Page - 152 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe

Chapter 3152 found in some—now lost—accompanying letter. Another possibility is that Hell was deliberately brief and dismissive regarding the reliability of Hoff- mann’s observation. After all, this “friendly” colleague was not only Lutheran but a high-profile propagandist at that: Hoffmann was the man who in 1756 published the account of Johann Ludewig, the “learned farmer” in Protestant Saxony, to which Hell and Weinhart offered their portrait of Peter Anich as a Catholic counterpart.42 Preceding the twenty-two pages on Germany, there are thirteen pages cov- ering “observations made in Italy.”43 Again, Hell’s Jesuit network emerges from these pages clearly. In Bologna, a group dominated by Jesuit astronomers and spearheaded by the observatory director Zanotti had produced a report that Hell reprinted, interspersed with his own comments, over nearly six pages. Similarly, two-and-a-half pages from a printed report by Leonardo Ximenez (1716–86) in Florence was found worthy of insertion. Again, the depiction of cutting-edge observational astronomy as a largely Jesuit affair is striking. The sheer amount of space devoted is quite spectacular, given that several places, such as Padua (where a substantial group of Jesuits had prepared themselves) and Venice (where perhaps the most famous of all, Boscovich, was present), had overcast weather. Furthermore, some places had not yet submitted any report to Vienna, such as Milan, where—as Hell points out—a team of Jesuit astronomers ran the famous Brera Observatory. One may interpret this name- dropping as a sign of Hell’s eagerness to demonstrate the importance of Jesuit science to the project. The close political and dynastic relations between Habsburg-ruled Vienna and various Italian territories may also have influenced the imperial astronomer’s account. In Hell’s 1761 transit of Venus report, we find that Jesuit, Catholic, and impe- rial concerns manifest themselves both in the selection of materials and in the space and nature of the commentary dedicated to the various observations. These concerns are mostly recognizable in regard of Habsburg, or at least Holy Roman, territories. The bias is less conspicuous, it partly even dissipates, as the concentric rings move farther away from Vienna. France is extolled as “the highly fertile parent and nurse of the most eminent astronomers of our age” and the Académie des Sciences as a “mother of astronomers.”44 Over the six- page coverage of Gallia, there is no particular Jesuit coverage. The emphasis on nobility and Catholicism, so visible in the account from Germany, is, however, 42 Ludewig, Der gelehrte Bauer. Mit D. Christian Gotthold Hoffmanns […] Vorbericht. Cf. above, 117–18. 43 Hell, “Observatio transitus Veneris […] 1761,” 49–61. 44 Hell, “Observatio transitus […] 1761,” 36–42 (quotations on 36).