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Scaliger

Name: Joseph Justus Scaliger

Achievements: Developed a major astronomical chronology.

Born: August 5, 1540; Agen, France

Died: January 21, 1609; Leyden, Holland (now Netherlands) (Aged 69)

Field & Discipline: History; Philologist

Language: Polymath

Father: Julius Caesar Scaliger (1484-1558)

Mother: Unknown

Siblings: None

Spouse: None

Children: None

Education: College de Guyenne, Bordeaux (1552-55)

Major Work:

“Treatise on the Correction of Chronology” (1583)

Life & Times:

By 1561 Scaliger was able to write Greek and Latin with ease.  In 1562 he began to study Hebrew, Arabic, Syrian and Persian, and converted to  Protestantism. By 1563 he was well-enough regarded to become “literary companion” to a nobleman of Poitou, Louis Chasteigner de la Rochepozay, and his sons, and in 1565 he left Paris in their entourage on a trip to Rome.

After two years in Italy, Scaliger went to Scotland, where the court life of [visited court of] Mary Queen of Scots* appalled him by its "wickedness". Travelling through England in 1566 he was impressed by [impressed by] Queen Elizabeth's* fluency in modern languages.

In 1570 Scaliger found himself at Valence, France,  where the eminent jurist Jacques Cujas took him in, and where Scaliger made important friendships, with such men as the statesman and historian [a pal of] de Thou* and [a pal of] Dupuy*,  member of the Paris Parlement.   In 1572, Scaliger was in Strasbourg, but with the news of the Massacre of  Protestants on St Bartholomew's Day at Paris, he immediately left Strasbourg and fled to Geneva.

Scaliger was welcomed and made an official citizen. Two months later he was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the Calvinist Academy of Geneva.

By 1574, back in Paris, Scaliger was enjoying a period of academic fame as the chief expert on early Latin verse, and his “De verborum” was greeted with much praise.   In 1577 his new editions of the works of the Catullus, Tibullus, and Propertius were highly regarded, and put him at the head of European scholars.

Scaliger then turned to the study of astronomy, and in 1579 began to coordinate all the ancient (Greek, Roman, Hebrew, Egyptian, Ethiopic, Babylonian, Phoenician, Persian, Arabic and Syrian) systems of chronology, and then to equate them all according to the newly discovered astronomical principles established by [used data of] Copernicus* and [used data of] Brahe*.

The result of this immense labor was Scaliger's masterpiece, the “Treatise on the Correction of Chronology” published in 1583, the first four books of which deal with the chronological history of all known calendars and computations made by the various civilizations of antiquity.

Books V-VI then present Scaliger's own new, "fixed method" of chronology, which he named (after his father) the Julian Period,  involving a cycle of 7,980 years. This was the product of 28 x 19 x 15 (the 28-year solar cycle of the Julian calendar in which dates recur on the same days of the week; the 19-year lunar cycle, after which the phases of the Moon recur on a particular day in the solar year; and the 15-year taxation cycle of ancient Rome).  The last time these cycles had all coincided was 1 January 4713 BC.  Scaliger chose this as his “Year One.”  The entire 7,980-year cycle, he reckoned, would be enough by which to date all foreseeable events.

During the following decade Scaliger's life as a Protestant in Paris worsened dramatically, but 1592 he was offered a professorship of philosophy at the Calvinist University of Leyden, in the Netherlands; although he was unwilling to return to teaching and therefore at first refused, the following year Leyden changed the offer, simply

inviting him to stay and work at the university, with a salary but no teaching duties. Scaliger accepted the offer, and in the summer of 1593 he moved to Leyden, where he would remain until his death sixteen years later.

Scaliger settled happily in Leyden, wrote several important works, and made many influential friends, including work commissioned by Prince [commissioned by] Maurice of Nassau*, who commissioned several works and translations from him.

Within three or four years of his arrival Scaliger had firmly established himself as one of the major humanists,  and befriended many young scholars, including(by correspondence) [corresponded with] Casaubon*.

He also entered into a long and bitter controversy with Christopher Clavius over the merits of the Gregorian calendar reform of 1582.   Finally, the cold and damp Dutch winters undermined his health, and during the particularly harsh winter of 1608-09 he died.

Extra Connections: Met [met] Chapman*  and [met] Wren*

[house guest was] Peiresc* stayed with him.

He supported [encouraged] Grotius*

Assessment: From 1583 he held a chair of Leyden, where he inspired a long line of scholars.

Oneliner: JJ Scaliger, Renaissance humanist

Bibliography:

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