J.L. Vives: De officio mariti

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The Astrolabe

An ancient instrument for solving problems of location and distance, as well as time

Astrolábon órganon is the word used in Ptolemaeus Syntaxis 5.1 to describe a form of armillary sphere consisting of both fixed and rotating rings for determining the ecliptic co-ordinates of stars. Also called astrolabe were two-dimensional representations of the celestial sphere: over fixed disks with a representation of the horizon of the earth (in each case for a specific geographic latitude) and its parallels up to the zenith lies a rotating representation of the heavens (called ‘spider’ or ‘net’) with zodiac and indicators for some of the brightest stars. On the back is an indicator (‘alidade’) with visor plates for calculating the height of the stars. The astrolabe allows its user to determine the hours of day and night, the positions of stars, and the height and depth of objects on earth (mountains, buildings, wells). The oldest extant descriptions of the flat, planispheric astrolabe come from Iohannes Philoponus, 6th century AD, and (in Syrian) from Severus Sebokht, c. 660 AD. Indirect references may date back as early as Theon (4th cent.). Between the 8th and the 9th centuries the Arabs appropriated the knowledge of the astrolabe. At the end of the 10th century and again in the 12th century, they passed it on to Western Europe, where astrolabes were constructed up until the 17th cent. Today, one Byzantine astrolabe (from 1062) is extant, as are some 750 Arabic-Islamic astrolabes and approximately the same number of European astrolabes.

This information is abstracted from Brill's New Pauly, the English edition of the authoritative Der Neue Pauly, Encyclopaedia of the Ancient World. The encyclopaedic coverage and high academic standard of the work, the interdisciplinary and contemporary approach and clear and accessible presentation have made the New Pauly the unrivalled modern reference work for the ancient world. For more information see www.brillsnewpauly.com or visit our website catalog: www.brill.nl/bnp
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J.L. Vives: De officio mariti

Introduction, Critical Edition, Translation and Notes

Edited by C. Fantazzi and C. Matheeussen. Translated by C. Fantazzi

Books

Available
Publication year: 2006


Series:	Selected Works of Juan Luis Vives, 8
ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007:	978 90 04 15404 9
ISBN-10:	90 04 15404 3

Cover:	Hardback
Number of pages:	xxvi, 246 pp.

List price:	€ 99.00 / US$ 147.00

Table of contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction
I. Prefatory Remarks
II. Brief Synthesis and Comparison with De institutione feminae Christianae
III. Revisions in the 1538 Edition
IV. Editions and Constitution of the Text
V. Translations
VI. Abbreviations Used in the Introduction and Notes

Sigla

DE OFFICIO MARITI
Praefatio
Cap. I. De coniugii origine et utilitate
Cap. II. De eligenda uxore
Cap. III. De accessu ad coniugium
Cap. IV. De disciplina feminae
Cap. V. De domo
Cap. VI. De externis
Cap. VII. De cultu
Cap. VIII. De absentia mariti
Cap. IX. De reprehensione et castigatione
Cap. X. De progressu in coniugio
Cap. XI. Quas utilitates affert amor conjugum mutuus
Cap. XII. De iis quae non habet liberos
Cap. XIII. De uxore natu grandiore

Index nominum
Index locorum

Reviews

'Charles Fantazzi's masterful translation of De Officio Mariti is a much welcome addition to the library of early modern primary sources available in English. The parallel Latin-English text is particularly helpful for scholars [...]'. Magda Teter, Wesleyan University. In: Sixeteenth Century Journal, Vol. 40, no. 2 (2009), pp. 490-491.

Readership

For those interested in studies of women in the Renaissance, women’s studies in general, the institution of marriage, Renaissance Latin didactic literature, the writings and ideas of Juan Luis Vives.

About the author(s)

Charles E. Fantazzi, Ph.D. (1964) in Comparative Literature, Harvard University, currently Distinguished Visiting Professor of Humanities at East Carolina University. He has recently published Angelo Poliziano, Silvae, in I Tatti Renaissance Library (Harvard University Press, 2004).

This treatise is a sequel to Vives’ On the Education of the Christian Woman, published in Brill’s series, Selected Works of J.L. Vives. It studies the institution of marriage from a male vantage point, with interesting observations on female psychology, anticipating his later work, De anima. Vives insists more here on the weakness and instability of the woman than in the previous treatise, relying on the biological tenets of Aristotle and Galen. Much attention is given to the choice of a wife and to the husband’s role as tutor of his spouse and disciplinarian. The marriage debt is regarded as a necessary evil, as in St. Paul, while the spirituality of the union is exalted. The book was often printed together with the De institutione feminae Christianae and even considered as a fourth book of that work.

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