A History of Magic and Experimental Science, Volume 2 (of 2) / During the First Thirteen Centuries of Our Era

by Lynn Thorndike

CHAPTER LXXI

CECCO D’ASCOLI

Reasons for his celebrity—An astrologer burned by the Inquisition—Works by Cecco to be considered here—Other sources—The sentence by the Inquisition—Villani’s account—The later manuscripts—Astrology for cities—The fate of individuals—Influence of stars and signs—How mind and soul are affected—The stars and dreams—Astrological images—Did Cecco deny human free will?—Founders of new religions said to be born of incubi and succubi at astrological periods—Birth of Christ and darkness during His passion were both miraculous—Christian qualification of Albumasar—Cecco’s astrology not the most extreme—Charge that he taught astrological necromancy—His attitude toward magic—His frequent citation of books of magic and necromancy—Necromancy employs evil spirits—Cecco unduly curious rather than heretical in this regard—Was his death due to personal enemies?—His execution of little significance.

Reasons for his celebrity.

The name of Cecco d’Ascoli has perhaps received more attention and is better known than the writings and actual achievements of its owner deserve. If so, this is mainly for two reasons; first, that his poem l’Acerba has been associated with the study of Dante; second, that he was condemned by the Inquisition and burned at the stake in Florence in 1327. Doubtless Cecco should receive some attention in the histories both of literature and science as one who was both an Italian poet and a Latin teacher and writer of astronomy and astrology. But his works and personality would perhaps have been long since forgotten but for the fact that his learned poem, l’Acerba, was taken to be an invidious parody of Dante’s Divine Comedy, and that both it and his astrological work in Latin were ordered to be burned at the same time with himself, while all persons retaining copies of them were to be excommunicated. Recently, it is true, it has been held that Cecco imitated Dante out of admiration for him and not from any desire to cast aspersion upon the Divine Comedy,[2950] but in any case their names have long been coupled. As for the condemnation by the Inquisition, its chief effect seems to have been to raise a rather ordinary astrologer to the position of a martyr for science and a reproach to the medieval church. Many apologies for and eulogies of Cecco have been penned through the centuries since, while a few writers have tried to justify the action of the Inquisition, to discredit Cecco, and to question his scientific reputation.[2951] Certainly the condemnation by the Inquisition seems to have advertised rather than repressed his writings, since not only has the poem l’Acerba survived but also two works on astrology. Of these three the two that the Inquisition probably meant to forbid were both in print before 1500 and the Protestant Revolt. The third, which the Inquisitors seem to have overlooked, was also neglected by publishers until the present century.

An astrologer burned by the Inquisition.

Hitherto in our survey of medieval learning, more particularly of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, we have found little or no evidence in support of the old view, or rather assumption, that every medieval scientist was persecuted by the church. Signs of a theological party hostile to the growing interest in natural science we have seen, but much more evidence of this growing interest itself, and that too among bishops, friars, Franciscan as well as Dominican, and even popes. We have seen that the scientific attitude of William of Conches prevailed in the long run, that it is very doubtful if Roger Bacon was in any sense persecuted by the church for devotion to natural science, and that Peter of Abano did not have to die in order to escape the Inquisition but that it had to wait until after his death before it could do him any harm. But now in Cecco d’Ascoli we come at last, and it is not until the fourteenth century, to a well authenticated case of an astrologer of some learning being put to death through the agency of the Inquisition. This makes his writings the more important for us to note, although we do not find their contents such as to entitle him to any high rank as a natural scientist.

Works by Cecco to be considered here.

It is hard to see any reason for the condemnation of l’Acerba by the Inquisition except that it was written by Cecco. Its superstition is so slight as not to call for notice here, nor is its natural science more remarkable than that of other vernacular poems such as the Romance of the Rose. Our discussion will center about his two extant Latin works which are in the form of commentaries upon the Sphere of Sacrobosco[2952] and the Principia of Alcabitius.[2953] Both seem to be in the form of class-room lectures and were presumably delivered by Cecco at Bologna. As we shall see, it is reasonably certain that the Latin work condemned by the Inquisition was the commentary on the Sphere and not that on Alcabitius, although why the latter should be overlooked when the innocuous l’Acerba was condemned is difficult to explain except by the usual ignorance and stupidity of censors and persecutors. It is unlikely that either of the Latin works has been altered from Cecco’s original either by himself or others in order to render it less objectionable from the theological point of view, after the Inquisition had condemned his book on astrology in toto. It would be more likely if anything to be touched up in the other direction. In any case these two works are what we have from Cecco’s pen to show what were the views of an astrologer condemned by the Inquisition.

Other sources.

