Seite - 269 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe
Bild der Seite - 269 -
Text der Seite - 269 -
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.
Maximilian Hell (1720–92)
And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe
- Titel
- Maximilian Hell (1720–92)
- Untertitel
- And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe
- Autoren
- Per Pippin Aspaas
- László Kontler
- Verlag
- Brill
- Ort
- Leiden
- Datum
- 2020
- Sprache
- englisch
- Lizenz
- CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
- ISBN
- 978-90-04-41683-3
- Abmessungen
- 15.5 x 24.1 cm
- Seiten
- 492
- Kategorien
- Naturwissenschaften Physik
Inhaltsverzeichnis
- Acknowledgments VII
- List of Illustrations IX
- Bibliographic Abbreviations X
- Introduction 1
- 1 Shafts and Stars, Crafts and Sciences: The Making of a Jesuit Astronomer in the Habsburg Provinces 37
- 2 Metropolitan Lures: Enlightened and Jesuit Networks, and a New Node of Science 91
- 3 A New Node of Science in Action: The 1761 Transit of Venus and Hell’s Transition to Fame 134
- 4 The North Beckons: “A desperate voyage by desperate persons” 172
- 5 He Came, He Saw, He Conquered? The Expeditio litteraria ad Polum Arcticum 209
- 6 “Tahiti and Vardø will be the two columns […]”: Observing Venus andDebating the Parallax 258
- 7 Disruption of Old Structures 305
- 8 Coping with Enlightenments 344
- Appendix 1 Map of the Austrian Province of the Society of Jesus (with Glossary of Geographic Names) 394
- Appendix 2 Instruction for the Imperial and Royal Astronomer Maximilian Hell, S.J 398
- Bibliography 400
- Index 459