Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T05:46:57.039Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Charlatan epistemology: As illustrated by a study of wonder-working in the late seventeenth-century Dutch Republic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 January 2022

Koen Vermeir
Koen Vermeir*
Affiliation:
Université de Paris, CNRS, SPHERE, F-75013 Paris, France
*
Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Argument

This article highlights the epistemic concerns that have permeated the historical discourse around charlatanism. In it, I study the term “charlatan” as a multivalent actor’s category without a stable referent. Instead of defining or identifying “the charlatan,” I analyze how the concept of the charlatan was used to make epistemic interventions about what constituted credible knowledge in two interconnected controversies. Focusing on these controversies allows me to thematize how the concept of “the charlatan” expanded beyond medical contexts and to bring a history of knowledge perspective to the history of medicine.

The title of the article, “Charlatan Epistemology,” indicates a historical epistemological approach to charlatanism as well as the existence of a charlatan’s embodied epistemology. On the one hand, I historicize the epistemic characteristics of charlatanism, focusing on virtues as well as vices, knowledge as well as ignorance, by addressing the historical and contextual specificities of two case studies and the larger epistemic concerns at play. On the other hand, I show how references to charlatanism implied the existence of specific embodied knowledges, special skills and techniques to manipulate either natural secrets or the human psyche, and I explore the similarities and differences between charlatan epistemology and artisanal epistemology.

