© Hermann Hendrich
Socrates is anxious to see his ideal society in action, and in reply Critias gives an outline of the Atlantis myth.
Desmond Lee 1)
The well known Atlantis tales read and commented by innumerable philosophers over the ages found a new home when the descriptions and memories of those Europeans who reached the West Indies were spread under the philosophers of the 15th and 16th century. It is interesting to note, what change these informations by letter and later by books caused in the thinking in the areas of religion and literature and the early revolutionary movements.
Plato
The mythical story of an island where a human society exists – different from the one the storyteller lives in – was first used by Plato in his dialogues Timaeus and Critias. Although the story as told is made to have been handed down by Egyptian priests it seems that Plato may have invented it, so becoming the first science fiction writer. Just as a reminder: while in Timaeus Socrates expands his ideas about an ideal society, including "the production of children" recommendations, which were taken up much later in history, I would like to mention the Wiedertaeufer, the early years of the communist revolution in Russia and the Muehl commune in Austria during the seventies of the last century. Somewhat later (22) 2) the story is told in second indirect speech by Solon. Here we read (25) the famous description: "There was an Island opposite the strait which you call (so you say) the Pillars of Heracles, an island larger than Libya and Asia combined; …..On this island of Atlantis had arisen a powerful and remarkable dynasty of kings…. And the island of Atlantis was similarily swallowed up by the sea and vanished…".
In the dialogue "Critias" we find an expanded history of Atlantis together with some interesting parts on society in general. Besides its more phantastic genealogy and its feud with a prehistoric Athens there are also a number of points which we should be interested in. In (114) a metal with the name of orichalc is mentioned, "but was then mined in quantities in a number of localities in the island,…in those days the most valuable metal except gold." The very detailed description of the island itself, its buildings, the organisation of the society and the immense wealth 3), fill the last paragraphs of this dialogue. Being one of the most intensely and widely discussed items in the history of philosophy throughout the last 2400 years I may add two remarks by one of its translators into English. "Atlantis, then, is part of a middle episode in an attempt to grapple with the problems of human history and the ideal and real in human society.4) "… " We must remember Plato's purpose – to describe a rich, powerful and technologically advanced society to serve as opponent of his ideal Athens…and…his Atlantis has been widely influential….. " 5)
One aspect which will interest us in the following paragraphs is the imagined organisation of the society in Atlantis. As in the citation above Plato certainly had a political purpose in mind,
to describe in detail a society to serve as a mirror for his own one, to add imagination to those political leaders interested in a change away from the feudal constraints. In many ways we would call Plato today a conservationist, as one, who tries to hold traditional values, but who is also guided by an interested view into the future of his city and state. So we understand many of the descriptions in Critias as a warning and a recommendation.
The hundredthousandfold discussion of these two texts during the following ages until the time of the European explorations in the late 15th century have not added anything new, the scholars did not care about Athenic politics and were not interested in the "science fiction" part of the story about Atlantis. Since both texts are available widely I recommend to look them up again, there are only one page in Timaeus and thirteen pages in Critias covering the subject of Atlantis.
The "discovery" of America
It took a very long time until Europeans thought about travelling to the West over the Atlantic sea. As we know now for certain the first sea faring happened in the far North, when Norsemen reached first Greenland and then the North American continent. They did not, however, leave us any letters or descriptions of their journeys, of their founding small villages amongst the Indians or other facts besides some legends.
In 1492 one man reached the fulfilment of his personal urges and drives (to reach the Indies!) and his logbooks and letters are still available to the interested reader: Christopher Columbus. For our purpose we must consider, that those documents were not published until much later, but they show us the general European look onto strange societies.
