Excerpt from Studies in the History of Mediaeval Science The history of European science in the Middle Ages is twofold. On the one hand it is concerned with the recovery and assimila tionof the science of antiquity, little known at first and only gradually brought into the West, to some extent as enlarged by the Arabs, in the course of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; While on the other hand, it has to take account of the advance of knowledge, by the processes of observation and experiment in western Europe. The first phase deals primarily With translation from the Arabic and the Greek, in Spain, Sicily, North Africa, and the East, as a preliminary to the full assimilation of these successive increments of ancient learning and the Arabic addi tions thereto. The second more obscure, has to trace the exten sion of knowledge by such means as the observation of plants and animals, especially dogs, hawks, and horses, the actual treatment of disease, geographical exploration, and the growth of the ex perimental habit. On both these sides a consecutive and com prehensive history still remains to be written, While at many points monographic investigation is entirely lacking. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This 1997 book views the substantive achievements of the Middle Ages as they relate to early modern science.

The European Middle Ages form a complex and varied as well as a very considerable period of human history. Within their thousand years of time they include a large variety of peoples, institutions, and types of culture, illustrating many processes of historical development and containing the origins of many phases of modern civilization. - p. [3].

This Source Book explores a millennium of European scientific thought accompanied by critical commentary and annotation; nearly half the selections appear for the first time in the vernacular. Representing "science" in the medieval sense, selections include alchemy, astrology, logic, and theology as well as mathematics, physics, and biology.