The Lunar Eclipse

The Annals of Clonmacnoise have an entry for 670 that reads "The Moone was turned into a sanguine collor this year." A red moon usually means a lunar eclipse. During a lunar eclipse, the Earth passes between the sun and Moon, causing the light on the Moon to appear sanguine, or blood-red.

The mechanics of eclipses were understood long ago. Babylonians over 3000 years ago had eclipses figured out, and even Isidore of Seville in the 7th century understood the process. (The illustration is a 14th century book showing the phases of eclipses.) Isidore knew that the lunar eclipse would only occur when the Moon was full.

Not everyone knew that this was a predictable and understandable phenomenon, however. A solar eclipse took place on 23 June 1191 in England, and the monk Richard of Devizes commented that those who saw it and did not know what scholars knew thought it was a sign of something ominous. Earlier, a lunar eclipse during the First Crusade showed a blood-red Moon over Jerusalem as the Crusaders approached. It was described as a sign of God's will. (This was reported later by Albert of Aachen, writing a history of an event he did not himself witness. Albert had no compunction against stating that a lunar eclipse portended a defeat for the Crusade's enemies, while a solar eclipse would have meant disaster for the Crusade.)

John of Salisbury warned against using eclipses as signs of future success or failure. Astronomy was fine, but using it to predict the future was as erroneous as soothsaying, astrology, and other such practices.

Bishop Thietmar of Merseburg also proclaimed that eclipses were not caused by evil incantations or the celestial bodies being eaten by demons or monsters. This is the only reference to the idea of the sun or Moon being "eaten" during an eclipse. We can't be sure if anyone really claimed this, or if Thietmar was just exaggerating the fears of the uneducated so that he could counter them.

An eclipse in 756 was described by Simeon of Durham in some detail:

Moreover, the Moon was covered with a blood-red color on the 8th day before the Kalends of December [i.e., November 24] when 15 days old, that is, the Full Moon; and then the darkness gradually decreased and it returned to its original brightness. And remarkably indeed, a bright star following the Moon itself passed through it, and after the return to brightness it preceded the Moon by the same distance as it had followed the Moon before it was obscured.

Simeon seems to be describing the occultation of a star during the eclipse.

John of Salisbury has been mentioned here before, but he said and did a lot that deserves attention. We'll look at him next time.

Medieval Germ Theory?

It was Ignaz Semmelweis in the 1840s in Vienna who noticed a link between illness (and death) and unsanitary conditions, specifically a link between women dying during childbirth who were aided by people who also were performing autopsies. He spent years trying to implement a universal handwashing policy. He did not know what was causing the deaths, but he saw a link to something.

Figuring out the cause of disease was a goal for anyone practicing medicine from the beginning of the discipline. Long before germ theory was developed, the miasma theory was proposed by Hippocrates (c. 460 – c. 370 BC): that some form of "bad air" or even "bad water" arising from rotting matter caused diseases like the Black Death, cholera, and other infections. This was an important move away from the theory of supernatural causes of illness. (There was also the idea of an imbalance in the body's natural humors.) The miasma theory allowed infection to pass through a population because of the environment, not from personal contact.

To counter bad air, you would naturally want "good air."  medical faculty of the University of Paris, writing in 1348 to explain the causes of the Black Death, said "The present epidemic or pest comes directly from air corrupted in its substance" and recommends incense which "hampers putrefaction of the air, and removes the stench of the air and the corruption [caused by] the stench."

Earlier, however, there were counters to the miasma theory.

The Classical Era and Middle Ages did have theories of person-to-person contact. Thucydides (c.460BCE - c.400CE) believed that the plague of Athens was being spread by personal contact. Galen (129 - c.200CE) referred to "seeds of plague" in the air. Isidore of Seville also mentioned "plague-bearing seeds." Avicenna (c.980-1037) was widely studied, and he linked the miasma theory with personal contact, believing an ill person could infect others by transmitting the "bad air" through breathing. His example was tuberculosis, and he believed that disease could also be transmitted through dirt and water, anticipating Semmelweis by 800 years.

Recent posts have mentioned Bologna as an important center for medical study, so it is not surprising that it was a professor of Bologna, Tommaso del Garbo (c. 1305–1370), who in 1345 promoted Galen's "seeds of plague" idea in his works

It took Girolamo Fracastoro in 1546, however, to publish De Contagione et Contagiosis Morbis ("On Contagion and Contagious Diseases"), three volumes on different diseases and their avoidance and treatment. He believed that there were particles that could travel through the air or by direct contact.

