DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.63447#0536
520
THE HISTORICAL PAST OF ITALY.
challenged the admiration and study of the highest order
of intellects.
Francesco Stabili, better known as Cecco d’Ascoli, the
venerable, contemplative and ill-fated sage of the day,
was the master of Dante in astronomy. The lofty Tower
of Cremona still stands a silent witness to the memory
of this martyr to faction. From the summit of this
favouring and singular tower he, aided by Eastern science,
made his observations and calculations. In pursuance
of the opinions of the times, he was greatly sought after
to cast “nativities” and to draw “horoscopes.” It may
be here observed that these are by no means necessarily
a wilfully fraudulent series of documents; later science
has now exploded them, and they fall into the dominion
of ridicule and of the vulgar. At all times, it is but too
obvious, oracles were liable to abuse; but there were
fixed and definite rules for determining nativities and for
giving out oracles, and over these an honest and careful
astrologer had no kind of power.
It happened, nevertheless, that the decisions of the
planets, as delivered from the Tower of Cremona, were
favourable to the Ghibelline lords of the Casentino and
Umbria, and consequently were adverse to the Guelph
interests of Florence. In strict accordance with the
passions of the day, the government of the latter city,
therefore, leagued with the ecclesiastical authorities to
destroy the ill-fated astrologer. Up to that time, directly
sanctioned by the Church, he had held the Chair of
Astronomy, or, as it was then called, “ astrology; ” but
he was now accused of “ heresy, ” given up to the Inqui-
sition, and condemned to be burnt alive for “ the crime
and practice of astrology;” that is, of “evil necro-
mancy,” as the crime they accused him of was then
understood. With a final stroke of Guelph malice, we
find Dante, who owed him so much, places him in
“Hell.”
Dante’s celebrated allusion to the Southern Cross has
exercised the subtlety of many commentators; the ques-
tion, exhaustively treated by Dr. Barlow, has now been
THE HISTORICAL PAST OF ITALY.
challenged the admiration and study of the highest order
of intellects.
Francesco Stabili, better known as Cecco d’Ascoli, the
venerable, contemplative and ill-fated sage of the day,
was the master of Dante in astronomy. The lofty Tower
of Cremona still stands a silent witness to the memory
of this martyr to faction. From the summit of this
favouring and singular tower he, aided by Eastern science,
made his observations and calculations. In pursuance
of the opinions of the times, he was greatly sought after
to cast “nativities” and to draw “horoscopes.” It may
be here observed that these are by no means necessarily
a wilfully fraudulent series of documents; later science
has now exploded them, and they fall into the dominion
of ridicule and of the vulgar. At all times, it is but too
obvious, oracles were liable to abuse; but there were
fixed and definite rules for determining nativities and for
giving out oracles, and over these an honest and careful
astrologer had no kind of power.
It happened, nevertheless, that the decisions of the
planets, as delivered from the Tower of Cremona, were
favourable to the Ghibelline lords of the Casentino and
Umbria, and consequently were adverse to the Guelph
interests of Florence. In strict accordance with the
passions of the day, the government of the latter city,
therefore, leagued with the ecclesiastical authorities to
destroy the ill-fated astrologer. Up to that time, directly
sanctioned by the Church, he had held the Chair of
Astronomy, or, as it was then called, “ astrology; ” but
he was now accused of “ heresy, ” given up to the Inqui-
sition, and condemned to be burnt alive for “ the crime
and practice of astrology;” that is, of “evil necro-
mancy,” as the crime they accused him of was then
understood. With a final stroke of Guelph malice, we
find Dante, who owed him so much, places him in
“Hell.”
Dante’s celebrated allusion to the Southern Cross has
exercised the subtlety of many commentators; the ques-
tion, exhaustively treated by Dr. Barlow, has now been