This year 2025 is the 1290 anniversary of the birth of Alcuin one of the greatest Saxon scholars, Alcuin (735-804) was born in Northumbria possibly in York itself in 735, he would go on to become one of the best sources of information during the latter part of the eighth century. Alcuin would be described as the most learned person of his time. The young Alcuin went to the cathedral church school of York. The school become a centre of excellence with people flocking from far and wide to study there. The school would become the Minster School in York which closed in 2020. It was founded in 627 by Paulinus of York the first archbishop of York. He was sent by the Pope in 601 to Christianise the Anglo Saxons.
It was here in York that Alcuin became a monk and teacher.
Within the monastic world he was able to gain access to magnificent libraries,
he wrote educational manuals and copied classical texts including those of the
great scientists of Greece, it was here that Alcuin became interested in
astronomy.
At this period of history monasteries were becoming the
centres of learning. They would assume great power because knowledge is power
and there was lots of knowledge in monasteries. This is often referred to as
the Dark Ages which it wasn’t. There was lots of scientific learning going on.
This learning was happening not in Europe it was in the Arabic world with
places like Baghdad and Damascus becoming the scientific centres of the world.
In 781Alcuin was sent to Rome and on his return while
travelling across Europe he met Charlemagne who was King of the Franks and
emperor of what we call today the Carolingian Empire.
Charlemagne ruled a vast amount of western Europe. He would
introduce things that would have a major impact on medieval Europe. However,
what a lot of people won’t know is that Charlemagne was fascinated by
astronomy, the movements of the stars and planets, and Sun and Moon. And then
suddenly he was meeting someone who had a great deal of knowledge in astronomy.
And luckily for science and astronomy they got on well together.
Charlemagne would build a great palace and library at Aachen
it was here that Alcuin would teach Charlemagne and his son Louis at the palace
school in Aachen. Charlemagne was able to follow the movements of the stars and
studied them carefully with the help of Alcuin.
One of the books that would come into the possession of
Charlemagne was a work produced by the Greek poet Aratus 310 BCE- 240 BCE
during the period of classical Greek science. Aratus was a poet rather than a
scientist, so his drawings had a very artistic rather than scientific nature.
However, the work did describe what the constellations looked like. The images are based on 38 small drawings.
This work today is known as the Leiden Aratea because it is stored at the
Leiden University library in the Netherlands. The artistic interpretations of
the constellations are well known to astronomers today, however because this is
an artistic interpretation the stars are not in their correct positions.
Alcuin because of his access to great libraries would have
been aware of this work and he possibly knew of the Frankish churchman and poet
called Modiun of Autun 770-840/3 which
is in east central France. When Modiun tried to find favour with Charlemagne
and then Louis the Pious, he wrote a poem talking about the star constellations
and how if they were reproduced by Charlemagne he would be compared to the
great scholars and philosophers of the
classical period of Greek civilisations of antiquity. This poem would have helped Alcuin in trying
to persuade Charlemagne to get the star maps re produced for future
astronomers.
If it had not been for Alcuin encouraging Charlemagne to set
up the great library at Aachen, then many books including scientific ones would
have been lost to history. In astronomy in particular the wonderful Leiden
Aratea constellations images would probably never have been reproduced and
could possibly have been lost for ever. Astronomy owes a lot to Alcuin and to
Charlemagne.
It was not just in the field of science that Alcuin worked
he also in his education work he introduced his student to grammar, and it
believed that Alcuin invented the question mark, although it did not look like
the question mark of today.
Sadly, neither Alcuin nor Charlemagne would live to see the
Aratea reproduced. Alcuin died on 19th May 804 CE. The constellations
themselves were produced probably near Aachen around 816 CE and even
Charlemagne never saw this work being completed as he died in 814 CE. The work
was completed sometime in 816 by Charlemagne’s son Louis the Pious.
Alcuin’s legacy in York is such that one of the colleges at
the University of York is named Alcuin College.
The work that was being produced by Alcuin during the Carolingian period was just before the great period of Arabic astronomy which began around 830. The following 500 years would see most of the develops in astronomy and science come from Arabic astronomers living in such places such as Baghdad and Damascus.
No comments:
Post a Comment