The idea that these "seeds of disease" were living things (what we call "germs") and traveling from one person to another was not being entertained, simply because there was a long-standing theory that living matter could arise spontaneously from putrefaction, and no one believed in invisible living things floating in the air. The belief that life could spring from rotting organic matter hindered understanding of bacteria already existing in the air around us. As it turns out, there were plenty of examples of Spontaneous Generation; let's talk about those tomorrow.

Who Were The Vandals?

Isidore of Seville (c.560 - 636) wrote Historia de regibus Gothorum, Vandalorum et Suevorum ("History of the Kings of the Goths, Vandals and Suevi"). From him we learn about some of the Germanic peoples that existed in the 7th century. They were noted earlier by Pliny the Elder, who used the term Vandilii generically for a lot of the Germanic tribes, as did Tacitus.

The Vandals appear on the "world stage" in 405CE when, moving long the Danube, they are stopped in their westward expansion by the early Franks. Gregory of Tours, with typical (we assume) medieval historian literary license, tells us that the ensuing Vandal-Frankish War resulted in the death of 20,000 Vandals, including their current king Godigisel. Godigisel's eldest son, Gunderic, then led the Vandals over the next few years into Gaul and thence to Iberia. In fact, some theorize that the term Al-Andalus used by the Umayyad rulers of Iberia from c.715 on may be an Arabism based on the word "Vandal."

Their swift advance through established kingdoms turned their name synonymous with ruthless destruction of anything good and beautiful.

They went into North Africa in 429, then led by Gunderic's half-brother Genseric, when the Visigoths entered the Iberian Peninsula. Genseric ruled the Vandals until 477, during which time he controlled the Roman province in Africa, as well as Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia, Malta, and the Balearic Islands Mallorca, Ibiza, etc.). Procopius, whose accuracy of reporting gave the West the secret of silk, wrote that the Vandals were actually invited to North Africa by the Roman general Bonifacius—unlikely, since he had previously fought them and was defeated by them again and again in the years to follow.

At one of these conflicts, a defeated Bonifacius barricaded himself and army inside Hippo Regius ("Royal Hippo" was so-called because it was one of the residences of Numidian kings). One of its most famous citizens, named for the place, was living there at the time; then he died, and the death of St. Augustine of Hippo was a turning point for the Western Roman Empire. Something had to be done about the Vandals in North Africa. I'll tell you what they did tomorrow.

The Etymologies of Isidore

The Etymologiae of Saint and Bishop Isidore of Seville (c.560 - 636) is an early encyclopedia that summarizes in 20 volumes all the knowledge that he considered important. It is most remembered and mentioned for the section on etymologies, but he also wrote about (or quoted from Greek and Roman sources) the trivium (grammar, rhetoric, logic) and quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy), law and medicine, the Church and various heresies, buildings and roads, materials and tools, war, foods, clothing, languages, pagan philosophers, architecture, and more. (Pope John Paul II named Isidore the patron saint of the Internet.)

His etymologies were worthy of the father in My Big Fat Greek Wedding who linked every concept to a Greek word. (The evidence suggests that Isidore was not well-versed in the Greek language.) Examples are that dominus (master) begins with "D" because so does domus (house), and a dominus is the master of a domus. Also, the Latin verb "to teach" is docere, which is related to docile (compliant) because compliant people can learn easily. He finds the origin of mendicus, the Latin word for beggar, in the Latin phrase manu dicere, "to speak with the hand," because (he says) there was an ancient custom for beggars to close their mouths and hold out their hand for food. Prostitutes (fornicatrix and fornicarius) are named from fornix, "arch," because they would hang about under an arch waiting for a client.

Among his other offerings:

—A table that explains family relationships ("Who is your second cousin twice removed?") and the terms for each family member.

—The classic "T" map of the world, the mappa mundi.  (The illustration is from a 10th century copy, showing such a map.)

—How the four elements make up the body:

But flesh is composed of four elements: earth is in the fleshy parts, air in the breath, water in the blood, fire in the vital heat. The elements are mingled in us in their proper proportions, of which something is lacking when the conjunction is dissolved.

—Bodily functions:

The mouth is compared to the door of the belly which receives and passes on food to the intestines through the esophagus which is near the windpipe, and which is closed off by the epiglottis during deglutition. 

The intestines are arranged in long circular entwinings so that food can be gradually digested. The abdominal viscera are separated from the heart and lungs by the diaphragm and covered by the omentum. Food, when first passed into the small intestine, is called jantaculum. The large intestine, the “blind gut,” is identified and it is pointed out that the gastrointestinal tract is open at each end. The rectum and anus are turned away from our faces to spare us the indelicacy of witnessing their evacuation.

