Abstract
This chapter examines the adaptive assimilation and innovative conceptual prolongations with practical applications of the classical Greek–Arabic science of optics in Renaissance perspectival pictorial arts , as mediated by European mediaeval optical theories and experimentations. This line of inquiry gives a historical account of the epistemic bearings of the connections and distinctions between the exact sciences and the visual arts, with an emphasis on the role of classical optics in the art of painting , and the function of pictorial art in pre-modern natural sciences. A special focus will be set on examining the optical and geometrical legacy of the eleventh century Arab polymath, al-Hasan ibn al-Haytham (known in Latinate renditions of his name as “Alhazen ” or “Alhacen”; d. after 1041 CE). This investigation considers the fundamental elements of his theories of vision, light , and space in the context of his studies in optics and geometry , while taking into account his use of experimentation and controlled testing as a method of demonstration and proof. This course of analysis will be furthermore linked to the adaptation of Ibn al-Haytham’s research within the thirteenth century Franciscan optical workshops, while scrutinizing the impress that his transmitted texts had on Renaissance perspectival representation of spatial depth and its entailed organization of architectural locales and spaces.
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Notes
- 1.
This dictum has been reported in connection with an anecdote about a dispute that took place over the assessment of the structural integrity of the elevation of the Duomo di Milano of the Santa Maria Nascente.
- 2.
I used simplified transliterations for all the Arabic terms throughout the text without the noting of diacritical vocalizing marks.
- 3.
While Ibn al-Haytham’s optical research proved to be a revolutionizing tradition in the course of development of the scientific discipline of optics up to the seventeenth century, other legacies in this science existed in the history of ideas in the classical Islamic civilization. One of these principal traditions is attributed to the research of the Arab philosopher al-Kindi (d. ca. 873), who partly influenced the optical investigations of Robert Grosseteste (d. ca. 1253) through the Latin version of his treatise in optics , entitled: De Aspectibus. However, this optical tradition was primarily Euclidean and Ptolemaic, like it was also later the case with the research of the Persian mathematician and philosopher, Nasir al-Din Tusi (d. ca. 1274). It is also worth noting in this regard that the philosopher and physician Ibn Sina (Avicenna , d. 1037 CE) developed a physical “intromission” theory of vision that is akin to that of Aristotle . Ibn Sina’s contributions in optics were not as influential as those of Ibn al-Haytham. Nonetheless, his research on the anatomy of the eye in his al-Qanun fi al-tibb (The Canon of Medicine) impacted the evolution of ophthalmology up to the sixteenth century, and his research in meteorology inspired Kamal al-Din al-Farisi’s revision of Ibn al-Haytham’s Optics in terms of offering a reformed explication of the reality of colours and the rainbow. Furthermore, Ibn Sina’s theory of perception was ecumenically influential in Islamic civilization and European mediaeval scholarship, particularly in terms of elucidating philosophical meditations on the nature of the soul (al-nafs; De anima) and the bearings of its cognitive faculties in terms of visual perception (Al-Kindi 1950–53, 1997; Hasse 2000) .
- 4.
The manuscript of the fourteenth century Italian version of Ibn al-Haytham’s Optics, entitled: Prospettiva, is dated on 1341 CE, and it is preserved in the Vatican under the following cataloguing details: Ms. Vat. At. 4595. Folios 1–177.
- 5.
In a critical analysis of Alistair C. Crombie’s thesis that “modern” scientific methodology is attributable to the tradition of Robert Grosseteste , and to thirteenth century opticians like Roger Bacon , John Peckham , and Witelo , Alexandre Koyré argued that the scientific method found its earlier roots in the legacy of Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen) in optics , which resulted in the flourishing of the perspectivism of Franciscan scholars in the European Middle Ages, in addition to the application of their experimental methods (Koyré 1948; Crombie 1953; Simon 1997; Federici Vescovini 1990, 2008) .
- 6.
Phenomena that were originally treated as topics of meteorology were studied based on new models of “reformed” optics . For instance, Kamal al-Din al-Farisi’s (d. ca. 1319 CE) explication of the phenomenon of the rainbow (qaws quzah) constituted a part of his commentary on Ibn al-Haytham’s Optics in Tanqih al-manazir; namely, a treatise entitled: The Revision of [Ibn al-Haytham’s] Optics (Al-Farisi 1928–29 ).
- 7.
This is particularly the case with the Quaestiones perspectivae of Biagio Pelacani da Parma.
- 8.
He is also known as “Franciscus Barocius”, and this particular discussion figures mainly in his Admirandum illud Geometricum Problema tredecim modis demonstratum— Raynaud and Rose discussed some related elements of the adaptive assimilation by Renaissance theorists of Arabic mathematical sources on conics and their applications in optics (Raynaud 2007; Rose 1970) .
- 9.
- 10.
- 11.
This aspect had implications on studying spherical aberration; namely, when beams of light, which are parallel to the axis of the lens (as a spherical section), yet that also vary in terms of their distance from it, become all focused in different places, which results in the blurring of the resultant image.
- 12.
The Arabic critical edition (based on four manuscripts) and the annotated French translation of this treatise (Fi al-tahlil wa-al-tarkib; L’Analyse et la synthèse) are established in Rashed (2002, pp. 230–391).
- 13.
The Arabic critical edition (based on two manuscripts) and annotated French translation of this treatise (Fi al-ma’lumat; Les connus) are established in Rashed (2002, pp. 444–583).
- 14.
“Bijection” refers to an equivalence relation or function of mathematical transformation that is both an “injection” (“one-to-one” correspondence) and “surjection” (designated in mathematical terms also as: “onto”’) between two sets.
- 15.
After all, the expression deployed by Euclid that is closest to a notion of “space ” as denoted by the Greek term: “khôra”, is the appellation: “khôrion”, which designates “an area enclosed within the perimeter of a specific geometric abstract figure”, as for instance noted in Euclid’s Data (Dedomena; al-Mu’tayat) Proposition 55 (as also related to: Elements, VI, Proposition 25): “if an area [khôrion] be given in form and in magnitude, its sides will also be given in magnitude” (Euclid 1956, 1883–1916).
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El-Bizri, N. (2014). Seeing Reality in Perspective: The “Art of Optics” and the “Science of Painting”. In: Lupacchini, R., Angelini, A. (eds) The Art of Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02111-9_2
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