Athanasius Kircher

Kircher, Phonurgia nova, 1673. View online.

Athanasius Kircher (1601/02 – 1680) was a German Jesuit scholar.

Works

(in Latin unless noted)

• Ars Magnesia, Herbipoli: Zinck, 1631, 63 pp, WDB, Gallica.
• Primitiae gnomoniciae catroptricae, Avenione: Pivot, 1635, 228 pp, BSB.
• Prodromus coptus sive aegyptiacus, Romae: Fide, 1636, 338 pp, MPIWG.
• Specula Melitensis encyclica, hoc est syntagma novum instrumentorum physico-mathematicorum, 1637.
• Magnes sive de arte magnetica, Romae: Grignani, 1641, 916 pp, MPIWG.
• Lingua aegyptiaca restituta, Romae: Scheus, 1644, 622 pp,, Gallica, RBR.
• Ars magna lucis et umbrae in decem libros digesta, Romae: Scheus, 1646, 935 pp, MPIWG, LHL, RBR.
• Obeliscus pamphilius, Romae: Grignani, 1650, 560 pp, MPIWG, IA, RBR.
• Musurgia universalis, sive ars magna consoni et dissoni, Romae: Corbelletti, and Grignani, 1650, 690 pp, MPIWG, RBR.
• Oedipus aegyptiacus, 3 vols., Romae, 1652-54, 424+440+546+592 pp, MPIWG v1, UH v1, MPIWG v2/1, Google v2/1, MPIWG v2/2, Google v2/2, Google v3.

• Scrutinium physico-medicum contagiosae luis, 1658, HUL.
• Iter extaticum coeleste, quo mundi opificium, 1660, RBR.
• Diatribe de prodigiosis crucibus, 1661, RBR.
• Polygraphia, 1663, RBR.
• Mundus subterraneus, 1665, UOL.
• Obelisci Aegyptiaci, 1666, RBR.
• Phonurgia nova, sive Conjugium mechanico-physicum artis et naturae paranympha philosophia concinnatum, Kempten: Rudolph Dreherr, 1673, PDF, SLUB, Gallica. Early book on sound, acoustics and music; describes acoustic apparatuses and phenomena such as the tuba stentorophonica [the loud trumpet], the statua citofonica [the talking statue], or the Aeolian harp. Commentaries: [1], [2].
• Sphinx Mystagoga, 1676, WDB.

Literature

• Joscelyn Godwin, Athanasius Kircher: A Renaissance Man and the Quest for Lost Knowledge, Thames & Hudson, 1979, 96 pp, Log.
• Paula Findlen (ed.), Athanasius Kircher: The Last Man Who Knew Everything, Routledge, 2003, PDF.
• John Edward Fletcher, A Study of the Life and Works of Athanasius Kircher, ‘Germanus Incredibilis’: With a Selection of his Unpublished Correspondence and an Annotated Translation of his Autobiography, ed. Elizabeth Fletcher, Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2011, 656 pp, Log.
• Daniel Stolzenberg, Egyptian Oedipus: Athanasius Kircher and the Secrets of Antiquity, University of Chicago Press, 2013, 320 pp.
• Daniel Stolzenberg, "Athanasius Kircher and the Hieroglyphic Sphinx", Public Domain Review, Sep 2014, HTML.
• Roberto Buonanno, The Stars of Galileo Galilei and the Universal Knowledge of Athanasius Kircher, Springer, 2014, PDF.