We have, it is true, some documentary evidence other than Cecco’s own works to show what his views were and why he was condemned by the Inquisition, but it is not very satisfactory. Boffito, who in recent times has made the most specialized study of Cecco d’Ascoli and his works, editing the commentary on Alcabitius hitherto unprinted and investigating the problem, “Why was the astrologer Cecco d’Ascoli condemned to be burned?”[2954] accepts outside of Cecco’s own writings only two sources as at all original and reliable, namely, the account in Giovanni Villani’s contemporary chronicle[2955] and a Latin manuscript in the Riccardian library at Florence[2956] which contains a summary of the inquisitorial sentence against Cecco. This manuscript is on paper and I should say is certainly not earlier than the fifteenth century. Boffito views with suspicion the longer sentence in Italian which was reproduced by Cantù[2957] and made use of in Lea’s History of the Inquisition,[2958] since it is not found earlier than in a manuscript of the seventeenth century.

The sentence by the Inquisition.

According to the Riccardian manuscript Cecco’s astrology was the reason, or at least the pretext, for his condemnation, but it does not make clear just what was found objectionable in his astrological teaching. It brings out further, however, that he was not put to death for a first offense but was burned at Florence as a relapsed heretic on the ground that he had violated the terms of a previous sentence imposed upon him by the inquisitor at Bologna. In 1324 the Bolognese inquisitor had found Cecco guilty of improper utterances concerning the Catholic Faith and had imposed upon him a penance of fifteen days of confession, daily recital of thirty Paternosters and as many Ave Marias, occasional fasting for a year, and the hearing every Sabbath of a sermon by the friars. He furthermore took from Cecco “all his astrological books, great and small,” forbade him ever again to teach astrology at Bologna or elsewhere, publicly or privately, deprived him indefinitely of his professorial chair and doctor’s degree, and fined him seventy pounds Bolognese. Taken altogether, this sentence, while it did not condemn Cecco to death, would seem to have deprived him rather effectually of future means of livelihood. Three years later the inquisitor at Florence received the account of the foregoing process against Cecco at Bologna, summoned him before himself, pronounced him a heretic, and handed him over to the secular arm to be burned at the stake. This part of the sentence was duly executed by the ducal Vicarius, Lord Jacob of Brescia. It was further decreed that Cecco’s astrological book in Latin and his poem l’Acerba in Italian should be burned and that all persons retaining copies of them should be excommunicated.

Villani’s account.

Villani adds a number of further details. He states that it was the Commentary on the Sphere which had caused Cecco’s condemnation at Bologna, that he had been forbidden to make further use of it, and that at Florence it was charged that he had violated this prohibition. But Cecco denied this and attributed his arrest at Florence to the hostility of a Friar Minor who was both bishop of Aversa and chancellor to Charles of Calabria, who was at that time duke of Florence and whose astrologer Cecco seems to have become after leaving Bologna. In this new position, Villani says, Cecco had made many true predictions of political events, but although a great astrologer he was a vain man and of worldly life. The friar-bishop-chancellor regarded Cecco’s presence at Florence as court astrologer as an abomination. Villani, however, like Cecco himself, does not appear to regard his practicing astrology at Florence as necessarily a violation of the decree of the inquisitor at Bologna; but if the Riccardian manuscript correctly reproduces the Bologna sentence, Cecco would certainly seem to have violated it. Villani volunteers more information than the Riccardian manuscript as to the respects in which Cecco’s teaching or practice of astrology was found objectionable. He makes the general assertion, which is too vague to be of much value, that Cecco was too bold in exercising his science in things prohibited and untrue, “since the influence of the stars does not constrain of necessity” nor against human free will and divine prescience. Villani, indeed, perhaps added this qualification, after having stated that Cecco made many true political predictions, in order to save himself from possible censure. But he more specifically states that Cecco ascribed the force of necessity to the stars; that in his treatise on the Sphere he asserted that there were evil spirits generated in the sky who could be coerced by incantations under certain constellations to perform many marvels; and that he taught that Christ came to earth in accordance with the will of God and with the principles of astrology, and ought from his nativity to live with His disciples come poltrone and to die the death that He did, while Antichrist would come according to the courses of the planets in rich raiment and power. Cecco also, Villani vaguely adds, taught “many other idle things and contrary to the Faith.”

The later manuscripts.

The later manuscripts incorporate these charges of Villani in the inquisitorial sentence against Cecco, using suspiciously similar wording in the passage concerning Christ and Antichrist, and charging that Cecco has taught his work on the Sphere in the schools contrary to his promise and oath. These manuscripts further assert that Cecco has confessed to teaching publicly that men born under certain constellations must necessarily be rich or poor or decapitated, that God would not change the course of nature, and that in the fourth and eighth sections[2959] of his Commentary on the Sphere he said that under certain constellations happy divine men would be born like Moses, Hermes, Merlin, and Simon Magus. Like Villani the later manuscripts mention Cecco’s political predictions at Florence and state that he had prophesied concerning “the Bavarian.”[2960] They also mention the stress laid by Cecco upon the importance of the constellations that cities are founded under. Such of the statements of these late manuscripts[2961] concerning Cecco’s astrological teachings as are not found in Villani will be found to rest upon certain passages in his own works or upon a misapprehension of them.[2962] They also mention his Commentary on Alcabitius, whereas the older form of the sentence condemns only one Latin book on astrology by him. Another suspicious circumstance about the longer form of inquisitorial sentence preserved in these late manuscripts is that the Inquisition is represented as itself condemning Cecco to death[2963] instead of handing him over to the secular arm.

