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The Battle of the Astronomers: Johann Adam Schall von Bell and Ferdinand Verbiest at the Court of the Celestial Emperors (1660–1670)

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Abstract

The paper is focused on the two most outstanding figures among the Jesuit missionaries in seventeenth-century China: Johann Adam Schall von Bell and Ferdinand Verbiest. Schall aimed to introduce the telescope into Chinese astronomy, which was traditionally based on naked-eye observation and calculation. With the advent of the Qing dynasty, he became head of the Mathematical Board and director of the Imperial Observatory. Verbiest was called upon in 1660 to assist Schall in his project of reforming the Chinese traditional calendar. The political situation changed in 1661, with the Empire ruled by a regency hostile to the Jesuits, as were most of the mandarins at the observatory. This was the difficult context of the famous dispute between Yang Guangxian, Wu Mingxuan, and the two Jesuit mathematicians to compare the merits of Western and Chinese astronomy, which lasted from 1664 to 1669. What happened was more than a scientific contest and a court conspiracy: it was a cultural confrontation between the Jesuits and the traditionalist side of the ruling elite, which regarded the Europeans and their increasing influence as a threat for the Empire.

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Fig. 1

Credit: Courtesy of the Smithsonian Libraries

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Notes

  1. With the term “sextant” I refer to the astronomical sextant (mural or frame-based), a traditional device known from the Middle Ages and developed in late-tenth-century Abbasid Iran, depicting a sixth of a circle and used to calculate the elevation angle of a celestial body above the horizon. It was introduced in China by Uighur and Muslim astronomers and must not be confused with the maritime sextant, a doubly reflecting navigation instrument that was developed in early eighteenth-century Britain.

  2. This was the traditional European device; the Chinese only used equatorial armillas.

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Acknowledgements

My first interests in the scientific, cultural, and political contest between Chinese and Jesuit astronomers at the court of the early Qing emperors Shunzhi and Kangxi were raised by an international conference on Galileo in China, which took place at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence on November 17, 2009. Aim of the workshop was to discuss the transfer of scientific and technical knowledge from Europe to China by means of the Jesuit missionary network in the Far East, in particular the circulation of Galilean astronomy and mechanics in the Celestial Empire from the 1610s to the 1760s.

Special thanks to Miao Tian (Institute for History of Natural Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing), for having introduced me to what I called the “battle of the astronomers,” as well as for her reflections upon the pragmatic attitude of the Chinese scholars of the time toward Western science and technology, compared with their disregard for its philosophical-religious background and implications. I want to thank also Iwo Amelung (Goethe-Universität and China-Institut, Frankfurt am Main) for his extremely reach and fascinating talk on Chinese traditional optics and glass-making before and after the introduction of the modern telescope in the late 1610s.

I cannot forget the intense discussions on the notion of “enculturation” I had with my friends and colleagues at the Niels Stensen Institute in Florence, while working at a seminar on Europe and China 1610–2010 to celebrate the fourth centennial of Matteo Ricci’s death: father Ennio Brovedani S. J., Dario De Santis (University of Milan “Bicocca”), Stefano Miniati (University of Siena), Diego Varini (University of Parma), and Davide Zanichelli (Foundation Palazzo Magnani, Reggio Emilia).

I am also in debt to Catherine Jami (CNRS and EHESS, Centre d’Études sur la Chine Moderne et Contemporaine, Paris), for her precious suggestions before, during, and after my presentation at the 4th International Conference of the European Society for the History of Science (Barcelona, November 18–20, 2010, http://4eshs.iec.cat/); Antonella Romano (EHSS, Centre Alexandre Koyré, Paris), whom I had the pleasure to meet for the first time at the symposium Within Europe and Beyond Europe: The Jesuits as Circulators of Science, during the same conference; and my friend and colleague Pietro Daniel Omodeo (Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage, University “Ca’ Foscari” of Venice), for the stimulating discussions we had in Barcelona.

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    Stefano Salvia

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Stefano Salvia, PhD, is a research assistant in History of Science, Department of Civilizations and Forms of Knowledge, University of Pisa and a collaborator at the Galileo Museum – Institute and Museum of History of Science, Florence.

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Salvia, S. The Battle of the Astronomers: Johann Adam Schall von Bell and Ferdinand Verbiest at the Court of the Celestial Emperors (1660–1670). Phys. Perspect. 22, 81–109 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00016-020-00254-0

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