Andreas Jaszlinszky
Encyclopedia
Andreas Jaszlinszky was the Slovakian
-born author of the early physics
textbooks Institutiones physicae pars prima, seu physica generalis (Trnava
/Nagyszombat, 1756/1761, 471 pp) and Institutiones physicae pars altera, seu physica particularis (Trnava
/Nagyszombat, 1756/1761, 341 pp).
) and published his physics textbooks as a professor
at the University of Trnava
(Kingdom of Hungary
in modern-day Slovakia
), where he taught philosophy
, metaphysics
, history
, ethics
, physics
and theology
. At that time, the University of Trnava was one of the major Jesuit universities in Eastern Europe
(and the only university
in the Kingdom of Hungary), along with Braunsberg, Lemberg, Vilnius
, and Prague
. Publication of Physica Generalis and Physica Particularis occurred in response to a 1753 order from Maria Theresa
(Habsburg
ruler in Vienna
) requiring every professor to write textbooks instead of dictating lecture notes, which created a surge of works by Adanyi, Jaszlinszky, Reviczky, Radics, and Horvath. Jaszlinszky became rector
of the university in 1771, and after the Suppression of the Society of Jesus in 1773, he became canon
in Rozsnyo. He was a contemporary of Johann Baptiste Horvath
, Leopold Biwald
, and Joseph Redlhamer
.
These Latin
physics textbooks each contain eight plates with descriptions and images of a variety of contemporary physics devices including manometers (fluid statics
), lenses
/prisms
(refraction
), and various simple machine
s. Coverage of electricity
is relatively sparse, although many other diverse topics are surveyed, including mechanics
, magnetism
, celestial mechanics
, fluid drag
experiments, mineralogy
, and human anatomy
. Extensive bibliographical references are provided.
Interestingly, these textbooks (1750s) at least somewhat ambiguously reflect incorrect Cartesian vortex mechanics, rather than the correct Newtonian mechanics fully embraced by Horvath
(1770s). Indeed, modern Newtonian mechanics (1687
) was only widely accepted in Hungary
by the 1760s and 1770s. It is also interesting to note that between 1616 and 1759, three years after first publication of Physica Generalis and Physica Particularis, Jesuit scientists could not publish textbooks overtly favoring Copernican
models of the solar system
, although the heliocentric theory was allowed to be presented along with other theories (for example Ptolemaic
as shown below in Plate 1 of Physica Particularis). However, since Nagyszombat had an astronomical observatory
(1755–1773), historians speculate that local Jesuit professors would have observed phenomena that would have convinced them that heliocentrism was correct. Indeed, Jaszlinszky essentially rejected the Ptolemaic approach.
Jaszlinszky was also the author of Tractatus Theologicus de Angelis, Beatitudine et Actibus Humanis (Trnava
, 1762/1769, 574 pp) and possibly Geographica (1761), in addition to Institutiones logicae (Trnava
, 1754, 164 pp) and Institutiones metaphysicae (Trnava
, 1755, 288 pp), consistent with how the Ratio Studiorum
(1599) was applied following Christopher Clavius
.
A copy of Physica Generalis is provided by Google Books. Images of the textbook title pages are also available. Each of these textbooks is worth approximately $150 depending on condition.
The plates shown below are from a copy owned by multiple professors at the Collegio Romano around 1762.
Slovaks
The Slovaks, Slovak people, or Slovakians are a West Slavic people that primarily inhabit Slovakia and speak the Slovak language, which is closely related to the Czech language.Most Slovaks today live within the borders of the independent Slovakia...
-born author of the early physics
Physics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...
textbooks Institutiones physicae pars prima, seu physica generalis (Trnava
Trnava
Trnava is a city in western Slovakia, 47 km to the north-east of Bratislava, on the Trnávka river. It is the capital of a kraj and of an okres . It was the seat of a Roman Catholic archbishopric . The city has a historic center...
/Nagyszombat, 1756/1761, 471 pp) and Institutiones physicae pars altera, seu physica particularis (Trnava
Trnava
Trnava is a city in western Slovakia, 47 km to the north-east of Bratislava, on the Trnávka river. It is the capital of a kraj and of an okres . It was the seat of a Roman Catholic archbishopric . The city has a historic center...
/Nagyszombat, 1756/1761, 341 pp).
Biography
Jaszlinszky joined the Jesuits (October 1733 in TrencinTrencín
Trenčín is a city in western Slovakia of the central Váh River valley near the Czech border, around from Bratislava. It has a population of more than 56,000, which makes it the ninth largest municipality of the country and is the seat of the Trenčín Region and the Trenčín District...
) and published his physics textbooks as a professor
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
at the University of Trnava
University of Trnava
The University of Trnava is a college of "university type" based in Trnava, Slovakia.-Historical university:The original Jesuit university was founded in 1635 by the Archbishop of Esztergom, Peter Pázmány. It had a faculty of arts, faculty of theology, faculty of law and faculty of medicine...
(Kingdom of Hungary
Kingdom of Hungary
The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...
in modern-day Slovakia
Slovakia
The Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...
), where he taught philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
, metaphysics
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...