Astrology for cities.

Let us next turn to Cecco’s two commentaries in Latin and see what foundation there is in them for the astrological teachings ascribed to him by Villani and the longer form of inquisitorial sentence preserved only in very late and suspiciously worded manuscripts. It is true that Cecco emphasizes the control exercised by the stars over the fate of cities. The laying of the first stone of a city is a moment as influential over all its future history as is the date of conception in the case of an individual. Romans and Tuscans are so corrupt because of the ascendancy of Venus over them, the Lombards are scientific through the influence of Mercury.[2964] If cities are to endure, they should be built under the fixed signs.[2965] It is best for a man to live in a city with the same guiding star as his own planet.[2966]

The fate of individuals.

In the notes which I took on the astrological statements in Cecco’s commentaries there seems to be no single direct assertion that under certain constellations men must necessarily be rich or poor or decapitated. Cecco does tell his students, however, “You ought to know another thing, that when Jupiter is in the signs of Mars, forsooth Aries or Scorpion, the person born will be bound with the girdle of poverty, infamous, and injured by the powerful.”[2967] The word “decapitated” perhaps is reminiscent of an anecdote which Cecco tells in discussing the fulfilment of dreams and their dependence on the constellations. A certain malefactor went to a meadow with his associates with a scythe to cut down grass and saw beetles rolling up dung in the road. This reminded him of a dream which he had had the night before that these beetles would decapitate him, and he started in to kill them. But as he struck at them with the handle of the scythe, the blade which was over his own neck cut off his head. “And the moon was in Taurus in conjunction with the fixed star which is called Aldebaran; such is the story told me by my master whom may God pardon.”[2968] This conjunction, however, would seem to have been that prevailing when the malefactor had his dream and not the constellation under which he was born. Cecco in another passage, however, not only cites Zael to the effect that a horoscope when Mars is lord of the ascendant and in a favorable angle of the sky bestows power and dignity along with impiety and the greatest cruelty, and, unless he is regarded by some favorable planet, will cause the possessor of the horoscope to lose his power soon; but Cecco also adduces the recent tyrant of Ascoli, John Venibene, as a specific example who ruled for three years very cruelly and then was expelled and died abroad.[2969] In the case, on the other hand, of a constellation under which are born lords of the whole earth, such as emperors, kings, and princes, Cecco warns that the sons born to peasants in this constellation will not become kings but simply leaders among men of their class, “since the intractability of the material weakens the celestial force” and “the vices and virtues of the parents are transmitted to their heirs.”[2970] Elsewhere he states that certain planets called superior are especially appropriated to kings, nobles, and magistrates, while the inferior planets signify concerning the populace.[2971]

Influence of stars and signs.

Cecco grants that the celestial bodies are inanimate but holds that by virtue of their substances and the mediation of the intelligences moving them they “have properties in different parts of the sky in which they are said to rejoice and sadden effectively in us, that is, by disposing us to good and to evil.”[2972] Cecco believes that each herb has its appropriate planet and sign, and that doctors should be careful to note the positions of planets in administering herbs.[2973] The parts of the human body and regions of the globe he also parcels out among the signs.[2974] In connection with the common topic of the influence of the stars upon the formation of the child in the womb he makes the less common observation that sometimes the influence of the stars is too strong, as is seen in the case of infants who talk when only two months old or have marvelous discretion beyond their years—or rather, months—and die young.[2975]

How mind and soul are affected

The heavens influence the human mind as well as body, therefore. The stars alter the elements, through these our bodies, and through these our souls.[2976] Certain signs of the zodiac are called human or rational “because they dispose man to reason” and “he will possess eloquence mingled with reason.” A person who is born under one of the vicious and tortuous signs, namely, the ram, crab, bull, scorpion, and goat, will have a tortuous and vicious disposition, plotting evil and detracting from others, such a person as the physician Gualfridinus, by which name, as Boffito has already suggested, Dino del Garbo, the noted medical writer of Florence, is probably indicated. When the moon is in one of the common signs, Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, or Pisces, persons who make advances to you are liable to prove fraudulent; marriages contracted then are liable to be dissolved; if one escapes from prison, it will be only to be retaken; but if one is accused of some crime, he will soon be acquitted; and so on. In some signs secrets will be kept, in others immediately revealed. When the moon is in the first facies of Scorpion, all news reports are false.[2977] The influence of the stars explains the puzzling fact, concerning which his fellow-townsmen of Ascoli have often questioned Cecco, why a man will choose a silly girl of low birth as his wife rather than another who is more beautiful, noble, and intelligent. The answer is that when the stars of two persons come into certain positions relative to each other, love which cannot be dissolved except by death results, regardless of beauty and social rank.[2978]

The stars and dreams.

