Despite their substantial differences in size, scope, genre, set-up and content, both works use the term anthropology in their title. The second, a tiny octavo booklet by the Milanese courtier Galeazzo Capra/Capella, comprises three elegant dialogues and appeared in Citation1533 in Venice from the presses of Manutius’ heirs.
The heavy, 250-folio learned treatise by the Leipzig professor Magnus Hundt was published in Citation1501. They represent the supposed archetypical differences between Northern and Southern Europe, between Latin and the vernacular and between Scholasticism and Italian Renaissance literature. The conclusion takes a closer look at the theoretical implications of my analysis of the quest for humanity.Īt first glance, it may seem odd to study Hundt’s Antropologium and Capra’s Anthropologia through the same lens, especially since both compete for the claim of having first promoted anthropology as an academic discipline. Finally, this contribution will demonstrate that both Hundt and Capra predominantly worked in the tradition of medieval authors, whose view of humankind and its possibilities was far less negative than what is often presented in scholarship on the Middle Ages.
Although neglected in secondary literature on Renaissance concepts of dignity, these anthropological treatises deploy much medical knowledge to buttress their portrayal of humankind. Then, it will argue that these early anthropological works are narrowly linked to Italian fifteenth-century treatises on human dignity and to sixteenth-century commentaries on natural philosophy. Starting with the study of Magnus Hundt’s Antropologium (1501) and Galeazzo Capra’s Anthropologia (1533), this article will first show that the comprehensive study of humankind ̶ with a focus on the unity of body and soul ̶ predates the Renaissance and has its roots in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages.
0 kommentar(er)