, history
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
, ethics
Ethics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
, physics
Physics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...
and theology
Theology
Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...
. At that time, the University of Trnava was one of the major Jesuit universities in Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
(and the only university
University
A university is an institution of higher education and research, which grants academic degrees in a variety of subjects. A university is an organisation that provides both undergraduate education and postgraduate education...
in the Kingdom of Hungary), along with Braunsberg, Lemberg, Vilnius
Vilnius
Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania, and its largest city, with a population of 560,190 as of 2010. It is the seat of the Vilnius city municipality and of the Vilnius district municipality. It is also the capital of Vilnius County...
, and Prague
Prague
Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...
. Publication of Physica Generalis and Physica Particularis occurred in response to a 1753 order from Maria Theresa
Maria Theresa of Austria
Maria Theresa Walburga Amalia Christina was the only female ruler of the Habsburg dominions and the last of the House of Habsburg. She was the sovereign of Austria, Hungary, Croatia, Bohemia, Mantua, Milan, Lodomeria and Galicia, the Austrian Netherlands and Parma...
(Habsburg
Habsburg
The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...
ruler in Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
) requiring every professor to write textbooks instead of dictating lecture notes, which created a surge of works by Adanyi, Jaszlinszky, Reviczky, Radics, and Horvath. Jaszlinszky became rector
Rector
The word rector has a number of different meanings; it is widely used to refer to an academic, religious or political administrator...
of the university in 1771, and after the Suppression of the Society of Jesus in 1773, he became canon
Canon (priest)
A canon is a priest or minister who is a member of certain bodies of the Christian clergy subject to an ecclesiastical rule ....
in Rozsnyo. He was a contemporary of Johann Baptiste Horvath
Johann Baptiste Horvath
Johann Baptiste Horvath was a Hungarian-born Jesuit Professor of Physics and Philosophy at the University of Trnava in modern-day Slovakia, which was then part of the Kingdom of Hungary...
, Leopold Biwald
Leopold Biwald
Leopold Gottlieb Biwald was a professor at the University of Graz.At the age of sixteen Biwald joined the Jesuits. He became teacher of rhetoric at a secondary school in Laibach and graduated as Dr. theol. in 1761. He became professor of logic and soon afterwards of physics at the University of Graz...
, and Joseph Redlhamer
Joseph Redlhamer
Joseph Redlhamer was a professor at the University of Vienna.He joined the Jesuits at age 18 and earned a doctorate in philosophy and theology, after which he taught ethics, philosophy and theology in Linz, Graz and Vienna...
.
These Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
physics textbooks each contain eight plates with descriptions and images of a variety of contemporary physics devices including manometers (fluid statics
Fluid statics
Fluid statics is the science of fluids at rest, and is a sub-field within fluid mechanics. The term usually refers to the mathematical treatment of the subject. It embraces the study of the conditions under which fluids are at rest in stable equilibrium...
), lenses
Lens (optics)
A lens is an optical device with perfect or approximate axial symmetry which transmits and refracts light, converging or diverging the beam. A simple lens consists of a single optical element...
/prisms
Prism (optics)
In optics, a prism is a transparent optical element with flat, polished surfaces that refract light. The exact angles between the surfaces depend on the application. The traditional geometrical shape is that of a triangular prism with a triangular base and rectangular sides, and in colloquial use...
(refraction
Refraction
Refraction is the change in direction of a wave due to a change in its speed. It is essentially a surface phenomenon . The phenomenon is mainly in governance to the law of conservation of energy. The proper explanation would be that due to change of medium, the phase velocity of the wave is changed...
), and various simple machine
Simple machine
A simple machine is a mechanical device that changes the direction or magnitude of a force.In general, they can be defined as the simplest mechanisms that use mechanical advantage to multiply force. A simple machine uses a single applied force to do work against a single load force...
s. Coverage of electricity
Electricity
Electricity is a general term encompassing a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge. These include many easily recognizable phenomena, such as lightning, static electricity, and the flow of electrical current in an electrical wire...
is relatively sparse, although many other diverse topics are surveyed, including mechanics
Classical mechanics
In physics, classical mechanics is one of the two major sub-fields of mechanics, which is concerned with the set of physical laws describing the motion of bodies under the action of a system of forces...
, magnetism
Magnetism
Magnetism is a property of materials that respond at an atomic or subatomic level to an applied magnetic field. Ferromagnetism is the strongest and most familiar type of magnetism. It is responsible for the behavior of permanent magnets, which produce their own persistent magnetic fields, as well...
, celestial mechanics
Celestial mechanics
Celestial mechanics is the branch of astronomy that deals with the motions of celestial objects. The field applies principles of physics, historically classical mechanics, to astronomical objects such as stars and planets to produce ephemeris data. Orbital mechanics is a subfield which focuses on...
, fluid drag
Drag (physics)
In fluid dynamics, drag refers to forces which act on a solid object in the direction of the relative fluid flow velocity...
experiments, mineralogy
Mineralogy
Mineralogy is the study of chemistry, crystal structure, and physical properties of minerals. Specific studies within mineralogy include the processes of mineral origin and formation, classification of minerals, their geographical distribution, as well as their utilization.-History:Early writing...