Cecco also ascribes the prophetic quality of dreams to astrological influence, which permits the union of the soul of the dreamer with the superior intelligences or spirits of the sky. Such revelation is, however, impressed upon the soul of the dreamer “under some similitude or figure.” Dreams come true when the moon is in the fixed signs, Taurus, Leo, Aquarius, and Scorpio; when the moon is in the common signs, dreams are partly true and partly false. The length of time to elapse before the dream is fulfilled can also often be determined. Cecco says that “minds ill-constituted and false and homicidal do not have true dreams because they are indisposed to receive the action of the intelligences.” Robbers and homicides may, however, have true dreams prophetic of their own deaths as in the tale of the malefactor, the beetles, and the scythe already recounted, and in the case of a native of Ascoli whom Cecco knew personally and “who was named Angelus and consequently was a devil.” Dreaming when the moon was in Leo that he would be hanged in Roman territory, he became so frightened that he turned friar, but after two years was dismissed from the Order, went to Viterbo, robbed a man, and was there hanged for it.[2979]

Astrological images.

Cecco alludes to astrological images twice in his commentary on the De principiis of Alcabitius. To illustrate how images work which are made as love charms, or to gain honor, and the like, he states that if an image for purposes of love is made in the hour of Venus when that planet is in Pisces or in Taurus, as the tin is poured out it acquires under the moulding influence of that constellation the due proportion of the elements essential to produce the desired property.[2980] Later Cecco tells us of an image which Vergil made at Naples to drive away flies. When the second facies of Aquarius is in the ascendant an image of a fly should be engraved on the stone in a ring.[2981] In his Commentary on the Sphere Cecco even goes so far as to tell how to construct an astronomical image which will enable one to receive responses from demons.[2982]

Did Cecco deny human free will?

Returning to the charges made against Cecco’s astrological teaching by Villani and the later manuscripts, especially the assertion that he ascribed necessity to the stars, we have to note that, although many of the astrological teachings just listed may seem to ascribe something closely approaching to necessity to the stars, nevertheless Cecco expressly asserted that he believed in freedom of the will. Many of the statements from his commentaries which we have thus far presented are cited by him from Ptolemy, Hermes, Zaël and other astrological writers, and perhaps are not always to be taken as his own opinion, especially when he quotes Hermes as saying, “The heavens are the cause of moral virtues and of all.”[2983] At any rate he now informs his students that according to “our and the true Faith” the circle of the zodiac, “though it may be the cause of life, yet is not the cause of our will or intellect except as a tendency (nisi dispositive), and so I hold and truly believe, although other astrologers hold the contrary, saying that all things which are generated and corrupted and renovated in the inferior world of generation and corruption have efficient causes in the superior world which is ungenerated and incorruptible.... That argument I will overthrow in my glosses to the Centiloquium”[2984]—a work by Cecco which seems to have been lost or never completed.

Founders of new religions said to be born of incubi and succubi at astrological periods.

The charge that in his Commentary on the Sphere Cecco said that under certain constellations happy divine men would be born like Moses, Hermes, Merlin, and Simon Magus, and that Christ and Antichrist were alike under the rule of the stars, appears from the text of the Commentary as it has reached us to be an unjust one. Cecco, it is true, quotes Hipparchus in the book on hierarchies of spirits to the effect that in the coluri, or circles whose purpose according to Sacrobosco is to distinguish the solstice and equinox, there are incubi and succubi by whose virtue there are born in a major conjunction as if from the deity men who seem divine and who establish religions in the world and work miracles. Such a man was Merlin and such an one will be Antichrist who will be conceived by a virgin and work many miracles.[2985] Of Antichrist Cecco promises to say more at the close of his lecture and he there quotes a treatise by Zoroaster on quarter-revolutions of the eighth sphere. According to this Pseudo-Zoroaster, whenever the eighth sphere completes one quarter of a revolution, which happens once in twelve thousand years, there are born by the virtue of incubi and succubi men supported by divinity who introduce new religions and by whose death even the heaven is perturbed. At the end of twelve thousand years the Mosaic law was terminated thus by the Christian religion, and “ours would be terminated in this way by Antichrist.”[2986] But Cecco does not necessarily subscribe to these statements of Hipparchus and Zoroaster. Indeed he has already declared the art of the latter contrary to the Christian faith and he now continues, “Whence that beast Zoroaster and some following him say that Christ was born under the dominion of those quarter-revolutions from the virtue of incubi and succubi, of whom I have spoken to you above, but it seems horrible to me even to write such words.”[2987]

Birth of Christ and darkness during His passion were both miraculous.

