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' (in English, ''Natural Magic'') is a work of popular science by
Giambattista della Porta Giambattista della Porta (; 1535 – 4 February 1615), also known as Giovanni Battista Della Porta, was an Italian scholar, polymath and playwright who lived in Naples at the time of the Renaissance, Scientific Revolution and Reformation. Giamb ...
first published in
Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...
in 1558. Its popularity ensured it was republished in five
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
editions within ten years, with translations into Italian (1560), French, (1565)
Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...
(1566) and English (1658) printed. ''Natural Magic'' was revised and considerably expanded throughout the author's lifetime; its twenty books (Naples 1589) include observations upon
geology Geology () is a branch of natural science concerned with Earth and other astronomical objects, the features or rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Ea ...
,
optics Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behaviour and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behaviour of visible, ultrav ...
,
medicine Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pr ...
s, poisons, cooking, metallurgy, magnetism,
cosmetics Cosmetics are constituted mixtures of chemical compounds derived from either natural sources, or synthetically created ones. Cosmetics have various purposes. Those designed for personal care and skin care can be used to cleanse or protect ...
,
perfume Perfume (, ; french: parfum) is a mixture of fragrant essential oils or aroma compounds (fragrances), fixatives and solvents, usually in liquid form, used to give the human body, animals, food, objects, and living-spaces an agreeable scent. Th ...
s,
gunpowder Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate (saltpeter). Th ...
, and invisible writing. ''Natural Magic'' is an example of pre- Baconian science. Its sources include the ancient learning of
Pliny the Elder Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/2479), called Pliny the Elder (), was a Roman author, naturalist and natural philosopher, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the emperor Vespasian. He wrote the encyclopedic ' ...
and
Theophrastus Theophrastus (; grc-gre, Θεόφραστος ; c. 371c. 287 BC), a Greek philosopher and the successor to Aristotle in the Peripatetic school. He was a native of Eresos in Lesbos.Gavin Hardy and Laurence Totelin, ''Ancient Botany'', Routle ...
as well as numerous scientific observations made by Della Porta.


Author

Giambattista della Porta Giambattista della Porta (; 1535 – 4 February 1615), also known as Giovanni Battista Della Porta, was an Italian scholar, polymath and playwright who lived in Naples at the time of the Renaissance, Scientific Revolution and Reformation. Giamb ...
(also known as John Baptist Porta) was born in Vico Equense, Italy, between October 3rd and November 15th, 1535 and was the second of three sons. The Porta family belonged to the ancient nobility of Solerno, granting them a modest fortune until Giambattista’s father, Nardo Antonio della Porta entered the service of Emperor Charles V in 1541. This allowed the family to alternate residences between Vico Equense and Naples. The nature of Giambattista’s formal education is unknown. Only two of Giambattista’s teachers have been identified: Antonio Pisano, a royal physician in Naples, and Domenico Pizzimenti, a translator of
Democritus Democritus (; el, Δημόκριτος, ''Dēmókritos'', meaning "chosen of the people"; – ) was an Ancient Greek pre-Socratic philosopher from Abdera, primarily remembered today for his formulation of an atomic theory of the universe. No ...
. It is believed that he was largely self-taught with an informal education that consisted of jovial discussions of scientific and pseudoscientific topics. Giambattista began collecting ‘secrets of nature’ when he was just fifteen. These secrets were eventually compiled and made into the twenty books of Natural Magic. The Acadéemies of Naples were shut down in 1547 due to ‘political intrigue’ and did not reopen until 1552, just six years before the original publication of Natural Magic. Della Porta had many friends in Naples’ most prestigious academies, and he even opened one himself sometime before 1580: Accademia dei Segreti. Academics gathered in della Porta’s home and discussed the ‘secrets of nature’. Later in life, della Porta became associated with Rome’s Accademia dei Lincei. He had a close relationship with its founder, Frederico Cesi and even wrote a compend of his family history. Porta’s reputation soared in the academy and he was second only to Cesi, until the enrollment of Galileo to the academy in 1611. In the same year, della Porta was entered into Oziosi in Naples, the city’s most renowned literary academy. Natural Magic was Giambattista’s first book and the one that he is best known for. It was first published as a treatise in 1558. This treatise included four books and presented ‘Magiae Naturalis’ as the “perfection of natural philosophy and the highest science.”¹ This was the basis of the twenty book edition published in 1589. It is a remarkable culmination of the credulity and curiosity of the late Renaissance, and is the basis of Giambattista’s reputation. Della Porta did attempt to depart from the marvellous curiosities of natural magic for the study of mathematics. He was interested in optics and was a contemporary of Galileo in the development of the principles behind the telescope. In Book XVII of Natural Magic, Giambattista is the first to add a concave lens to the already invented ‘
camera obscura A camera obscura (; ) is a darkened room with a small hole or lens at one side through which an image is projected onto a wall or table opposite the hole. ''Camera obscura'' can also refer to analogous constructions such as a box or tent in w ...
’. He experimented with both convex and concave lenses in order to clarify the image of the lens and to provide a mathematical explanation for their refractive properties. Giambattista was actually theorized to have priority in the invention of the telescope, but he reveals his secondary position to Galileo in an unpublished treatise that fails to discuss anything other than his contemporary’s work. Little is known about the marriage of Giambattista della Porta except that it produced a single daughter. Della Porta was known to have persistent ailments, often caused by anxiety. These included fevers that confined him to bed for months. Giambattista died on February 4, 1615 in Naples.


Contents

In Giambattista’s preface to Natural Magic he writes, “...if ever any man laboured earnestly to discover the secrets of Nature, it was I; For with all my mind and power, I have turned over the monuments of our ancestors, and if they wrote anything that was secret and concealed, that I enrolled in my catalogue of rarities.” Della Porta intended to compile the secrets of nature. However, Giambattista was skeptical of the discoveries of the past and insisted on making his own through experimentation. Again in his preface he says, “In our method I shall observe what our ancestors have said; then I shall show by my own experience, whether they be true or false…” Giambattista describes two different types of magic in Chapter II of Book I. The first is an evil thing having to do with spirits. He calls this sorcery. “The other Magick is natural; which all excellent wise men do admit and embrace, and worship with great applause; neither is there anything more highly esteemed, or better thought of, by men of learning.” This is the magic that della Porta dedicates his studies to.


See also

*
Natural magic Natural magic in the context of Renaissance magic is that part of the occult which deals with natural forces directly, as opposed to ceremonial magic which deals with the summoning of spirits. Natural magic sometimes makes use of physical substa ...
*
White magic White magic has traditionally referred to the use of supernatural powers or magic for selfless purposes. Practitioners of white magic have been given titles such as wise men or women, healers Alternative medicine is any practice that aims t ...


References


External links


Natural Magic online
(archived fro

on 16 April 2018)
Natural Magick
From the Collections at the Library of Congress 1558 books Science books 16th-century Latin books {{sci-hist-book-stub