Keywords

Charlatanquackembodied knowledgeartisan epistemologyhistorical epistemologydiviningmiracle cureaction at a distancemultivalent actor’s categoryboundaries of natureepistemic virtueepistemic viceagnotology
Type
Research Article
Information
Science in Context , Volume 33 , Issue 4: Charlatans , December 2020 , pp. 363 - 384
Check for updates
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anon. 1649. The Disease of the House: or, the state mountebanck: administring Physick to a sick Parliament. Nod-nol [i.e. London].Google Scholar
Anon. 1687. Le Charlatan découvert. Toulouse.Google Scholar
Anon. 1692. Loofwerck op het ondersoeck van Der valsche Genees-meesteren onwetenheyt. Harderwijk: Rampen.Google Scholar
Anon. 1697. Nodige Verantwoordinge (pamphlet bounded in the copy in the Municipal Library of Rotterdam of Rabus, De Weergalooze Dichter).Google Scholar
Anon. 1698. “Lettre à M. *** sur l’impossibilité des opérations sympathiques. Par M. L***, docteur en médecine. In 12. A Rotterdam. 1697.” Journal De Savans (Amsterdam edition), 13 January, p. 30-33.Google Scholar
Anon. 1699. Oprechte Haerlemse Saturdaegse Courant. Haarlem: Casteleyn.Google Scholar
Anon. [Slaart, Pieter vander.] 1701. “Wy konnen ter ernstiger verzoeke van verscheyde Vrienden niet nalaten de volgende Brief met de twee Attestatien hier te laten volgen.” De Boekzaal van Europe, November-December, p. 447-458.Google Scholar
Anon. 1705. “Entre les merveilleures Cures…” Le mercure galant, February, p. 213-263.Google Scholar
Asmussen, Tina and Hole Rößler. 2013. Scharlatan! Eine Figur der Relegation in der frühneuzeitlichen Gelehrtenkultur. Zeitsprünge Band 17, Heft 2/3. Frankfurt/Main: Klostermann.Google Scholar
Baron d’Almerigo, Giuseppe. 1699. Manifest van de Baron d’Almerigo, Vinder en eenigste Besitter van de groote Konst des algemeinen genesinge der siektens door Sympathie. Koninklijke Bibliotheek, shelfmark: pflt 14457.Google Scholar
Basnage de Beauval, Henri. 1697. “Een Brief over de onmogelijkheid der zoogenaamde Sympathetische Werking, geschreven van den Heer Doctor Herman Lufneu, Rotterdammer Stads Arts. De aloude bekende mogelijkheid van de Sympathetische Werkinge, voorgesteld in een Brief aan den Heer…. Door Jan Schilperoort Med. Doct. Natuurkundig Vertoog over de onmogelijkheid der zoogenaamde Sympathetische Werking, briefswijze geschreven door Doctor Herman Lufneu, Rotterdammer Stads Arts. Zijn gewaande Wederlegger Dr. J.S. word onder anderen beantwoort. C’est-à-dire, La possibilité, & l’impossibilité des effets de la poudre de Sympathie &c. Te Rotterdam by Pieter vander Slaart, en by Barent Bos in 8 pagg. 18. 32. & 160.” Histoire des Ouvrages des Savans, May, p. 408-417.Google Scholar
Bayle, Pierre. 1675. Pierre Bayle to Joseph Bayle, Rouen, 7 February (Letter 77). http://bayle-correspondance.univ-st-etienne.fr/?Lettre-77-Pierre-Bayle-a-Joseph&lang=fr (Last accessed: 23 November 2020).Google Scholar
Bayle, Pierre. 1696. Pierre Bayle to Jean-Baptiste Dubos, [Rotterdam,] Monday 3 September (Letter 1156) http://bayle-correspondance.univ-st-etienne.fr/?Lettre-1156-Pierre-Bayle-a-Jean&lang=fr (Last accessed: 23 November 2020).Google Scholar
Bayle, Pierre. 1697a. Pierre Bayle to Jean-Baptiste Dubos, Rotterdam, 7 March (Letter 1229) http://bayle-correspondance.univ-st-etienne.fr/?Lettre-1229-Pierre-Bayle-a-Jean&lang=fr#nh8 (Last accessed: 23 November 2020).Google Scholar
Bayle, Pierre. 1697b. Pierre Bayle to Jean-Baptiste Dubos, Rotterdam, 12 August (Letter 1286). http://bayle-correspondance.univ-st-etienne.fr/?Lettre-1286-Pierre-Bayle-a-Jean&lang=fr (Last accessed: 23 November 2020).Google Scholar
Bayle, Pierre. 1697c. Dictionaire historique et critique. Vol. 1. Rotterdam: Leers.Google Scholar
Bayle, Pierre. 1702. “Additions et corrections pour le 1. Tome.” Dictionnaire historique et critique. Rotterdam: Leers.Google Scholar
Bayle, Pierre. 1710. An Historical and Critical Dictionary. Vol. 1. London: Harper et.al.Google Scholar
Berti, Silvia, Charles-Daubert, Françoise and Popkin, R.H. (eds.) 1996. Heterodoxy, Spinozism, and Free Thought in Early-Eighteenth-Century Europe: Studies on the Traité des Trois Imposteurs. Heidelberg: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berti, Silvia. 2016. “Autour de l’auteur du Traité des Trois imposteurs. Milieux, amitiés, édition.” La Lettre clandestine 24: 19–34.Google Scholar
Beyer, Jürgen. 2003. “Ein Husumer Gebetsheiler (1680/81) als Trumpfkarte in der konfessionellen Polemik.” In Confessional Sanctity (c. 1550 – c. 1800), edited by Beyer, Jürgen, Albrecht Burkardt, Fred A. van Lieburg and Wingens, Marc, 337–356. Mainz: Philipp von Zabern.Google Scholar
