Boudet, Jean-Patrice (Author)
Micrologus: Nature, Sciences and Medieval Societies
Volume: 28
Pages: 143-166
Thirty years after the founding article of David Pingree, it is time to try to synthesize the recent works and to propose a new interpretation of the phenomenon constituted by the diffusion of Arabic magic texts in the Latin West. This paper takes first into account two main reference bibliographies: that of the "Speculum astronomiae," written in the middle of the XIIIth century by an anonymous author falsely identified with Albertus Magnus, and that of the "Antipalus maleficiorum," written in 1508 by Johannes Trithemius. Thanks to the lists of the "Speculum" and of the "Antipalus," we arrive at a provisional total of 54 texts and magic treatises translated or at least partially adapted from Arabic into Latin. But it is possible to draw up an additional list of 19 texts and treatises of this kind which are not mentioned either in the "Speculum" or in the "Antipalus." We thus arrive at a total of ca. 73 texts translated or adapted (at least partially) from Arabic. Of these 73 texts, it can be estimated that 60 survive in Latin or Spanish versions, whereas in the current state of research only five of them are preserved in their original language. We can therefore measure the extent to which the Latin and Castilian translations of these texts are testimonies of a major importance (even if they are indirect) for the history of magical literature in the medieval Arab world, and the strategic importance of these translations. As to the nature of the texts concerned, it is clear that the great majority of them belong to astral magic, which represents some 59 texts of 73, an astral magic of pagan origin, partly following the tradition of the Sabeans of H. arra¯n, little Islamized and therefore more easily transmissible despite the danger of idolatry it represented for the Christian world, on the condition of being the object of a more or less clear censorship as the case may be. But a more complicated situation can be observed in other magic treatises like the "Liber Bileth," mainly because of the contamination between Arabic, Jewish and Christian magic in the Late Middle Ages. The problem of the nature of the transmission of Arabic magic in a Christian environment is therefore rather complex and it is also the case for their reception that does not have to be the object of cut-anddried judgments.
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