Like in his logbook on his third voyage where he describes his voyage and some expected results or actions from the Spanish crown. "…about these lands which I have newly discovered in which I fervently believe the earthly Paradise to lie, the …." 6) And why did he say so? "I found some of the most beautiful country in the world 7), which was thickly populated….great numbers more (of the Indians) came to the ship in their canoes, many of them wearing pieces of gold round their necks, and some with pearls tied round their arms….and let them to a very large house, with a double-pitched roof. In it there were many seats on which they invited their guests to sit and others on which they sat themselves. They brought in bread and various kinds of fruits and different wines, white and red, made not from grapes but probably in various ways from various fruits. Some of it must have been made from maize, which is a cerial with an ear like that of wheat. I have brought some back…" About gold, pearls and jewels: "…these people are fairer than any others I have seen in the Indies. They all wear some jewel round their necks….I inquired very carefully where this gold came from, and they pointed to a land bordering on theirs, to the west, which was very high and not far away." And full of cannibals, apparently not so easy to reach! "I also asked them where they had got their pearls, and they again pointed to the west, and to the north as well…"
We see the kind of pattern in many reports, written by other European explorers as well, more often lieing about the resources looked after, as gold. In this regard we have some lines of Columbus 's letter covering his first voyage to various persons in Spain, written on his return 1493. "One sailor was known to have received gold to the weight of two and a half castellanos for a tag of breech laces….For newly minted blancas they would give everything they possessed, even two or three castellanos of gold ….In this island of Hispaniola I have taken possession of a large town which is most conveniently situated for the goldfields…" We understand very well why these reports have been written, firstly to justify the investment in the past journey, and secondly to prepare the investors for the next trip. The letters and the logbooks of Columbus show considerable differencies in this regard.
Rare in Columbus notes are reports about the different way sexuality is lived in this newly met societies. The sex hungry sailors and soldiers where met by girls and young women without restraint, but apparently there was no understanding of the kind of marriage bonding, which led later to the murder of all the left Christians at La Navidad. "Many (of my sailors) do not wish to return back to Spain, especially those, who found out, that they only have to reach out for the girls" 8) But he adds a question to himself, what would happen when they take the indians wifes? There is an amusing story (Logbook January 23, 1493) when he writes about an indian girl and her two sailor-lovers, who struggled heavily with each other and had to be laid in chains. The weeping girl came to the General Captain and asked for them to be released, since she loved both of them dearly.
There is one small remark about a very important difference between European and West Indian worlds: during his second voyage he notes, "… the Indians, the Admiral brought from Isabela, promptly seized anything that pleased them and the owners showed no sign of resentment. They seemed to hold all posessions in common."
On his second voyage there was a Fray Ramón Pane with him, who must have been one of the very early anthropologists, Columbus cites from this man's notes, but we do not know more about those notes. The few paragraphs Columbus wrote down after his second voyage give at least some idea what in Pane's text might have been described!
As Birgit Scharlau 9) states very clearly "With Columbus the seeds for a colonial version of the transantlantic reality have been laid." Knowledge about these first contacts with foreign societies was distributed with copies of the original letters, by what was called 'zeytungen' (in German), by organised sending of informative letters to interested persons, like those of the Fugger's, an early capitalist organization founded and working from southern Germany (Augsburg), leading many 'offices' in northern Italy, and single page prints similar to our handouts.10)
Already 1494 (!), when Sebastian Brant's "The Fool's Ship" was printed he mentioned naked human beings and "golden" islands, this is just one example how fast the knowledge spread about the newly discovered countries in the west
When we turn our attention to another one of the earliest investigators of the central and south American coast and the people living there we have to name Amerigo Vespucci of Florence, Italy, who conducted three voyages 11) in the years between 1499 and 1504, again described in the Four Voyages (lettera) 12), naturally not protected by any 'copyright' and full with the ideas of the copist. Especially I would like to mention his reports about the South American Tupi, or more correctly Tupinambá, a larger group of an indigene people living in the lowlands, and living in well organized farming societies of about 200 persons each.
