Page - 269 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe

269Observing Venus and Debating the Parallax Majesty.38 The printing process took its time, however, and not until February 8, 1770 could Hell present a copy of the work to its dedicatee.39 Immediately afterward, copies were distributed to learned societies and individual savants abroad.40 2 Accomplishment Contested During the eight months of secrecy between observation and publication, no foreign astronomer was given access to datasets from Vardø. This caused suspi- cion and even anger among some of Hell’s colleagues abroad. Most astronomi- cal datasets are useless unless they are compared with corresponding observa- tions from other sites, and this was true to an extreme degree as far as the eighteenth-century Venus transits were concerned. This was the last chance for more than a century to obtain data for the determination of that coveted measure, the solar parallax; and in 1769, those from the High North of Europe were, along with corresponding ones from the Southern Pacific, more precious than observations from anywhere else in the Old World. Because of such features, perhaps like no other scientific project of the age, the Venus transit enterprise embodied notions and practices of interpersonal dynamics associated both with the Republic of Letters and the ways in which it was understood to mirror the realities of complex, modern European societ- ies at large. With regard to its patronage and its composition, the expedition led by Hell was a counterpart of several dozen similar ones taking place simul- taneously all around the northern hemisphere, and a microcosmic version of 38 Sajnovics’s travel diary 1768–70 (wus), entry November 29, 1769: “When Reverend Father Hell asked him if he would allow the Observatio transitus Veneris that is going to be print- ed, to be dedicated to His Royal Name, the king answered: ‘That will be a pleasure to me.’” 39 Sajnovics’s travel diary 1768–70 (wus), entry February 8, 1770: “Around 4 o’clock, we went to the palace. At about 5 o’clock, His Highness the King opened the door. Honorable Fa- ther Hell offered him a copy of the Observatio. He accepted it very generously and in- spected it for a while. Then he kept talking for about half an hour, mentioning the north- ern light, the decrease of the sea level, the language of the Hungarians and the Lapps, etc., and finally, the quadrature of the circle. It emerged from all this that the king had been quite well informed concerning the works of Father Hell. He also demonstrated quite clearly that his own as well as the others’ expectations had been amply fulfilled.” 40 Hielmstierne to Johann Albrecht Euler in St. Petersburg, dated February 9, 1770 (archives of the Rossiiskaia Akademiia Nauk, hereafter: ran); Hielmstierne to Wargentin in Stock- holm, dated Copenhagen, February 10, 1770 (cvh). These examples corroborate a claim made by Hell in the “De parallaxi Solis […],” 110, that his Venus transit report was pub- lished in Copenhagen on February 8 and distributed by the post “to all academies” the next day.