Paul Strathern - The Other Renaissance: From Copernicus to Shakespeare. How the Renaissance in Northern Europe Transformed the World

THE OTHER RENAISSANCE

Also by Paul Strathern

The Florentines

The Borgias

Death in Florence

Spirit of Venice

The Artist, the Philosopher and the Warrior

Napoleon in Egypt

The Medici

First published in Great Britain in 2023 by Atlantic Books, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.

Copyright Paul Strathern, 2023

The moral right of Paul Strathern to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Hardback ISBN: 978-1-83895-513-7

Trade paperback ISBN: 978-1-83895-516-8

E-book ISBN: 978-1-83895-517-5

Map artwork by Keith Chaffer

Hardback endpaper image: Chart by Andreas Cellarius illustrating a heliocentric model of the universe as proposed by Nicolaus Copernicus, 1661 (steeve-x-art/Alamy Stock Photo)

Printed in Great Britain

Atlantic Books

An Imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd

Ormond House

2627 Boswell Street

London

WC1N 3JZ

www.atlantic-books.co.uk

To

My Brother Mark

P ARACELSUSS REPUTATION HAD SPREAD before him. His grand inaugural lecture in 1526 as professor of medicine at the University of Basel, the oldest and most prestigious in Switzerland, had attracted a large crowd. The front rows of the hall were filled with the city worthies in their robes of office; alongside them were the university professors bedecked in their black gowns with coloured sashes; and amongst them were the citys fashionably attired leading physicians. Ordinary townsfolk, the merely curious, and many students were crammed into the back rows, squatting in the aisles, or spilling out through the open door into the main square.

Enter Paracelsus in his ragged leather alchemists apron, bearing aloft a covered platter. He began his lecture by announcing to the assembled company that he would now reveal to them the greatest secret of medical science. Whereupon, with a flourish, he lifted the lid from the platter. To reveal a pile of fresh human excrement.

The first rows of the audience, close enough for their nostrils to detect the odour of what lay before them, rose to their feet. Muttering angrily amongst themselves, they began making their way back up the aisles, their scowling faces forcing a path through the squatting students cluttering the exit.

Amidst the rising hubbub, Paracelsuss voice could be heard calling out after them: If you will not hear the mysteries of putrefaction, you are unworthy of the name of physicians. Paracelsus had long understood that fermentation was the most important chemical process to take place in the laboratory of the human body. Here lay the secret of life itself: how the human body functioned, gaining its nourishment and expelling extraneous, often toxic, matter. The students and other townsfolk who had come along for the show were not disappointed, and began applauding and cheering him to the rafters.