Cecco goes on to affirm that “Christ our Lord” was the true son of God who came into the glorious Virgin and was not made by the nature of the celestial bodies. That He rather was the Maker of celestial natures many things show us. One is that the Magi, who were superior astrologers and acquainted with the secrets of universal nature, adored him as king and son of God, seeing this in the star which appeared to them with the figure of a crowned child beneath it.[2988] Cecco also argues that the period of darkness during Christ’s passion was a true miracle and not due to a natural eclipse, nor to the interposition of a comet called Milex, nor to the occult virtue of the stone heliotrope. The comet Milex is supposed to presage religious change and injury to kings and potentates, but Cecco argues that its interposition would not cut off the sun’s light and further that it is not found at the altitude necessary to interpose. The stone heliotrope is green with blood-colored drops, and when it is placed in a shell full of water in the rays of the sun, vapors arise from it which obscure the horizon in that city. Cecco does not dispute this occult virtue in the gem, which is commonly called “orfanella” and which renders a man invisible by affecting the eyes of others. But he argues that the eclipse during Christ’s passion was universal and not confined to the city of Jerusalem. Some say that an interposition of Venus and Mercury caused the darkness, but Cecco affirms that this would be astronomically impossible and in itself a miracle and subversion of natural order. Cecco, however, adds that while miraculous, the eclipse was also in a sense natural, since God is the First and Universal Cause and can alter the heavens which are a secondary universal cause.[2989]

Christian qualification of Albumasar.

Cecco also pretends that where Albumasar speaks of creatio as the work of the stars, he must really mean generatio, since the act of creation pertains to God alone, although generation is under the stars.[2990] As for Albumasar’s aphorism, “If anyone asks anything of God when the head of the dragon is in conjunction with Jupiter and the moon in mid-sky, his prayer will be fulfilled”—which Peter of Abano said he had tested twice with success; Cecco declares that it is not proper to interpret this as meaning that prayers to God will be infallibly answered in certain constellations, but that the word deus is to be taken here as indicating the king or other chief magistrate in the state.[2991] Thus Cecco seems at considerable pains to say nothing that might be offensive to the church, and he closes his Commentary on the Sphere with the statement that if in it or other writings of his aught is found to criticize, he will gladly submit it to the correction of the very holy Roman church. Possibly this remark and others like it represent a revision of his works undertaken after his first condemnation at Bologna. According to one of the late manuscripts,[2992] Cecco, when summoned before the Inquisition at Florence, claimed that his book had been corrected by the inquisitor of Lombardy. This defense was not allowed, however, and the terms of the sentence at Bologna would seem to preclude it. And since the sentence given at Florence absolutely forbade anyone to possess the book, there does not seem much reason why a revised rather than the original version should survive.

Cecco’s astrology not the most extreme.

On the whole, then, it would be surprising if Cecco’s condemnation were due merely or primarily to his astrological teachings. As Tiraboschi[2993] noted nearly one hundred and fifty years ago, he upholds human free will, though attributing to the stars a natural inclination to vice or virtue, and holding other superstitions common to the astrologers of his time. Tiraboschi also noted his submissive tone to the church and was unable to see in the Commentary on the Sphere the errors which had been charged to Cecco’s account. More than this, in a number of respects Cecco did not go as far as some of his predecessors or subsequent writers. Christ and Antichrist had been partially subjected to the stars by writers before him who do not seem to have been assailed by the Inquisition for their views, and Pierre d’Ailly, the great cardinal and reformer, went much farther in this direction than Cecco in the next century. Peter of Abano had held views concerning the influence of the constellations on the appearance of new religions and on prayers to God which Cecco rejects. But all in vain the concessions made to the Christian standpoint by Cecco at the expense of astrological doctrine; of him alone we know surely that he was condemned by the Inquisition, and he went to the stake.

Charge that he taught astrological necromancy.

We have not yet, however, discussed Villani’s charge that in his Commentary on the Sphere Cecco asserted that there were evil spirits generated in the sky who could be coerced by incantations under certain constellations to perform many marvels. Villani perhaps has reference to the passage in which Cecco gives astronomical directions to be followed by anyone who wishes to make an image by means of which he may receive responses from spirits.[2994] There is indeed a good deal of information concerning spirits in the heavens in Cecco’s commentary on Sacrobosco’s manual, and he shows a wide acquaintance with books of magic. We turn, therefore, from his astrology proper to his attitude to magic and to astrological necromancy.

His attitude toward magic.

Cecco’s attitude to magic so-called is the usual one of condemnation. He repeats that Zoroaster was “the first inventor of the magic art,” and gives a classification of the magic arts almost identical with that of Hugh of Saint Victor, but states that he derives it from the Liber de vinculo spiritus of Hipparchus, a book of necromancy. Cecco says that magic is “emphatically censured by holy mother church,”[2995] and he does not directly question or qualify this condemnation. He says nothing of a natural magic which is harmless. His chief concern with magic, as in the cases of Michael Scot and Peter of Abano, seems to be to distinguish astrology from it as a reputable science, and to hold that one can learn of the future better as well as more legitimately by astrology.

His frequent citation of books of magic and necromancy.

