A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume II (of 2). Johann Beckmann. Читать онлайн. Newlib. NEWLIB.NET

Автор: Johann Beckmann
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Teatro di Machine ed Edificii, di Vittorio Zonca. Padoua, 1621, and reprinted in 1656, fol. The greater part of the machines delineated in this scarce book are engines for raising heavy bodies; but many of them are used in various trades and manufactures, and may serve in some measure to illustrate the history of them.

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J. M. Beyer’s Schauplatz der Mühlen-Bau-kunst. Leipzig, 1735, fol. Reprinted at Dresden, 1767.

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All those authors who have written expressly on the fate of the Huguenots, the History of Richelieu, Louis XIII., and the siege of Rochelle, make mention of Targone.

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Histoire de la Milice Françoise, par Daniel. Amst. 1724, i. p. 332.

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L’Hoggidi, overo gl’Ingegni non inferiori a’ passati. Ven. 1636, 8vo.

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Kriegsbuch, Frankf. 1596, fol. p. 9.

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The works in which this subject has been already treated are the following: – Eberhartus de Weihe, de Speculi origine, usu et abusu. A compilation formed without taste, of which I gave some account in the Article on Chimneys. – Spanhemii Obs. in Callimachi hymn. lavacr. Palladis, p. 615. – Académie des Inscriptions, t. xxiii. p. 140. – Recherches sur les Miroirs des Anciens, par Menard. A short paper, barren of information. – Saggi di Dissertazioni Accad. dell’ Accad. Etrusca dell’ città di Cortona, vii. p. 19: Sopra gli Specchi degli Antichi, del Sig. Cari. A translation from the French, with the figures of some ancient mirrors. It contains an explanation of some passages in Pliny, where he seems to speak of a mirror formed of a ruby, and some conjectures respecting the mirror of Nero. An anonymous member of the Academy, in an appendix, confirms the former, and considers the latter, very properly, as improbable. – Caylus, Recueil d’Antiquités, iii. p. 331, and v. p. 173. A description and figures of ancient mirrors, with some chemical experiments on their composition. – Amusemens Philosophiques. Par le père Bonaventure Abat. Amst. 1763, 8vo, p. 433: Sur l’Antiquité des Mirroirs de Verre. A dissertation worthy of being read on account of the author’s acquaintance with the ancient writers, and his knowledge of technology; but he roves beyond all proof, and employs too much verbosity to decorate his conjectures.

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Passages of the poets, where female deities and shepherdesses are represented as contemplating themselves in water instead of a mirror, may be found in the notes to Phædri Fab. i. 4, in the edition of Burmann.

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Chap. xxxvii. ver. 18.

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Exodus, chap. xxxviii. ver. 8.

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Historia Vitri apud Judæos, in Comment. Societat. Scient. Gotting. iv. p. 330. Having requested Professor Tychsen’s opinion on this subject, I received the following answer: – “You have conjectured very properly that the mirrors of the Israelitish women, mentioned Exod. xxxviii. 8, were not employed for ornamenting or covering the washing-basins, in order that the priests might behold themselves in them; but that they were melted and basins cast of them. The former was a conceit first advanced, if I am not mistaken, by Nicol. de Lyra, in the fourteenth century, and which Michaelis himself adopted in the year 1754; but he afterwards retracted his opinion when he made his translation of the Old Testament at a riper age. In the Hebrew expression there is no ground for it; and mirrors could hardly be placed very conveniently in a basin employed for washing the feet. I must at the same time confess that the word (מראת) which is here supposed to signify a mirror, occurs nowhere else in that sense. Another explanation therefore has been given, by which both the women and mirrors disappear from the passage. It is by a learned Fleming, Hermann Gid. Clement, and may be found in his Dissertatio de Labro Æneo, Groning. 1732, and also in Ugolini Thesaurus, tom. xix. p. 1505. He translates the passage thus: Fecit labrum æneum et operculum ejus æneum cum figuris ornantibus, quæ ornabant ostium tabernaculi. This explanation however is attended with very great difficulties; and as all the old translators and Jewish commentators have here understood mirrors; and as the common translation is perfectly agreeable to the language and circumstances, we ought to believe that Moses, not having copper, melted down the mirrors of his countrywomen and converted them into washing-basins for the priests.”

