrandt’s Rape Narratives and Ovid’s Metamorphoses

Litsardopoulou

2021

Philosophia

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In this article I will explore the relationship between man and animal as presented by Ovid in some of his rape stories narrated in the Metamorphoses. The stories I will discuss are those of Actaeon and Callisto, the rape of Europa and the rape of Proserpina. Against Ovid's background, I will examine Rembrandt's version of these stories. In other words, I will investigate how Ovid's textual construction of animals vs. humans relates to Rembrandt's painterly construction of them. Accordingly, I will explore how Rembrandt's presentation of animals in his mythical images may reflect some of the prevalent attitudes of the period towards animals. My final goal is to address the question of the sublime in Rembrandt's myths of human-animal transformation. Specifically, I will try to show that in his work the animals become agents of the sublime on a par with humans and gods. I will argue that similarly to Ovid's reader, Rembrandt's viewer experienced awe, amazement, even terror in front of his depictions of sublime passions, impossible disguises and transformations, his stories of violence, enacted collaboratively between man and animal.

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Writing Metamorphosis in the English Renaissance

Wiseman

2014

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Taking Ovid's Metamorphoses as its starting point, this book analyses fantastic creatures including werewolves, bear-children and dragons in English literature from the Reformation to the late seventeenth century. Susan Wiseman tracks the idea of transformation through classical, literary, sacred, physiological, folkloric and ethnographic texts. Under modern disciplinary protocols these areas of writing are kept apart, but this study shows that in the Renaissance they were woven together by shared resources, frames of knowledge and readers. Drawing on a rich collection of critical and historical studies and key philosophical texts including Descartes' Meditations, Wiseman outlines the importance of metamorphosis as a significant literary mode. Her examples range from canonical literature, including Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Tempest, to Thomas Browne on dragons, together with popular material, arguing that the seventeenth century is marked by concentration on the potential of the human, and the world, to change or be changed.

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The Virtues of Animals in Seventeenth-Century Thought

Cited by 12 publications

References 19 publications

Linnaeus as a Second Adam? Taxonomy and the Religious Vocation

Linnaeus as a Second Adam? Taxonomy and the Religious Vocation

The Animal as Agent of the Sublime in Rembrandt’s Rape Narratives and Ovid’s Metamorphoses

Writing Metamorphosis in the English Renaissance

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