—Medicine:

The poppy is the sleep-bearing herb, of which Vergil says [Georgics 1. 78]: Lethaeo perfusa papavera somno, ‘Heavy sleep, pressed out of the poppy,’ since it stupefies the sleeper. Some poppies are common; others are stronger, namely those from which flows the juice called opion.

...and many other topics, as mentioned above.

His Etymologiae was studied and copied and illustrated through the Middle Ages, and many versions of the manuscript exist in various museums.

One of the other notable things about Isidore is his family. His parents died early in the life of Isidore and his siblings, but all four children became saints; three became bishops. His older brother Leander has been mentioned, but not the rest. A brief look at his family next time.

Isidore of Seville

Isidore of Seville was probably born about 560, in Cartagena, Spain. His devout parents were both members of influential families that were involved in the conversion of the Visigoths to Catholicism from Arianism. The upbringing provided by his parents inspired Isidore and his siblings to enter the religious life, all of whom became saints.

He was educated at the liberal arts Cathedral school at Seville, learning the trivium and quadrivium. He mastered classical Latin and learned some Hebrew and Greek. Records are scarce about his early life and whether he ever joined a monastery, but in 619 he declared anathema harassing a monastery or monks. When his brother Leander, bishop of Seville, died in 600 or 601, Isidore was named his successor. He set about to eradicate any remaining traces of Arianism among the Visigoths, and was largely successful. He presided over a couple synods and a Council of Toledo.

His influence on the following centuries came more from his writings than his efforts against heresy. One was the De fide catholica contra Iudaeos, ("On the Catholic Faith against the Jews"). Like Augustine of Hippo, Isidore recognized the importance of the Jews because of their role in the Second Coming of Christ. In the Fourth Council of Toledo, however, he advocated removing children from the parents of "Crypto-Jews": Jews who were hiding their Judaism by acting as Christians. His argument was that the parents had probably had the children baptized as part of their subterfuge, and so educating the children as proper Christians was appropriate. (The Summa Theologica of Aquinas in the 13th century would state "it was never the custom of the Church to baptize the children of Jews against the will of their parents.")

He also wrote Historia de regibus Gothorum, Vandalorum et Suevorum ("History of the Kings of the Goths, Vandals and Suevi"), covering from 265 to 624.

He was the earliest Christian writer to try to summarize the knowledge of the world. His encyclopedic work, the Etymologiae, compiled his own thoughts with pieces from numerous Roman handbooks and miscellanies. It was so extensive (20 volumes with 448 chapters total)—one bishop described it as "practically everything that it is necessary to know"—that some of the works he drew from were no longer thought to be necessary to be copied and preserved.

The Etymologiae deserves its own treatment, which I will give it tomorrow.

The Spanish Come to Ireland

The 9th century Historia Brittonum (History of the Britons) tells of three invasions of Ireland from the Iberian Peninsula. The Partholón die of plague, the Nemedians return to Iberia, but the Milesians stay and become the Irish people. The Milesians are called that because they descend from a miles Hispaniae, sometimes called Miled. The settlers came with 30 ships, each of which held 30 wives.

According to the Lebor Gabála Érenn (The Book of the Taking of Ireland), written by Christians and incorporating Irish mythology, Noah's son Japheth had a descendant who was a Scythian king named Fénius Fairad, who was one of 72 chieftains who built the Tower of Babel. His son wed the daughter of an Egyptian pharaoh. Their son, Goidel Glas, invents the Gaelic language after the confusion in languages caused by Babel.

Goidel's descendants leave Egypt for Scythia, then leave Scythia and wander for 440 years, eventually reaching Iberia/Hispania. One of the settlers, Íth, builds a tower there so tall that he spots the island of Ireland. Íth sails there, meeting three kings/gods of the Tuatha Dé Danann. Íth is killed, his people return to Iberia; then the sons of Íth's brother, Mil, lead an invasion force for revenge.

Landing in Ireland, they meet three queens/goddesses of the Tuatha, one of whom, Ériu, prophecies good fortune for them if they name the Ireland after her (this is where we get the name Eire). The Milesians and the Tuatha meet and agree to a three-day truce, during which the Milesians must take to their ships and wait off shore. The Tuatha create a storm that prevents the ships from landing again, but a Milesian, Amergin, knows a magical verse that calms the storm. The ships return, and the agreement is made with the Tuatha that the Gaels will live above ground, and the Tuatha must live below ground.