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Oneirocrit. lib. iii. cap. 30. p. 176.

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Joh. Sarisberiensis, i. cap. 12.

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Plin. lib. xxxiii. cap. 9. Seneca, Quæst. Nat. i. cap. 5.

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Vita Probi, cap. iv. p. 926: “Patinam argenteam librarum decem specillatam.” Salmasius chooses rather to read specellatam. I am inclined to think that this word ought to be read in Suetonius instead of speculatum, where he speaks of an apartment which Horace seems to have been fond of. That historian, in his Life of Horace, says, “Ad res venereas intemperantior traditur: nam speculato cubiculo scorta dicitur habuisse disposita, ut quocunque respexisset, ibi ei imago coitus referretur.” Lessing, who in his Miscellanies (Vermischten Schriften, Berlin 1784, 12mo, iii. p. 205) endeavours to vindicate the poet from this aspersion, considers the expression speculatum cubiculum, if translated an apartment lined with mirrors, as contrary to the Latin idiom, and thinks therefore that the whole passage is a forgery. Baxter also before said that this anecdote had been inserted by some malicious impostor. This I will not venture to contradict, but I am of opinion that specillatum or specellatum cubiculum is at any rate as much agreeable to the Roman idiom as patina specillata. This expression Salmasius and Casaubon have justified by similar phrases, such as opera filicata, tesselata, hederata, &c. The chamber in which Claudian makes Venus ornament herself, and be overcome by the persuasion of Cupid, was also covered over with mirrors, so that whichever way her eyes turned, she could see her own image. Did Claudian imagine that this goddess knew how to employ such an apartment, not only for dressing, but even after she was undressed, as well as Horace? I have seen at a certain court, a bed entirely covered in the inside with mirrors.

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Iliad. lib. xiv. ver. 166.

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Hymnus in Lavacrum Palladis, v. 15, 21. It was however customary to ascribe a mirror to Juno, as Spanheim on this passage proves; and Athanasius, in Orat. contra Gentes, cap. xviii. p. 18, says that she was considered as the inventress of dress and all ornaments. Should not therefore the mirror, the principal instrument of dress, belong to her? May it not have been denied to her by Callimachus, because he did not find it mentioned in the description which Homer has given of her dressing-room?

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De Natur. Deorum, iii. 22.

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Licetus de Lucernis Antiq. lib. vi. cap. 92.

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Lib. xxxiv. cap. 17, p. 669.

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Quæst. Nat. at the end of the first book.

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Mostell. act i. sc. 3. v. 101.

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Arrianus in Epictet. i. cap. 20, p. 79.

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Among the remaining passages of the ancients with which I am acquainted, in which mention is made of silver mirrors, the following deserves notice. Chrysostom, Serm. xvii. p. 224, who, in drawing a picture of the extravagance of the women, says, “The maid-servants must be continually importuning the silversmith to know whether their lady’s mirror be yet ready.” The best mirrors therefore were made by the silversmiths. It appears that the mirror-makers at Rome formed a particular company; at least Muratori, in Thesaur. Inscript. Clas. vii. p. 529, has made known an inscription in which collegium speculariorum is mentioned. They occur also in Codex Theodos. xiii. tit. 4, 2. p. 57, where Ritter has quoted more passages in which they may be found. But perhaps the same name was given to those who covered walls with polished stones, and in latter times to glaziers.

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Lib. xxxiii. c. 9. p. 627, and lib. xxxiv. c. 17, p. 669.

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Philosophical Transactions, vol. lxvii. p. 296.

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Quomodo