The fact, however, that the church disapproves of magic and “vituperates” it, does not restrain Cecco from frequent citation of books of magic, such as the Liber artis magicae of Apollonius,[2996] nor from retailing to his students much information concerning spirits in the sky and necromancy. Thus when Sacrobosco mentions the four points of the compass, Cecco is reminded of a statement in the Liber de ordine intelligentiarum of Hipparchus that certain princes of the demons “occupy the four parts beneath the sky. For expelled from heaven, they occupy the air and the four elements.”[2997] When Sacrobosco speaks of the zenith and poles in a purely astronomical way, Cecco again quotes Hipparchus as saying, “O wonderful zenith and godlike nature,”[2998] etc., after the manner of an invocation, and Solomon in the Liber de umbris idearum as exclaiming, “O arctic Manes! O antarctics propelled by divinity! Why do natures so great and noble seem to be enclosed in mineral species?” This last remark, Cecco explains, refers to the responses given by these spirits in metal mirrors.[2999] When Sacrobosco treats of climates, Cecco remarks that the word may be understood necromantically as well as astronomically. Zoroaster, the inventor of the magic art, uses the word in the necromantic sense when he says, “For those climates are to be marveled at, which with flesh of corpses and human blood give responses trustworthily.” “By this,” continues Cecco, “you should understand those four spirits of great virtue who stand in cruciatis locis, that is, in east, west, north, and south, whose names are Oriens, Amaymon, Paymon, and Egim,[3000] spirits who are of the major hierarchy and who have under them twenty-five legions of spirits each. Therefore because of their noble nature these seek sacrifice from human blood and likewise from the flesh of a dead man or cat.[3001] But this Zoroastrian art cannot be carried on without great peril, fastings, prayers, and all things which are contrary to our Faith.”[3002]

Necromancy employs evil spirits.

This last word of warning may seem a bit belated and perhaps somewhat perfunctory, but shows Cecco still consistent in recognizing that magic and necromancy are contrary to the Christian religion. In other passages he calls these spirits demons and diabolical,[3003] and affirms with Augustine that “spirits who are outside the order of grace” cannot truly transmute bodies, nor raise the dead, nor do any marvels and feats of magic except those which can be accounted for by the occult virtues of nature.[3004] And in speaking of a demon named Floron, who was mentioned by Solomon in the Book of the Shadows of Ideas, who was of the hierarchy of cherubim, who was confined in a steel mirror by a major invocation, who knew many secrets of nature, and who deceived King Manfred and others by ambiguous oracles in modern times,—Cecco concludes, “So beware of these demons because their ultimate intention is to deceive Christians to the discredit of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Cecco tells a story of a man of Ferrara who consulted this demon Floron as to hidden treasure and was told that he would find enough in a certain spot to last him for the rest of his life. He dug in the cavern indicated and uncovered only four ounces of gold, but as an avalanche crushed him immediately afterward, the oracle was fulfilled.[3005] Yet on the next page we find Cecco giving the instructions already mentioned for making an astronomical image in order to obtain responses from a spirit. And several pages further on he cites a response of this same Floron as to the time when demons are least liable to deceive one and when as a consequence it is best to consult them, and again as to the divinity of Christ, of whom this demon Floron said, “He took upon Him human flesh that all flesh through Him might be saved.”[3006]

Cecco unduly curious rather than heretical in this regard.

Thus, much of Cecco’s work seems less a commentary upon Sacrobosco’s text than a manual of astrological necromancy. His citations from the books of magic and necromancy well illustrate those relations between astronomy, magic, and necromancy to which we have before had allusions in the writings of Albertus Magnus and elsewhere. We remember the distinction drawn in the Speculum astronomiae between commendable works of astronomy and injurious works of necromancy, and we wonder if the cause of Cecco’s condemnation may not have been that instead of sticking to the field of astrology he made these dangerous excursions into the subject of necromancy. It might well be held that he was leading his students into temptation by the numerous references to demons, the magic art, and astrological necromancy in his Commentary on the Sphere. At the same time it must be remembered that such pillars of the Christian Faith and learning as William of Auvergne and Albertus Magnus had read and cited books of magic and necromancy. Cecco’s passages concerning astrological necromancy are almost all quotations or citations from other authors. When he speaks in his own name it is usually to declare magic and necromancy contrary to Christianity and to censure the passages which he has just cited. Moreover, the notion of hierarchies of spirits, of their presence in sky and air and elements, of their power to work marvels,—all these were orthodox enough Christian doctrines. And Cecco does not, like William and Albert, hint at a natural variety of magic apart from demons which is not idolatrous and unchristian. Of indiscreet curiosity concerning such matters and undue mention of them he might be found guilty, but scarcely of any direct heresy so far as his extant written works are concerned.

Was Cecco’s death due to personal enemies?

