Matters of Exchange: Commerce, Medicine, and Science in the Dutch Golden AgeA new and unexpected history of the Dutch pursuit of commerce in the 16th and 17th centuries and how it triggered the Scientific Revolution In this wide-ranging and stimulating book, a leading authority on the history of medicine and science presents convincing evidence that Dutch commerce—not religion—inspired the rise of science in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Harold J. Cook scrutinizes a wealth of historical documents relating to the study of medicine and natural history in the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe, Brazil, South Africa, and Asia during this era, and his conclusions are fresh and exciting. He uncovers direct links between the rise of trade and commerce in the Dutch Empire and the flourishing of scientific investigation. Cook argues that engaging in commerce changed the thinking of Dutch citizens, leading to a new emphasis on such values as objectivity, accumulation, and description. The preference for accurate information that accompanied the rise of commerce also laid the groundwork for the rise of science globally, wherever the Dutch engaged in trade. Medicine and natural history were fundamental aspects of this new science, as reflected in the development of gardens for both pleasure and botanical study, anatomical theaters, curiosity cabinets, and richly illustrated books about nature. Sweeping in scope and original in its insights, this book revises previous understandings of the history of science and ideas. |
From inside the book
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... animal and human bodies depended on exacting methods for manipulating objects that were imported from other technical activities. The powerful and continuing interest in the medicine and natural history of the Indies came to be manifest ...
... animals, and plants: priests who stood in hot sands all day looking straight at the sun as well as forest-dwellers who lived from the scent of flowers alone.10 The islands further to the southeast, ''the Indies,'' were a region of even ...
... animals, herbs, shrubs, and trees, their economic and medical uses to humanity, and the investigation of the tools, costumes, customs, and beliefs of strange people.51 Pliny's remained a text much mined by authors of medieval ...
... animals, and minerals and their medical uses. The famous printer of Venice Aldus Manutius brought out a Greek edition of Dioscorides in 1499, and this was followed by a reliable Latin translation by the French medical humanist Jean de ...
... animals and fish, various kinds of earths, and roots. It contained, in short, all those things that are ''most beautiful, rare, and good,'' assembled into a one of the most exquisite and singular ''Universal Theaters'' of the age.90 It ...
Contents
1 | |
42 | |
82 | |
Four Commerce and Medicine in Amsterdam | 133 |
Five Truths and Untruths from the Indies | 175 |
Descartes in the Republic | 226 |
Seven Industry and Analysis | 267 |
Eight Gardens of the Indies Transported | 304 |
The Medicine of East Asia | 339 |
Sticking to Simple Things | 378 |
Eleven Conclusions and Comparisons | 410 |
Notes | 417 |
Bibliography | 473 |
Index | 537 |
Other editions - View all
Matters of Exchange: Commerce, Medicine, and Science in the Dutch Golden Age Harold John Cook No preview available - 2007 |