Title:
Printing and astrology in early modern France : vernacular almanac-prognostications, 1497-1555
Creator:
Rivest, Justin
Date Created:
2010
Degree Awarded:
Master of Arts
Subjects:
Economics History
Geographical Focus:
France
Supporting Materials:
n/a
Description:
This thesis examines the French trajectories of an early ephemeral printed genre, annual almanac-prognostications, charting the genre’s development from its crigins at the end of the fifteenth century to its transformation by Michel Nostradamus in 1555. In so doing, it investigates how astrology was transformed by vernacularization and the introduction of print technologies. Based on a study of thirty-five surviving examples of the genre and a microhistory of the life and times of a single prognosticator, Jean Thibault, it argues that printing opened both astrological predictions (annual almanac-prognostications) and a key resource for producing them (celestial ephemerides) to an increasingly broad audience. Astrolegy was transformed from an esoteric art practiced by university physicians for a select clientele to a popular print phenomenon that provided predictions on weather, public health, commodities, warfare, and propitious times for everything from planting crops to letting blood to the general public.
Source
Preferred Citation:
Rivest, Justin. 2010. "Printing and astrology in early modern France : vernacular almanac-prognostications, 1497-1555", Department of History, Carleton University
Link to this page:
https://cuhistory.github.io/grads/items/hist_111.html
Rights
Rights:
Copyright the author, all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.