But in 1507 his journey report "mundus novus" (about his third voyage) and the "Lettera"were published in a major book "Cosmographiae introductio" edited by the cosmograph Matthias Ringmann, published by Martin Waldseemueller in Latin and accompanied by a globe and a large world map. There the name for the newly found continent was stamped for the times to come, since Waldseemueller used the Latin version 'Americus Vespucius'! With this book a much larger number of European scholars and philosophers had a wealth of information about the new countries. But let us not forget, that the way the contacts and reports where made: these investigators and voyagers had their Christian outlook, they carried the European mythological view to the West and only a few were able to see differencies in an unbiased light. There are, however, already some lines in Vespucci's letters, like when he talks about common property, societal wealth and contempt of gold in those societies he met. But still with the small openings and a background of Greek philosophy some of the eminent European thinkers could be induced to think again of a new Atlantis, an Utopia.
The humanist movement in Europe, however, had its beginnings much earlier, some struggles of scholars with the medieval scholasticism started in Italy already in the 14th century, but it took another hundred years until these new ideas were brought to central Europe. The main content of the movement, worked out in the monasteries and by clergics, was to forget about the discussion of endless second commentaries and to read and comment the original literature in Greek or Hebrew. Already in 1499 a print in Greek appeared in Erfurt, Germany. Slowly the movement was reaching the wordly rulers, the most prominent ones were Charles the 4th in Prague and Albrecht the 2nd in Vienna. Between 1456 and 1506 eight new universities were founded in Germany alone. One of the main centers of humanism in Germany was the city of Muenster – we shall read further on of quite some other events there.
Soon humanism involved intellectuals and artists besides the universities, Marsilio Ficino founded in 1459 the Academia in Florence 13), which was mainly concerned with the works of Plato and was kept up until 1522, having a profound influence on other humanists in Europe due to its new translations of the originals into Latin 14). Smaller groups formed in many larger cities, like the Sodalitas in Nuremberg, the meetings were called "Stompitziana" after the organizer Johannes von Stompitz, and we know for sure the Albrecht Duerer was present at many of their evenings.
Outopia – Eutopia
(No Place – Good Place)
A detailed described Utopia should be a mirror to the real existing society showing its different ways of using resources, dealing with elite power, distribution of wealth, family organisation, crimes and punishment, and set in a far away country!
The first of these thinkers to work out a complete 'mirror' for his own society in England was Thomas More - as I proposed based on the new heard stories from the West (and for sure in the tradition of the newly started discourse over the Greek philosophers) – with the title of Utopia (No Place – Good Place). And here I must cite those lines of More, who belong to the base of my proposition: in a dialogue between More an his friend Peter in the beginning of his book: " More: 'The moment I saw him (e.g. a friend of Peter), I thought, he must be a sailor.' 'In that case you made a big mistake,' he (Peter) replied, 'I mean, he's not a sailor of the Palinurus type. He's really more like Ulysses, or even Plato. You see, our friend Raphael – for that's his name, Raphael Nonsenso – is quite a scholar. He knows a fair amount of Latin and a tremendous lot of Greek. He's concentrated on Greek, because he's mainly interested in philosophy, and he found that there's nothing important on that subject written in Latin, apart from some bits of Seneca and Cicero. He wanted to see the world, so he left his brothers to manage his property in Portugal – that's where he comes from – and joined up with Amerigo Vespucci.'" Then More and this Raphael went into the garden of More's hotel, sat down on a bench and began talking more freely. "…emphasizing the most instructive parts of his story, such as the sensible arrangements that he noticed in various civilized communities. These were the points on which we questioned him most closely, and he enlarged most willingly. …..but examples of wise social planning are not so easy to find. Of course, he saw much to condemn in the New World, but he also discovered several regulations which suggest possible methods of reforming European society…."15)
And after lunch they continued their talk on the same bench, and Raphael starts out in introducing the island myth as follows: "Well, the island is broadest in the middle, where it measures about two hundred miles across…." Due to the very wide reception of More's 'De Optimo Reip. Statu, deque noua insula Utopia 16)…’
I feel no obligation to discuss its content any further, as my main interest is in the renewal of utopian outlines including heavy critique against the state of the current societal state called up by the various reports from the New World.17)
But one exception: the views on communism in 'Utopia' and in other texts by More and his contemporaries (Erasmus) have certainly found more ground by the sometimes vivid descriptions of those who returned from the West.