Why the link to Iberia/Hispania, Spain? One reason might be the coincidental similarity between the names Iberia/Hiberia and Hibernia, as well as the names Galicia and Gael. Isidore of Seville made many erroneous (but widely believed) concordances based on words and his take on history. Isidore also described Iberia as the "mother[land] of the races" (we don't know why). Historians Orosius and Tacitus thought Ireland was situated between Iberia and Britain, and one modern scholar (read his essay "Did the Irish Come from Spain?" here) sees this as a reason to think that Irish arrivals would have started from Spain. 

In truth, DNA analysis shows close relations between modern Irish and northern Iberians. Hmm.

Regarding Isidore of Seville, whose works were considered the encyclopediae of his time and generations after: he has been mentioned, but has never been the subject of a post. I'll fix that tomorrow.

The Ostrogoths, Finally

To be fair, I have mentioned one Ostrogoth before: King Theodoric was talked about here and here. The larger culture of the Goths has been mentioned many times in this blog, but this particular group has been wanting attention. The "Ostrogoths" part of the name comes from Germanic auster meaning "eastern." Before descending on Italy, these "Eastern Goths" built an empire in the 3rd century stretching east to what is now Belarus and Ukraine; "many Ostrogothic graves have been excavated south and southeast of Kiev" [Britannica] It is believed that the difference between Ostrogoths and Visigoths is based on geography, with "Visi-" being tacked on by the Roman scholar/statesman Cassiodorus (mentioned in the first Theodoric link above).

Little is known of the Ostrogoths and Visigoths except through records from the cultures with whom they came in contact, mostly Roman. They left us no literature of their own, although we know they had their own spoken language: a Goth Christian Bishop named Wulfila (or a team working under him) designed a Goth alphabet based on Greek and used it to translate the Bible; I showed their alphabet here. A few additional Goth religious fragments exist. Other Gothic documents such as statements from Theodoric are in Latin.

Isidore of Seville wrote a history of the Goths, in which he tells us that, when they asked the Roman Emperor Valens to send them teachers to instruct them in the Christian faith, Valens (because he had strayed from the truth) sent them heretical priests who instructed them in the Arian heresy. Salvian of Marseilles, a 5th century writer in Gaul concerned with the decline of the Roman Empire, writes in his De gubernatione Dei ("On the government of God") about the vices of the Romans versus the virtues of the "barbarian" Goths. The Arian Goths are praised for the chastity, tolerance toward Catholics.

Sometimes a charismatic ruler is necessary to hold a nation together. When Attila the Hun died and his empire began to fall apart, the Ostrogoths grew in strength, especially under Theodoric, and expanded, eventually into Italy. But after Theodoric died in 526, the Ostrogoth control of Italy started to disintegrate, and the Emperor Justinian in the Eastern Empire saw his chance. He declared war on the Ostrogoths in 535. In the following two decades, much of Italy was damaged in the battles between the two armies. What is certain is that, after 554CE, no more Gothic texts are produced in Italy; the Ostrogoths seem to have lost their national identity.

Although I said I would touch on the Ostrogoths only before taking on the first Duke of Milan, I can hardly pass up the opportunity at this point in modern history to seize the opportunity given me by the Ostrogothic link to Kyiv.

Ultima Thule

A 1537 rendition of Thule

On New Year's Eve 2018, a NASA probe transmitted pictures of Ultima Thule, an object 4 billion miles from Earth. "Ultima Thule" is not your typical astronomical naming convention.

Ultima Thule, or the "ultimate Thule," was first described about 300BCE by a Greek explorer named Pytheas. It was supposedly about six days north of Britain, a place so far from the natural world that land and sea and air were no longer separate substances, but instead formed a strange mixture in which one could not survive.

A thousand years after Pytheas, Isidore of Seville (mentioned here, also involving astronomy) explained Ultima Thule as being so far north that there was no daylight beyond it, making the sea cold and sluggish.

As stories of explorers (verified or not) appeared, Thule was identified and re-identified with lands farther and farther from mainland Europe. St. Brendan's voyages suggested new lands that historians thought might refer to Thule. The later Middle Ages decided it must refer to Iceland or Greenland. In early modern times, Norway became the candidate to explain early stories of a land that far north.

In the 20th century, the idea of Thule was co-opted by certain German writers and politicians as the legendary origin of the Aryan race. Fortunately, the 21st century has given it a new connotation.

Leander of Seville

Commentary on Job being given from
Pope Gregory to Bishop Leander of Seville

St. Isidore of Seville (c. 560 – 4 April 636) has been mentioned here before as the author of a popular encyclopedia of information and etymologies. He was not the only saint in the family, however. His brother, Leander (c. 534 – 13 March 600/601), was also made a saint.*

Leander was Bishop of Seville (a position later held by Isidore), using his authority in political ways: he tried to convert Hermengild, the son of the Arian Christian King of the Visigoths in Spain, to Roman Catholic Christianity. Hermengild converted, his father King Liuvigild got angry, and suddenly Leander was exiled.

