''Protogaea'' is a work by

Gottfried Leibniz Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (or Leibnitz; – 14 November 1716) was a German polymath active as a mathematician, philosopher, scientist and diplomat who is credited, alongside Isaac Newton, Sir Isaac Newton, with the creation of calculus in ad ...

on geology and natural history. Unpublished in his lifetime, but made known by

Johann Georg von Eckhart Johann Georg von Eckhart (7 September 1664 – 9 February 1730) was a German historian and linguist. Biography Eckhart was born at Duingen in the Principality of Calenberg. After preparatory training at Schulpforta, he went to Leipzig, where a ...

in 1719, it was conceived as a preface to his incomplete history of the House of Brunswick.

Life

''Protogaea'' is a

history of the Earth The natural history of Earth concerns the development of planet Earth from its formation to the present day. Nearly all branches of natural science have contributed to understanding of the main events of Earth's past, characterized by consta ...

written in conjectural terms; it was composed by Leibniz in the period from 1691 to 1693. A summary in Latin was published in 1693 in the Leipzig ''

Acta Eruditorum (from Latin: ''Acts of the Erudite'') was the first scientific journal of the German-speaking lands of Europe, published from 1682 to 1782. History ''Acta Eruditorum'' was founded in 1682 in Leipzig by Otto Mencke, who became its first edit ...

''. The text was first published in full in 1749, shortly after

Benoît de Maillet Benoît de Maillet ( Saint-Mihiel, 12 April 1656 – Marseille, 30 January 1738) was a well-travelled French diplomat and natural historian. He was French consul general at Cairo, and overseer in the Levant. He formulated an evolutionary hypoth ...

's more far-reaching ideas on the origin of the Earth, circulated in manuscript, had been printed.

Views

''Protogaea'' built on, and criticized, the

natural philosophy Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe, while ignoring any supernatural influence. It was dominant before the develop ...

René Descartes René Descartes ( , ; ; 31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650) was a French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician, widely considered a seminal figure in the emergence of modern philosophy and Modern science, science. Mathematics was paramou ...

, as expressed in his '' Principia Philosophiae''. Leibniz in the work adopted the Cartesian theory of the Earth as a sun crusted over with

sunspot Sunspots are temporary spots on the Sun's surface that are darker than the surrounding area. They are one of the most recognizable Solar phenomena and despite the fact that they are mostly visible in the solar photosphere they usually aff ...

s. He relied on the authority of Agostino Scilla writing about

fossils A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

to discredit the speculations of

Athanasius Kircher Athanasius Kircher (2 May 1602 – 27 November 1680) was a German Society of Jesus, Jesuit scholar and polymath who published around 40 major works of comparative religion, geology, and medicine. Kircher has been compared to fellow Jes ...

and Johann Joachim Becher; he had met Scilla in Rome a few years earlier. He took up suggestions of Nicolaus Steno that argued for the forms of fossils being prior to their inclusion in rocks, for stratification, and for the gradual solidification of the Earth.

Notes

External links

''Protogaea''
(1749, German), full digital facsimile from

Linda Hall Library The Linda Hall Library is a privately endowed American library of science, engineering and technology located in Kansas City, Missouri, on the grounds of a urban arboretum. It claims to be the "largest independently funded public library of sc ...

{{Authority control 1693 non-fiction books 1749 non-fiction books Books by Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz History of Earth science Geology books Natural history books Books published posthumously Fossils