The early reformation
Let me branch out to those men and women, who began to fight for a real life observing those utopian ideals. These movements in the beginning of the early reformative decades after 1500 where coming from a new interpretation of the New Testament and the now almost a hundred years tradition of humanism, started basically in the towns and were declining the current ways of the catholic church. All the well known reformers (as they orginally strove out to reform the catholic church) had very sincere ties with humanism, for Luther 18) this is well documented (see Junghans.H.) and Zwingli even had a long and deep communciation by letter with Erasmus. Since some of these reformative groups, being the more progressive branch of Reformation, demanded baptims for grown ups a general term was connoited for them: anabaptists. And their demand for a Christian life beyond the state, the share of production goods and the equal distribution of societal wealth onto all its members (communism) made them groups to be persecuted, expelled from the their home towns or countries, their prominent members killed in various terrible ways by the state authorities.
The two best documented historic events took place around Thomas Muenzer and, somewhat later, the city of Muenster, both in Germany.
So we are in no way looking back. But we intervene ourselves as
living ones…..Muenzer especially is history in its fruitful sense; he and
his own and all bygone, which is suited to be written down, is there to
commit ourselves, to enthuse us to support in ever wider ways the
continous comprehensive meaning for us . 19)
Thomas Muenzer was born 1489 and took up studies to become a priest. Most probably already in the second decennium of the 16th century he travelled throughout Mid-Germany as a preacher holding sometimes small office. Already during those years he did not conform to the regular catholic service traditions. He kept a small library, but always had the fixed opinion to be inspired from upon. Soon he was regarded as one of the reformers, and met with Luther in 1519. His thinking about freedom and the two 'kingdoms' – the worldly and the christian one – was, however, quite different from the main stream of the reformators. Convinced that it was God will to overthrow the old social order he promoted the establishment of a new egalitarean society which would practice the sharing of goods. All his revolutionary rhetoric, however, was filled with his spiritualism. He found a lot of followers in the lower social classes, but had to move restlessly from town to town, even to Prague, since the feudal local rulers had recognized him as one of their fiercest enemies. 1521 he nailed a long text "Intimatio Thomae Muntzeri manu propria scripta et affixa Pragae a. 1521 contra Papistas" in Latin, German and Czech to the (church) doors. Let us read some of his own lines: "I, Thomas Muenzer from Stolberg, together with the expected and eminent fighter for Christ, Johannes Huss 20), fulfilling the bright trombones with new singing, testify with a deep sigh before the Church of the Elected ones and the whole world, that Christ and his Elected ones give testimony to me, whom I had known since my childhood: that I used more intensive hard work over all others, who lived throughout my time, until I had been recognized to have reached a much more complete and rare science (sic!) of the insuperable and holy believe in Christ." 21)
The upraisal of the lower social classes in Germany – 'Die Bauernkriege' (The peon's wars) - started, Thomas was one of their leaders and was slaughtered after the failure of the first German revolution, having been tortured without reaching anything substantial, in Muehlhausen 1525.
The eminent German philosopher Ernst Bloch has published the first modern monograph about Muenzer in 1921 22), and there we find the following lines, closing our small hint about Muenzer:< br>
"...also the connections have been laid open with humanistic wideness and and comparative tolerance, with abbot Joachim's prophesies about a Third 'Reich'( = kingdom and other scripts). Generally Muenzer and the Anabaptists represent politically throughout the Left, the new, uncomprimising and radical principle of the reformation…" 23)
The various groups of the anabaptists had spread from Zurich throughout Europe, always mercilessly suppressed by the authorities, due to their belief in different ways of communal life, communism and the baptism after childhood. During the 'Reichstag' (The council of the Holy German Empire) in Speyer 1529 the death sentence was declared to everyone who would keep his anapbatism faith. Thousands of men and women were murdered during the coming decades. At Muenster in Germany some of the prominent Dutch anabaptist preachers 24) founded a Christian community in this town, based on the teachings of anabaptism, the reformers and the expectation of a close world ending, called the kingdom of the anabaptists.