If neither Cecco’s astrology nor his citation of books of magic and necromancy seems sufficiently extreme to account alone for his condemnation by the Inquisition, we may perhaps find the clue in the hypothesis of personal enemies, which has already been more than once advanced by writers on Cecco. That he would have made bitter personal enemies one can well imagine from the sharp personalities in which he indulges in his works. That such personalities were not unwelcome to the taste of that time, however, is indicated by Dante’s frequent allusions to the recent dead in his Inferno. Cecco with less discretion directed his gibes against the living. Thus he states that the head and tail of the dragon are the intersections of circles, and not stars forming the shape of a dragon in the sky “as a certain physician of ours of Ascoli (?) argued together with his mother who was as big a fool as himself.”[3007] We have already mentioned Cecco’s insulting words concerning the physician Gualfridinus, who seems the same as Dino del Garbo. Now while Villani tells us that Cecco attributed his arrest at Florence to the chancellor of the duke, in the very next chapter, in mentioning the death of Master Dino del Garbo, whom he calls a very celebrated physician and a man learned in natural science and philosophy, who wrote “several noble books” at the request of King Robert of Naples, Villani adds that Dino “was a great cause of Cecco’s death, attacking as erroneous the book from which he had lectured at Bologna; and many said that he did this through envy.”[3008] Padre Appiani, a Jesuit who wrote an apology for Cecco in the seventeenth century, attributed his persecution at Bologna to the son, Tommaso del Garbo, and that at Florence to Dino.[3009] Tiraboschi in the eighteenth century came to the conclusion that “envy had no small part in the condemnation of this unhappy astrologer, and that he would not have perished so wretchedly if he had not had powerful enemies who conspired to his ruin.”[3010] Nothing is said by Villani of Cecco’s having offended the duke of Florence, Charles of Calabria, and so forfeited his favor and protection, but this would seem likely, though of course it would account only for his second sentence at Florence.

His execution of little significance.

The condemnation of Cecco, therefore, may be a good example of the way in which the Inquisition could be manipulated for private ends, but it does not seem a sign of any general attack by the church and Inquisition on astrology or on learned men who showed an interest in occult science. The charges repeated, or invented, against Cecco by Villani and the late manuscripts are loose and exaggerated. Why Cecco d’Ascoli was burned at the stake is a problem that has puzzled more than one investigator, and none of the explanations offered is entirely satisfactory. It is, however, fairly evident that the process against Cecco was a failure as an attempt to check his teachings and simply advertised him and his writings. It came late in the medieval period and apparently was not soon repeated. Everything tends to indicate that his execution was an exceptional and sensational, but not especially significant event. The attitudes toward astrology of Thomas Aquinas, whom the church canonized, and of Albertus Magnus, who was beatified, are much more important and more characteristic of medieval ecclesiastical culture.

[2950] G. Castelli, La vita e le opere di Cecco d’Ascoli, 1892, chapter 12.

[2951] For an account of this literature see Castelli’s opening chapters.

The important contributions of G. Boffito will be mentioned presently. W. St. C. Baddeley, Cecco d’Ascoli, Poet, Astrologer, Physician, 1894, is a worthless popular essay.

[2952] Sphera Mundi cum tribus Commentis nuper editis videlicet Cicchi Esculani, Francisci Capuani de Manfredonia, Iacobi Fabri Stapulensis.... Impressum Venetiis per Simonem Papiensem dictum Bivilaquam, 1499. As the leaves are unnumbered in this edition, the following references will follow the foliation of the 1518 edition, sphera cum commentis, etc., which will be cited as Sphera.

BN 7337, 15th century, pp. 32-41, Caeci Aesculani super sphaeram, seems to contain only portions of Cecco’s commentary and to omit Sacrobosco’s text entirely.

[2953] Il Commento di Cecco d’Ascoli all’ Alcabizzo, edito a cura del P. G. Boffito, 1905. This will be referred to as Alcabizzo.

[2954] Studi e Documenti di Storia e Diritto, Publicazione periodice dell’ accademia di conferenza Storico-Giuridichi, Roma, XX (1899), 357-82, “Perchè fu condamnato al fuoco l’astrologo Cecco d’Ascoli?”

[2955] Muratori, Scriptores, tome 13, X, 39-40.

[2956] Riccard. 673 (M-I-25), fol. 111r-v, “De magistro Cecco de asculo quare combustus sit.”

[2957] Gli Eretici d’Italia, Turin, 1865, I, 151.

[2958] H. C. Lea, A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, III, 444.

Lea’s sources for his account of Cecco would seem somewhat dubious from his own description of them, since he says, “I owe many of the above details to a sketch of Cecco’s life in a Florentine MS which I judge from the handwriting to be of the seventeenth century and of which the anonymous author appears to be well informed; also to a MS copy of the elaborate sentence, much more full than the fragments given by Lami and Cantù.” Lea supplied no further means of identifying these MSS, but presumably he had reference to two of the following:

Poppi 199, 18th century folio, Vita e morte di Cecco d’Ascoli.

Panciatichiani 117, 18th century, p. 50—“Abiura di Cecco d’Ascoli e sua morte seguita in Firenze l’anno 1328, con altre notizie appartenenti alla sua vita.” Precede una nota sul padre Accursio Buonfantini Inquisitore, che esaminò e condannò Cecco d’Ascoli; pp. 51-9, Esame e condanna di Cecco d’Ascoli, “Al nome de Dio amen. Noi frate Accursio ... / ... Familiari e servitori dell’ Inquisizione e molte altre persone”; pp. 60-3, Memorie della vita e morte di Cecco d’Ascoli, “Nella città d’ascoli nella marca fu un artigiano assai commodo ... / ... che troppo dalla credenzia della vera fede si allontanano”; pp. 63-4, Altre notizie date dal Sig. A. M. Manni, “Maestro Cecco fu cittadino ascolano, filosofo et astrologo ... / ... delle Virtù delle Pietre, manoscritto del sig. Alessandro Cherubini.”