, and human anatomy
Anatomy
Anatomy is a branch of biology and medicine that is the consideration of the structure of living things. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy , and plant anatomy...
. Extensive bibliographical references are provided.
Interestingly, these textbooks (1750s) at least somewhat ambiguously reflect incorrect Cartesian vortex mechanics, rather than the correct Newtonian mechanics fully embraced by Horvath
Johann Baptiste Horvath
Johann Baptiste Horvath was a Hungarian-born Jesuit Professor of Physics and Philosophy at the University of Trnava in modern-day Slovakia, which was then part of the Kingdom of Hungary...
(1770s). Indeed, modern Newtonian mechanics (1687
Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica
Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Latin for "Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy", often referred to as simply the Principia, is a work in three books by Sir Isaac Newton, first published 5 July 1687. Newton also published two further editions, in 1713 and 1726...
) was only widely accepted in Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
by the 1760s and 1770s. It is also interesting to note that between 1616 and 1759, three years after first publication of Physica Generalis and Physica Particularis, Jesuit scientists could not publish textbooks overtly favoring Copernican
Heliocentrism
Heliocentrism, or heliocentricism, is the astronomical model in which the Earth and planets revolve around a stationary Sun at the center of the universe. The word comes from the Greek . Historically, heliocentrism was opposed to geocentrism, which placed the Earth at the center...
models of the solar system
Solar System
The Solar System consists of the Sun and the astronomical objects gravitationally bound in orbit around it, all of which formed from the collapse of a giant molecular cloud approximately 4.6 billion years ago. The vast majority of the system's mass is in the Sun...
, although the heliocentric theory was allowed to be presented along with other theories (for example Ptolemaic
Geocentric model
In astronomy, the geocentric model , is the superseded theory that the Earth is the center of the universe, and that all other objects orbit around it. This geocentric model served as the predominant cosmological system in many ancient civilizations such as ancient Greece...
as shown below in Plate 1 of Physica Particularis). However, since Nagyszombat had an astronomical observatory
Observatory
An observatory is a location used for observing terrestrial or celestial events. Astronomy, climatology/meteorology, geology, oceanography and volcanology are examples of disciplines for which observatories have been constructed...
(1755–1773), historians speculate that local Jesuit professors would have observed phenomena that would have convinced them that heliocentrism was correct. Indeed, Jaszlinszky essentially rejected the Ptolemaic approach.
Jaszlinszky was also the author of Tractatus Theologicus de Angelis, Beatitudine et Actibus Humanis (Trnava
Trnava
Trnava is a city in western Slovakia, 47 km to the north-east of Bratislava, on the Trnávka river. It is the capital of a kraj and of an okres . It was the seat of a Roman Catholic archbishopric . The city has a historic center...
, 1762/1769, 574 pp) and possibly Geographica (1761), in addition to Institutiones logicae (Trnava
Trnava
Trnava is a city in western Slovakia, 47 km to the north-east of Bratislava, on the Trnávka river. It is the capital of a kraj and of an okres . It was the seat of a Roman Catholic archbishopric . The city has a historic center...
, 1754, 164 pp) and Institutiones metaphysicae (Trnava
Trnava
Trnava is a city in western Slovakia, 47 km to the north-east of Bratislava, on the Trnávka river. It is the capital of a kraj and of an okres . It was the seat of a Roman Catholic archbishopric . The city has a historic center...
, 1755, 288 pp), consistent with how the Ratio Studiorum
Ratio Studiorum
The Ratio Studiorum often designates the document that formally established the globally influential system of Jesuit education in 1599...
(1599) was applied following Christopher Clavius
Christopher Clavius
Christopher Clavius was a German Jesuit mathematician and astronomer who was the main architect of the modern Gregorian calendar...
.
A copy of Physica Generalis is provided by Google Books. Images of the textbook title pages are also available. Each of these textbooks is worth approximately $150 depending on condition.
The plates shown below are from a copy owned by multiple professors at the Collegio Romano around 1762.
Plates (8) from Physica Generalis (1756)
Plates (8) from Physica Particularis (1756)
See also
- Johann Baptiste HorvathJohann Baptiste HorvathJohann Baptiste Horvath was a Hungarian-born Jesuit Professor of Physics and Philosophy at the University of Trnava in modern-day Slovakia, which was then part of the Kingdom of Hungary...
- Edmond PourchotEdmond PourchotEdmond Pourchot was a university professor noted for his controversial advocacy of Cartesianism in place of Aristotelianism...
- Pierre LemonnierPierre LemonnierPierre Lemonnier was a French astronomer, a Professor of Physics and Philosophy at the Collège d'Harcourt , and a member of the French Academy of Sciences....
- Philip of the Blessed TrinityPhilip of the Blessed TrinityPhilip of the Blessed Trinity was a French Discalced Carmelite theologian and missionary.-Life:He took the habit at Lyon where he made his profession on 8 September 1621...
- Charles MortonCharles Morton (physicist)Charles Morton was the author of the English language Compendium Physicae , an early American textbook on astronomy and physics...