During 1534 to 1535 the town was under siege from various associations between the bishop of Muenster and feudal lords. In the 'kingdom' the preachers achieved an (early) state communism, as all goods and other property were held by the council of the town, and distributed after its decisions, later on it became law, that all women would have to be married, so polygony was declared law! The interesting fact for us is that at least three of the leaders in Muenster, especially Jan van Leiden, came from the Netherlands. And in the Netherlands of those times – belonging to the Habsburg empire – many informations about the newly descovered Western islands and the American continent were available. 25) The siege lasted long, but finally the town was won by the coalition forces by betrayal on June 25, 1535. Hundreds of men were brutally killed, the women driven away, the leaders tortured and slaughtered. Their corpses were placed into baskets and hung into a church tower.
This event became the final note in Europe for the re-establishment of the catholic church and state accepted reformatism, and the rule of feudalism for the next few hundred years. Within the group of intellectuals, however, the examples of those small anabaptist communities were remembered until the times of the Enlightenment. Interestingly, that Hans Jacob Christoffel von Grimmelshausen, the eminent German novellist and poet of the 17th century encloses a (utopian) description of such a community into his major novel "Simplicius Simplicissimus" 26) , covering the brutality of the Thirty Years War in Germany. I am translating some of this chapter 27) "….So after this guiding principle (of theology) I invented a way to live for humanity, which could be more angelic than human, when indeed a community could be started consisting of married or single men and women, who intend in the way of the anabaptists (sic!), lead by a sensible chairman, to reach their physical maintenance by the work of their own hands and trying to reach the eternal bliss for their souls by praise of the Lord in their remaining time." Then follows a fictitious description of his visit with anabaptists in Hungary.
This situation in general left the room open for discussion only in theory, when utopian themes were on the table. And even there the various theoretical city-planners, architects and artists in the general sense were not allowed to distribute their ideas in freedom. Some of them received punishment, like Tommaso Campanella who was staying in chains for years.
So Utopia became a subject for theory alone, and I shall mention from these years in Europe in the beginning of the 16th century the following text, when the Thirty Years War devastated most of what is now Austria, Czech Republic, Germany and Western Poland.
In "The City of the Sun" 28) (Subtitle: A Poetical Dialogue between a Grandmaster of the Knights Hospitallers and a Genoese Sea-Captain, his guest) by the Dominican philosopher T. Campanella we find a similar structure as in the Atlantis myth told by Plato and the More's Utopia. Besides the detailed description of his Sun City Campanella views the structure of the society there as a mild dictatorship of a priest, called 'Metaphysic', assisted by a fundamental association of scientists, called doctors, of all known science branches. "…an they (this race of men) are determined to lead a philosophical life in fellowship with one another. Although the community of wives is not instituted among the other inhabitants of their province, among them it is in use after this manner: All things are common with them, and their dispensation is by the authority of the magistrates. Arts and honors and pleasures are common, and are held in such a manner that no one can appropriate anything to himself." 29) And further on: "But with them all the rich and the poor together make up the community. They are rich because they want nothing, poor, because they possess nothing; and consequently they are not slaves to circumstances, but circumstances serve them."
The last book I like to mention is the well known "Nova Atlantis" 30) of 1627 by Francis Bacon ( 1561 – 1626). In his story, finished after his death by his secretary, a group of sailors finds an extreme wellcome at an island not known in other parts of the world. During their initation on this island, named Bensalem (a state), the history is revealed to them, including the story of Atlantis, Coya (Peru) and Tyrambel (Mexico). In various sequences the storyteller is confronted with the many wonderful ways of living in Bensalem, including the customs and laws of marriage, until the Father of Solomon's house talks to him about "The end of our foundation is the knowledge of causes, and secret motions of things; and the enlarging of the bounds of human empire, to the effecting of all things possible." From this lines onward the text is fully devoted to scientific fiction without any mentions towards the organization of the society or its rulers.