He traveled to the other end of the Mediterranean, where he continued to oppose Arianism by writing treatises against it. Here he met and became friends with the man who would later become Pope Gregory the Great, (mentioned here). The two remained in contact, and letters that passed between them still exist.

Hermengild, the rebellious son, was put to death by his father (and therefore became a martyr in the Catholic Church). Luvigild died in 589, and sometime after that Leander returned to Spain, convoking the Third Council of Toledo that renounced Arianism. Bishop Leander spent the rest of his life fighting heresy in Spain. When he died, in 600/601, Isidore became bishop in his place.

*As were their siblings, Florentina and Fulgentius.

From Scroll to Book

DailyMedieval has mentioned books several times, and it occurs to me that people might be asking themselves "When he says book does he mean scroll? When did the switch to binding flat pages take place?"

Surprisingly early, as it happens. The earliest examples of bookbinding are from India before the Common Era, where a sutra (from the word for "a rope or thread that holds things together") was made from palm leaves, written on, then sewn together along one edge; enclosed in wooden boards, the excess thread was wound around the boards to keep all together. Buddhist monks carried this technique through Persia, Afghanistan, Iran, until it reached China in the 1st century BCE.

This method spread slowly, but by the 4th century CE bound books and scrolls were being produced in equal numbers (based on surviving texts). Using wooden boards to contain information was not a new idea. Wax tablets in a wooden frame existed from Roman times right through the Middle Ages (as mentioned here). The word "book," however, was not being used the way we use it today. Isidore of Seville (c.560-636), the famous early etymologist, said:

A codex is composed of many books; a book is of one scroll. It is called codex by way of metaphor from the trunks (codex) of trees or vines, as if it were a wooden stock, because it contains in itself a multitude of books, as it were of branches.

As for the word "book" itself, which eventually replaced the word "codex," its likeliest origin is in the word for beech. This has led scholars to assume that some of the earliest collections of writing (that weren't on scrolls) were written on beech wood.

The important point is that the development of the codex method of holding data increased the longevity of "books" over scrolls, which did not have hard covers and which experienced wear every time they were unrolled and re-rolled. "Books" could now be made larger, as well, without falling apart; meaning, for example, an entire Bible could be contained in one printed object.

Were there differing opinions on the usefulness or appropriateness of the different styles of "book"? Perhaps there were, although any difficulties in adapting to the new style probably did not go like this.

Eclipse in 828

A lunar eclipse was recorded for July 1 in 828 very early in the morning. A second one occurred on Christmas Day, and was recorded thusly in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle:

In this year the Moon was eclipsed on mid-winter's Mass-night, and the same year King Ecgbert subdued the kingdom of the Mercians and all that was South of the Humber.

Note the lack of panic, such as we expect from Hollywood's portrayal of technologically primitive people experiencing an eclipse. Even if your theory of the heavens were no more sophisticated than perceiving heavenly bodies as balls of light affixed to concentric crystal spheres, you would realize that they could simply overlap at times. The Babylonians and Greeks had figured out the patterns of eclipses centuries earlier than the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and Isidore of Seville (c.560-636) in his Etymologies (which was used throughout the Middle Ages the way we would use an encyclopedia) explained

"The moon suffers an eclipse if the shadow of the earth comes between it and the sun" while an eclipse of the sun takes place "when the new moon is in line with the sun and obstructs and obscures it."

While Medieval Europe had Isidore to explain what was happening, however, they did not necessarily have the knowledge of the Babylonians and Greeks to understand why it was happening. The event could still be unnerving. Bishop Eligius of Noyon in the 7th century warned: "When the moon is darkened, no one should dare to utter shouts, because it becomes dark at specific times at God's command." Hrabanus Maurus (c.780-c.856), another encylopedist, tells of a lunar eclipse when some threw spears toward the moon, trying to defend it from its attacker.

Even if the mechanism of eclipses was understood, people might still accept them as a sign of great portent, or as the result of human actions. Bishop Thietmar of Merseburg, referring to an eclipse of 990, wrote "I urge all Christians that they should truly believe that this does not happen on account of some incantations by wicked women, nor by eating, and it cannot be helped by any action in the world."

Oh, and when Astronomy Today tells you that the eclipse of May 5, 840 so frightened King Louis that he "died just afterwards"? Ask to see their sources. Louis died on June 20th at the age of 62, after years of quelling civil wars. I think there are likelier reasons or his death than being afraid of an eclipse.