What topic should I choose for my essay?

[MagisterCultuum]

Write an essay of 2000-2500 words analyzing the treatment of at least one scientific field of inquiry/study in a work of Middle English literature (e.g. a poem, a play, a work of prose fiction) employing 3-5 secondary (scholarly) sources and paying attention to the literary (i.e. aesthetic, formal) qualities of the object text of your essay.

What would you suggest I choose?

The essay is due in 3 weeks. We also have to do a short (5 to 10 minute) presentation to the class, which can be either live (in which case it is due the same day as the essay) or a video posted on the class website (in which case it is due a week later).

 

[Camikaze]

John Donne's poetry has numerous scientific references (eg. 'At the round Earth's imag'nd corners', referring to the newly ascendant idea that the Earth was round). I don't know if it would be enough, though.

 

[Plotinus]

Erm, everyone knew that the world was round in John Donne's day, and they had done so since antiquity. In fact I know of only two authors of the first millennium AD (Lactantius and Cosmas Indicopleustes) who denied it, and none of the second. Plus, of course, Donne wrote in modern English, not Middle English.

I must admit that I can't think off-hand of any text that satisfies the description given. Your best bet might be to look for something in Chaucer but I don't know what.

 

[sydhe]

I have a suggestion. See if you can find one of these
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bestiary

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I could choose a bestiary. Actually, today the professor recommended that those of us who haven't picked something yet look into bestiaries.

I have to read this bestiary for class on Tuesday anyway. I believe we are allowed to choose a text we had to read anyway, as I know one guy in the class is doing his on Sir Orpheo, which we went over in class today.


Today in class he stated that it doesn't actually have to be presented as science in the work. We can also try to interpret things that are presented as magic in scientific terms, like arguing characters were afflicted by mental illnesses instead of by faeries.

 

[eastsidebagel]

The American Civil War. This one always hits the nail on its head.

 

[Camikaze]

Erm, everyone knew that the world was round in John Donne's day, and they had done so since antiquity.

But only since the Reformation was it accepted in religion. And that Donne poem was a Holy Sonnet.

Donne wrote in modern English, not Middle English.

Where is the split between the two? I would have imagined it would be roughly around Donne's time, but I have no idea, really.

 

[Dachs]

Where is the split between the two? I would have imagined it would be roughly around Donne's time, but I have no idea, really.

You stop getting Middle English around the end of the Wars of the Roses. Then it becomes Early Modern and Modern English.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

But only since the Reformation was it accepted in religion. And that Donne poem was a Holy Sonnet.

Not so. Technically the church didn't have a position on such matters (actually, I think it still doesn't), but most churchmen at the time considered Plato and Aristotle the next best thing to scripture. Also, there are plenty of bible verses that refer to the earth as an orb. The educated class and the clergy were essentially identical in the middle ages, so the church was most familiar with these ancient philosophies and recent developments built on ancient philosophies, all of which held the earth and other heavenly bodies to be spheres. The majority of references to a flat earth even in the first few centuries of the church mocked the idea. There are probably ore people alive today that believe in a flat earth than there ever were in the middle ages (largely becase there are more people total).

While the idea that the earth was (at least roughly) a sphere was almost universally accepted, it is true that it was held to be the center of the universe and to be stationary. However, the notion that the earth moved had been gaining popularity for about a century before Copernicus. Copernicus wasn't rejected until long after he was dead, even though his system's predictions were much less accurate than Ptomely's. Apparently, most astronomers didn't think it was posible for humans to come up with a system that was an accurate model of the heavens, but only to keep up appearances. In the mid 14th century Nicole Oresme had disproven all arguments against an earth that revolved on its axis except for the one about Joshua making the sun stand still, and had considered that it may refer to relative motion or a figure of common speech like it is thought of today. In the end he rejected a moving earth on spiritual grounds, but some people think that that part of the text was sarcastic. I believe I've read that the priest who prosecuted Galileo actually prefered a system in which the earth revolved around its own axis but was still the center of the universe, which makes Galileo's "but it does move" comment after recanting really no big deal. The church had more issues with his methods and hs disrepect for the pope than for his actual ideas.

For science, the renaissance was actually a big step backwards from the high middle ages.

Where is the split between the two? I would have imagined it would be roughly around Donne's time, but I have no idea, really.

Generally, Middle English is considered to be the language spoken from about 1066 to 1470. More isolated areas may have continued speaking old english and middle english longer though. In general rustic dialects tend to change much more slowly.

 

[Plotinus]

Galileo didn't really say "but it does move" at all. I think that the "compromise" theory you mention is that of Tycho Brahe, according to which the earth revolves around the sun and everything else revolves around the earth; this was quite a popular theory in the seventeenth century, especially among Jesuits. You are right, though, that the Galileo affair revolved around Galileo's methods rather than his theory itself. The thing that got him into trouble was not his idea that the earth revolves around the sun but his insistence that (a) scientific theories of this kind describe reality accurately, rather than merely model it for predictive purposes, and (b) he could actually prove that his theory did so correctly, because it explained the tides. Ironically, I think many scientists today would reject his (a), and his (b) was plain wrong (his explanation of the tides was nonsense).

That's a side issue though. You're entirely correct that the church taught that the earth is round. I would say that Donne's references to the "imagined corners" of the earth would be just a snide comment on the inaccuracy of the biblical verses that speak of its corners, not a reflection of some kind of new cosmological paradigm that was gaining ground when he was writing.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

No, I didn't know (or at least had forgotten) that about Brahe's theory. This particular class only covers medieval science, not the renaissance.

I was thinking more of the idea that the earth was at the center of the universe but rotated about its own axis, possibly instead of having the celestial sphere in motion. That was defended as possible (but not necessarily true) by Jean Buridan and Nicole Oresme in the mid 14th century. It was considered long before this, but most thought that the observation that an arrow shot straight up returns to the same spot disproved it. The 12th century texts we read clearly stated that a rotating earth was quite possible under the system of the classical elements, but just seemed unlikely. One author argued that it is much more reasonable for the earth to rotate than the heavens because the force needed to move the earth was far less than the force needed to move the whole celestial sphere.




Anyway, getting back on topic, are there any other suggestions or should I just go with a bestiary?

 

[civiijkw]

I'm not sure if Milton is in a time period that would work for you. It does mention some of the wepons of Satan (I remember somebody commenting that they had some similarity to tanks) and waffles on whether the sun goes around the Earth or vice versa.

 

[sydhe]

Milton would be too late. He and Shakespeare are Modern English. Middle English is more like Chaucer.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Yeah, Milton would be about 200 years too late. I'd want Chaucer era, but probably not a work by Chaucer himself. The professor said that the shear volume of works on Chaucer makes sifting through them all to find good scholarly sources difficult.


Your mention of weapons reminded me of the various inventions (including flying machines, direct energy weapons, etc) Roger Bacon proposed the church invests in trying to invent so as to defend against the armies of the antichrist. That wouldn't count as a work of fiction though, so it wouldn't fit the criteria. Also, Now that I think of it, it was all in Latin (which I could probably read, if typed or at least in better hand witting than was common at the time, but it wouldn't meet the language requirement.)

 

[sydhe]

In addition to bestiaries, there were herbals with plant remedies based on old theories.

 

[GoodGame]

Maybe google for something that brings up the Galen (ancient Greek medicine/biology)? Given that science would be kind of stalled for the M.E. period, that'd be fair game, no?

Or possibly something discussing the art of war engineering, gunpowder experiments, bombards, etc..