The main bulk of this work, which was appended to a larger volume called the "Sylva Sylvarum" or "The Natural History of Winds" is – as we see from the above short description – is beyond the scope of my small investigation. Let me cite a few lines by Manly P. Hall, from his forword of New Atlantis in 1985: " The Utopian idea seems to have gained ground as the result of the explorations of these navigators who brought home the first accounts of the civilizations of the Western Hemisphere. It was evident that the Aztec, Maya and Inca forms of government had strong democratic elements. They were highly socialized states, comparativly free from the tragedies which burdened Europe for ages. When Pizarro asked the Inca how criminals were punished in Peru he replied that he could not answer the question because there were no criminals. Bacon's New Atlantis describes the adventures of a seaman who departed from Peru and he may well have been influenced by the glowing accounts of the great cities of Central and South America."
Many acounts of travels in the newly discovered world areas were printed throughout the 16th century and later, showing the general interest in receiving direct information. An example is the book by Andreas Ultzheimer 31) including a number of his own drawings.
One very late echo of the reports from the areas beyond Europe may be the frontispiece of the "Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft" 32) showing an Indian Palm; the association was founded in 1617.
There is a great number of texts covering utopian societies or science fiction fantasies throughout the centuries until today, which, however, do not add any new point of view to our proposal. The early 19th century offered a concept of "Der edle Wilde" (The noble savage), a man from an "uncivilized" society, but surpassing his contemporaries of civilized societies in many a virtue. In this respect I have to mention also the various reports of mainly French early anthropologists in North America (and South America) who had a profound influence on the theories of a man like Rousseau 33) and then on the Founding Fathers of the USA,
Jean de Léry (1558 – Tupinambá), Jaque Cartier (1538 about the Hurons), Samuel de Champlains and Louis Armand de Lahontan.
Concluding I hope to have offered confirmation to my thesis of a renewed drive in utopian, communistic and religious areas of European thinking and political actions throughout the 15th and 16th century after the reports from Nueva Hispania were distributed by letters and books.
Hermann J. Hendrich, Vienna, © 2004
Literature:
Bacon F. (Lord Verulam) 'New Atlantis' (eBooks@Adelaide)
Bloch E. 'Thomas Muenzer als Theologe der Revolution' (1921) in Ernst Bloch
Gesamtausgabe Band 2, (1969 Suhrkamp Verlag Frankfurt am Main)
Brant, S., 'Das Narrenschiff' (1944 Zinnen-Verlag, Muenchen)
Campanella, T. 'The City of the Sun' transl. by Kirk Crady (The Alchemy Web Site)
Cohn, N. 'Das neue irdische Paradies' (rowohlts enzyklopaedie)
Columbus, Ch. 'Das Bordbuch 1492' ed. Robert Gruen (1970 Horst Erdmann Verlag,
Tuebingen und Basel)
Columbus, Ch. 'The Four Voyages' ed. and transl. by J.M.Cohen (1969 Penguin Books)
Junghans, H. 'Der junge Luther und die Humanisten' (1985 Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht in Goettingen)
Kohl, K.-H., ed. 'Mythen der Neuen Welt, zur Entdeckungsgeschichte Lateinamerikas'
(1982, Froehlich & Kaufmann, Berlin)
Luethi, K 'Calvinismus und Kapitalismus' in "Ueber Gesellschaft hinaus" (2000 Agsbach)
Marboe, R.A., 'Entdecker, Conquistadoren, Navigatoren' (2003 Mandelbaum, Wien)
More Th. 'Utopia' transl. by Paul Turner (1965 Penguin Books)
Plato 'Timaeus and Critias' translated by Desmond Lee (1965 Pinguin Books)
Scholl H. 'Reformation und Politik' (1976 Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart, Berlin, Koeln,
Mainz)
Strasser, R 'Die Taeufer von Zuerich 1525' (2000 www.efb.ch/texte)
Strasser, R. 'Muenster-Taeufer 1534-1535' (1995-1997 www.efb.ch/Texte)
Ultzheimer, A. 'Beschreibung etlicher Reisen 1596-1610' ed. Sabine Werg (1971 Horst
Erdmann Verlag, Tuebingen und Basel)
Used References:
archINFORM
Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon
Brockhaus Enzyklopaedie
Columbia Enycyclopedia
philosophenlexikon.de
Theologische Realenzyklopaedie
Wikipedia
1) In his introduction to his translations of Timaeus and Critias, Penguin Books, London 1965
2) This number and the following ones follow the concordance numbers in the Penguin edition.
