Georg Bauer (1494-1555), known by his Latinized name Georgius Agricola, was a humanist academic, physician, metallurgist, and chemist. He was born in Glauchau, province of Saxony, during the dawn of the Nordic Renaissance.
He is considered the founder of modern mineralogy and a pioneer of metallurgy. His medical, chemical and mathematical writings were a key contribution to developing the fundamentals of the extraction and transformation of metals, as well as of mining, geology and paleontology.
His ability to provide scientific arguments and make logical deductions, at a time when superstition and dogma still dominated, is the reason why he is considered one of the most notable scholars in Western Europe.
Biography
Early years and youth
Little is known of Agricola's early years. He was born into a family devoted to Catholicism and his father was a prosperous cloth merchant. During his early years, in parochial school, he learned principles of arithmetic and Latin.
With the initial intention of becoming a priest, in his 20s, he attended the University of Leipzig. Perhaps the influence of one of his professors, a former student of the great humanist Erasmus of Rotterdam, made him change his plans and led him towards the academic world.
Agricola became a professor after studying philosophy, philology, and the ancient languages. It was while studying the classics, in the early years of the Reformation, that he adopted the Latin version of his name.
His studies continued for a few more years in Leipzig and later at the University of Bologna, Italy. During his stay in the cradle of Humanism and the Renaissance, he deepened his knowledge in Greek, Hebrew, Arabic and began his facet in science and medicine.
In those years he maintained constant contact with humanistic thinkers and the academic circles of the universities of Padua and Venice. It was at this time that he established his great friendship with Erasmus, a Dutch theologian and philosopher, who is said to have motivated him to write and publish several books.
Professional life
Ten years after starting his medical practice, Agricola moved to another major mining city, Chemnitz, where he continued to practice medicine and conduct geological studies.
Throughout his life, Georigus is considered to have had a limited interest in politics. It is only possible to identify a brief pamphlet, called "Turkish Speech", in which he calls on Emperor Ferdinand I and urges him to the political and religious integration of Germany, before the Turkish siege of Vienna.
However, from his 50 years his diplomatic phase begins in which he assumes various public positions. First he was elected Burgomaster of his city, then he was an emissary of the negotiations between the Protestant Duke Maurice of Saxony and the Catholic Emperor Charles V.
Agricola passed away in 1555, one year before the posthumous publication of De Re Metallica, the work for which he would be remembered as the father of mineralogy. It is said that he suffered a stroke due to a heated religious debate.
Precisely, for religious reasons, he could not be buried according to the Catholic tradition in his hometown, whose majority was Protestant. His remains had to be buried in the cathedral of Zeitz, in the state of Saxony-Anhalt.
Contributions
Among his contributions stands out, in the field of stratigraphic geology, the understanding of the arrangement and origin of rocks, observing how they were arranged in strata and with a determined and detectable order.
His descriptions of wind and water as geological forces was one of his great contributions in physical geology. Additionally, his explanation of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, due to underground heating.
Also the area of paleontology was favored by its observations and scientific arguments on all kinds of fossils, minerals and gems. Agricola left behind the simple alphabetical classification or by physical properties.
He managed to differentiate them by color, taste, smell, place of origin, natural strength, shape and size. This allowed to disprove some typical superstitions of the time and identify potential medicinal uses.
Plays
Agricola wrote more than 10 books in Latin, between published and unpublished, among which may be mentioned: Bermannus, sive de Re Metallica (1530), De lapide philosophico (1531), De ortu et causis subterraneorum (1544), De Ortu et Causis Subterraneorum (1546), De Natura Fossilium (1546) and De Re Metallica (1556).
De Re Metallica, literally translated "On the Nature of Metals," was his most important book, being the only guide available to miners and metallurgists for the next 180 years.
The book compiled descriptions of minerals and strata, methods of surveying, excavation, analysis, smelting, equipment and machinery used in all processes of mining activity. Aspects of prospecting, logistics, mine administration and occupational diseases of miners were also addressed in his posthumous work.
Undoubtedly, the recognition that Georgius Agricola maintains until today, as a pioneer of metallurgy and founder of modern mineralogy, is due to his innovative vision and the search for scientific precision that drove him.
References
- Hannaway, O. (1992). Georgius Agricola as Humanist. Journal of the History of Ideas, 53 (4), 553-560. doi: 10.2307 / 2709936. Recovered from jstor.org
- Raymond, R. (1914). The American Historical Review, 19 (3), 597-599. doi: 10.2307 / 1835088. Recovered from jstor.org
- UCPM (University of California Museum of Paleontology). (sf). Georgius Agricola (1494-1555). Recovered from ucmp.berkeley.edu
- Encyclopædia Britannica, & Cahn, RW (2019, March 20). Georgius Agricola: German scholar and scientist. Recovered from britannica.com
- Toxicological Sciences, Volume 69, Issue 2, October 2002, Pages 292–294. Recovered from academic.oup.com