Palat. 895, 17th century, carte 15, Sentenzia contro a maestro Cecco di maestro Simone degli Stabili da Ascoli, data in Firenze l’anno di nostro Signore 1328, “Noi frate Accursio di Firenze, dell’ ordine de’ frati minori, per autorità appostolica Inquisitorre della eretica malignità della prouincia de Toscana ... / ... come in Firenze è pubblico è notorio per l’euidenza del fatto manifesto.”

Castelli, p. 42, says that the number of copies of the sentence and relation of the death of Cecco found in the libraries of Italy is incredible, but he mentions only two.

[2959] Cecco’s Commentary is not divided into such sections in the two editions and MS which I have seen.

[2960] “del Bavaro”; the illusion is presumably to the emperor, Louis of Bavaria.

[2961] Listed above, p. 951, note 5. Panciatich. 117 is very similar to Palat. 895, but the wording is not identical, and from fol. 56v on the former omits much of the diffuse moralizing of the latter on how wicked it is to pry into the future and to destroy faith in freedom of the will, the basis of all morality (see Palat. 895, fol. 9r-v).

[2962] Such as ascribing to Cecco views which he cites from other authors only to condemn immediately.

[2963] In Palat. 895, for instance, fol. 12v, “Deliberarono condannare alla morte il detto maestro Cecco”; fol. 13v, “lo condanniamo alla morte come merita.”

[2964] Sphera, fol. 11; BN 7337, p. 33. Cecco also uses the inhabitants of Ferrara and Bologna to illustrate his point. Each city or state, however, has a triple influence exerted on it by the stars, according to its climate, its province, and the moment of its building. See also fol. 14.

[2965] Alcabizzo, ed. Boffito (1905), pp. 31-2.

[2966] Ibid., 53-4.

[2967] Ibid., pp. 58-9.

[2968] Alcabizzo, p. 31.

[2969] Sphera, fol. 20; BN 7337, p. 37.

[2970] Alcabizzo, pp. 9-10.

[2971] Sphera, fol. 11.

[2972] Alcabizzo, p. 20.

[2973] Ibid., 23-4, 49-50.

[2974] Ibid., 50.

[2975] Ibid., p. 23.

[2976] Sphera, fol. 7, “... elementa alterant complexiones, complexionibus alteratis alterantur animae que in nobis sunt quia anime consequuntur corpora ut dicit philosophus in principio sue physionomie.”

[2977] Alcabizzo, pp. 32, 43, 46-8.

[2978] Alcabizzo, pp. 34 and 36.

[2979] Ibid., 29-31.

[2980] Alcabizzo, p. 26.

[2981] Ibid., p. 43.

[2982] Sphera, fol. 18.

[2983] Ibid., fol. 4; BN 7337, p. 32.

[2984] Ibid., fol. 12.

[2985] Sphera, fol. 14; BN 7337, p. 34.

[2986] Ibid., fols. 22-23; BN 7337, p. 39.

[2987] “Unde iste bestia zoroastes et aliqui eum sequentes dicunt quod Christus fuit ortus in dominio istarum quartarum ex virtute incuborum et succuborum de quibus supra dixi vobis quod horribile mihi videtur scribere ista verba.”

[2988] BN 7337, p. 39.

[2989] Sphera, fol. 23.

[2990] Alcabizzo, p. 49.

[2991] Alcabizzo, p. 17. In the Sphera, fol. 22 (BN 7337, p. 38), he had promised to treat of this matter in the commentary on Alcabitius’ De principiis.

[2992] Palat. 895, 17th century, fols. 10v-11r.

[2993] Tiraboschi (1775), V, 165.

[2994] Sphera, fol. 18.

[2995] Ibid., fol. 3, “a sancta matre ecclesia vituperabiliter improbata.”

[2996] Or Liber de angelica factura, (or perhaps factione) as it is called in BN 7337, p. 35.

[2997] Sphera, fol. 15; BN 7337, p. 34.

[2998] Sphera, fol. 20.

[2999] Sphera, fol. 17.

[3000] In BN 7337, p. 37, these names are spelled, “Orion, Agimon, pagimon, et egin.”

[3001] “vel gatti” in the printed text; “vel capti” in BN 7337.

[3002] Sphera, fol. 21.

[3003] Sphera, fols. 17 and 22.

[3004] Sphera, fol. 16.

[3005] Sphera, fol. 17; BN 7337, p. 35.

[3006] Sphera, fol. 22; BN 7337, p. 39.

[3007] Alcabizzo, p. 16, “sicut silogizabit quidam noster medicus exculanus cum matre sua fatua sicut ipse.” If the reading were “patre suo fatuus,” one might be tempted to try to see in it a reference to Dino del Garbo and his son, Tommaso del Garbo.

[3008] Villani, X, 40.

[3009] Cited by Castelli; I have not seen the work.

[3010] Tiraboschi (1775), V, 165.