3) Which reminds one of the German fairy tale Schlaraffenland.
4) Desmond Lee in Appendix on Atlantis in "Timaeus and Critias", Penguin Books, London 1971
5) Desmond Lee as above
6) "Narrative of the third voyage of Christopher Columbus to the Indies, in which he discovered the mainland, dispatched to the sovereigns form ther island of Hispaniola."
7) Punta del Aguja
8) Logbook January 20, 1493
9) in "Mythen der Neuen Welt, Zur Entdeckungsgeschichte Lateinamerikas", Berlin 1982
10) I must bring here a thought by René Alexander Marboe, when he mentions the simultaneous destruction of the Maya and Aztec codices, causing the end of their cultural identities, and the rise of the European book printing, causing in using the universal language of Latin a new unity amongst European scholars and interested laymen.
11) The first voyage as described in the letters (written most probably by Piero Soderni on basis of original letters by Vespucci and inventing the first voyage in 1497) did not take place in reality.
12) "It may have been the publication and wide-spread circulation of his letters…." Wikipedia, 'Amerigo Vespucci'
13) With consent and monetary help by Cosimo de'Medici, the ruler of Florence during thos years.
14) Let's not forget, that Latin was the universal scientific language during tho centuries!
15) "Utopia" translated by Paul Turner, Penguin Books, London 1965
16) Underligned in the original title!
17) See also Marboe, R.A., "Entdecker, Conquistadoren, Naviatoren p388 ff
18) Luther wrote an exegese about Erasmus's 'Novum Instrumentum…'., around 1516 he sought friendship with Erasmus by letter
19) Ernst Bloch, "Thomas Münzer as the theroretician of the revolution" preface
20) Johannes Huss, (Jan Hus), 1369 – 1415, Czech religious reformer, became a national martyr when he was burned at the stake during the Council of Constance. Despite the absolute importance of this religious leader I am unable to have more than this mentioning due to space available.
21) Translated by the author
22) "Thomas Münzer als Theologe der Revolution" Munich 1921 Kurt Wolff
23) Translated by the author
24) names may be irrelevant, but I would like to mention Bernhard Rothmann, Jan Matthijs, Bernd Knipperdollinck, Bernd Kechtinck and Jan van Leiden.
25) For instance: Albrecht Duerer, the artist, travelled to the Netherlands for first viewing of the rare imports from the new West.
26) First edition appeared in 1668
27) 19th chapter, in which Simplicius starts to study books
28) written in Italian as "la cittá del Sole" in 1602, shortly after Campanella's imprisonment for heresy and sedition a Latin version written 1613-14 was published in Frankfurt 1623.
29) This reads like some one benevolent to the Muenster Kingdom would report about this event, which happened, as we know, almost a hundred years earlier.
30) "New Atlantis/Begun by the /Lord Verulam/Viscount St. Albans:/and/Continued by R.H.Esquire./Wherein is Set forth/A Platform/of/Monarchial Government./With/A Pleasant intermixture of diverse rare Inventions,/and wholsome Customes, fit to be introduced/into all kingdoms, states, and /Common-wealths./…"
31) "Beschribung ettlicher Raysen, wie dieselbige Hr. Andreas Josua Ultzheimer...." manuscript dated 1622
32) A German association founded to observe and improve the usage of the German language.
33) "Du contract social ou principies du droit politique" 1762