Table of Illustrations and Figures
Preface
PART ONE: MEMORY
Chapter One: A Reception History
The reception of Renaissance Platonism in German Studies
The reception of Renaissance Platonism in art history
The reception of Renaissance Platonism in the history of the
natural sciences
The reception of Renaissance Platonism in the history of
philosophy
Texts in a tangle
Chapter Two: The memory of Ficino north of the Alps
The laus Florentiae as a rhetorical topos in the work of German
humanists
The memory of Ficino’s person
Chapter Three: The diffusion of Ficino’s work in manuscript and print
Northern and Central European manuscript sources of Ficino’s
work
Ficino’s work in print
PART TWO:
THREE KEY CONCEPTS IN FICINO’S WORK:
ANCIENT THEOLOGY, MELANCHOLIA, CELESTIAL INFLUENCE
Chapter Four: The Ancient Theology in sixteenth-century Germany:
six case-studies
Conrad Peutinger
Johannes Murmellius
Johann Eck
Desiderius Erasmus
Laurentius Corvinus
Nicolaus Copernicus
Evaluating the implications of the Ancient Theology
Chapter Five: A manual for the scholarly life: De vita
Philipp Ulstad
Gulielmus Insulanus Menapius Grevibrugensis
Jason Pratensis
Medicine for the common man: Walter Ryff and Andreas Sommer
Georg Pictorius
Heinrich Rantzau
Gregor Horstius
Chapter Six: As above, so below. Astrology, seminal ideas and the
metaphysics of light
Johannes Rosenbach ( Johannes ab Indagine)
The great conjunction of 1524 and the universal deluge
Developments in astrological theory during the sixteenth century
Ficino as an enemy of astrology: Johannes Lange, Johannes
Lensaeus and Otto Casmann
Kepler, Schaerer, Feselius and the “new star” of 1604
The uses of astrology
Chapter Seven: Ficino and alchemy
Paracelsus
Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Paracelsians
Pseudonymous works
PART THREE:
STUDIES OF THE RECEPTION OF FICINO’S WORK
IN EIGHT GEOGRAPHICAL CENTRES
Chapter Eight: Tübingen and Stuttgart
Martin Prenninger
Johannes Reuchlin
Nicolaus Ellenbog
Chapter Nine: Nuremberg
Conrad Celtis, poeta laureatus
Johannes and Willibald Pirckheimer
The physicians of Nuremberg: Hartmann Schedel, Hieronymus
Münzer, Dietrich Ulsenius and Ulrich Pinder
The Nuremberg Poets’ School
Albrecht Dürer
Chapter Ten: Leipzig
Paulus Niavis
Johannes Landsberger
Jacobus Barinus
Matthaeus Lupinus Calidomius
Conrad Wimpina
“Laurentius” and the Tractatulus contra poetice detractores (c. 1505)
Astronomy and ethics: Conrad Tockler, Magnus Hundt and
Virgilius Wellendorffer
Chapter Eleven: Strasbourg and Sélestat
Johannes Geiler von Kaisersberg
Jacob Wimpheling
Johannes Adelphus Müling
Das buch des lebens (1505)
Lilium musice plane (1506)
De christiana religione (1507)
Margarita facetiarum (1508/1509)
Thomas Murner
Beatus Rhenanus
Chapter Twelve: Erfurt and Gotha
Nicolaus Marschalck
Heinrich Fischer (Aquilonipolensis)
Conrad Mutianus Rufus
Helius Eobanus Hessus
Chapter Thirteen: Cologne
Hermann Buschius
Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim
Oratio in praelectione Convivii Platonis
Oratio in praelectione Hermetis Trismegisti
De occulta philosophia
Chapter Fourteen: Wittenberg
Otto Beckman
Luther’s critique of the Ancient Theology
Later Lutheran attitudes towards the Ancient Theology
Philipp Melanchthon
Melanchthon on the distinction between philosophy and
theology
Universal harmony and astrology in Melanchthon’s thought
Melanchthon and the Neoplatonic metaphysics of light
Melanchthon’s reception of Ficino’s psychology
Responses to Melanchthon’s Ficinian psychology: Johannes
Placotomus, Matthaeus Dresser, John Woolton, Johannes
Stigelius and Wilhelm Adolf Scribonius
Ficino’s Letter of Truth and Protestant apologetic
The place of Ficino’s work in heterodox Lutheranism
Sebastian Franck
Samuel Eisenmenger (Siderocrates)
Valentin Weigel
The place of Ficino’s work in orthodox Lutheran scholasticism of
the seventeenth century
Chapter Fifteen: Switzerland
Johann Ulrich Surgant
Huldrych Zwingli
Heinrich Bullinger
Jean Calvin
Philology and printing in Basel
Revisions to Ficino’s Plato translation
Pietro Perna and the revision of Ficinos Plotinus translation
Editions of Ficino’s Opera omnia
PART FOUR:
CHANGING WORLDS, CHANGING MINDS:
FICINO’S WORK AFTER THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
Chapter Sixteen: Ficino’s ghost
Chapter Seventeen: The changing fortunes of Ficino’s theory magic
and dietetics from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century
Talismanic magic
The persistence of Renaissance cosmology and medicine
The survival of Ficino’s scholarly dietetics
Chapter Eighteen: Ficino and the encyclopaedists
Bartholom¤us Keckermann
Rudolph Goclenius
Johann Adam Scherzer
Tobias Pfanner
Jacob Masen
Johann Jacob Hofmann
Daniel Georg Morhof
Chapter Nineteen: Opposition to Ficino’s work
Literary objections to Ficino’s style
Philosophical objectios to Ficino: Giambattista Crispo, Andreas
Libavius and Henning Arnisaeus
Religious objections to Ficino: Ludwig Crocius, Johann Heinrich
Alsted and Christoph Besold
Objections in natural philosophy
Thomas Erastus
Nicolas Guibert
Daniel Sennert
Opposition to the Ancient Theology
The Casaubon affair
Continued defence of the Hermetica
The Ancient Theology and early modern religious issues
Opposition to Ficino’s medical theories
Opposition to Ficino’s theory of language: Abraham Mylius and
Johann Christian Frommann
The passing of the magical episteme
Conclusion
Bibliography
Abbreviations
Editions of Ficino’s works
Primary sources by authors other than Ficino
Secondary literature and reference works
Manuscripts
Index