Brian, Thomas. 1637. The pisse-prophet, or, Certaine pisse-pot lectures Wherein are newly discovered the old fallacies, deceit, and jugling of the pisse-pot science, used by all those (whether quacks and empiricks, or other methodicall physicians) who pretend knowledge of diseases, by the urine, in giving judgement of the same. London: Thrale.Google Scholar
Buissière, Paul. 1698. Pierre Buissière to Pierre Bayle. Paris, 25 July (Lettre 1370). http://bayle-correspondance.univ-st-etienne.fr/spip.php?page=article&id_article=48005089&lang=fr (Last accessed: 23 November 2020).Google Scholar
Cadet de Gassicourt, Charles-Louis. 1813. “Charlatan, charlatanisme.” In Dictionnaire des sciences médicales: Biographie médicale, edited by Charles Louis Fleury Panckoucke, 543-553. Paris: C. L. F. Panckoucke.Google Scholar
Caufapé, Anicet. 1696. Nouvelle explication des fièvres. Toulouse: Desclassan.Google Scholar
Corneille, Thomas. 1694. Le dictionnaire des arts et des sciences. Vol. 2. Paris: Coignard.Google Scholar
Cremer, Thomas. 1697. Verdediginge van Thomas Cremer. Rotterdam: Pieter van der Slaart.Google Scholar
Cryle, Peter. 2006. “Charlatanism in the ‘Age of Reason’.” Cultural and Social History 3 (3):243–249.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cunningham, Andrew and Perry, Williams. 1993. “De-Centring the ‘Big Picture’: The Origins of Modern Science and the Modern Origins of Science.” The British Journal for the History of Science 26:407–432.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Daston, Lorraine and Peter, Galison. 2007. Objectivity. New York: Zone Books.Google Scholar
de Francesco, Grete. 1937. Die Macht des Charlatans. Basel: Benno Schwabe und Co.Google Scholar
de Vet, Joannes Josephus Victor Maria. 1980. Pieter Rabus: een wegbereider van de Noordnederlandse verlichting. Amsterdam: Holland University Press.Google Scholar
Dear, Peter. 2006. The Intelligibility of Nature: How Science Makes Sense of the World. Chicago: Chicago University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doedijns, Hendrik. 1699a. Haegse Mercurius, 7 March. The Hague: Van Limburg.Google Scholar
Doedijns, Hendrik. 1699b. Haegse Mercurius, 28 March. The Hague: Van Limburg.Google Scholar
Doedijns, Hendrik. 1699c. Haegse Mercurius, 4 April. The Hague: Van Limburg.Google Scholar
Doedijns, Hendrik. 1699d. Haegse Mercurius, 3 June. The Hague: Van Limburg.Google Scholar
Dubos, Jean-Baptiste. 1696. Jean-Baptiste Dubos to Pierre Bayle. Beauvais, 23 September 1696 (Lettre 1160) http://bayle-correspondance.univ-st-etienne.fr/?Lettre-1160-Jean-Baptiste-Dubos-a&lang=fr#nh12 (Last accessed: 23 November 2020).Google Scholar
Füssel, Marian. 2004. “Charlataneria Eruditorum’, Zur sozialen Semantik des gelehrten Betrugs im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert.” Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte 27 (2):119–135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Füssel, Marian. 2006. “‘The Charlatanry of the Learned’: On the Moral Economy of the Republic of Letters in Eighteenth-Century Germany.” Cultural and Social History 3 (3):287–300.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gentilcore, David. 2006a. Medical Charlatanism in Early Modern Italy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gentilcore, David. 2006b. “The ‘Golden Age of Quackery’ or ‘Medical Enlightenment’? Licensed Charlatanism in Eighteenth-Century Italy.” Cultural and Social History 3 (3):250–263.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heath, Joseph. 2014. Enlightenment 2.0. New York: Harper Collins.Google Scholar
Herwig, Henning Michael. 1692. Disputatio Medica Inauguralis de Medicorum non Medicorum Ignorantia. Harderwijk: Sas.Google Scholar
Herwig, Henning Michael. 1700. The Art of Curing Sympathetically, or, Magnetically. London: Newborough, Parker, Buck.Google Scholar
Herwig, Henning Michael. ca. 1698. Ars Curandi Sympathetice sive Magnetice Verissima. Culemborg: Hammius.Google Scholar
Iliffe, Rob. 1999. “Lying Wonders and Juggling Tricks: Religion, Nature, and Imposture in Early Modern England.” In Everything Connects: In Conference with R.H. Popkin, edited by Force, James and David, S. Katz, 183–211. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Le Brun, P. 1732. Lettres qui découvrent l’illusion des philosophes sur la baguette, et qui détruisent leurs systèmes. In Histoire critique des pratiques superstitieuses, Vol. 3. Edited by P. Le Brun. Paris: Delaulne. (Sections were first published in 1693).Google Scholar
Le Clerc, Laurent Josse. 1732. Lettre critique sur le Dictionaire de Bayle. The Hague.Google Scholar
Lufneu, Herman. 1697a. Lettre a mr. B*** [Bayle] sur l’impossibilité des operations sympathiques. Rotterdam: Acher,Google Scholar
Lufneu, Herman. 1697b. “Een Brief, over de onmogelijkheid der zoogenaamde Sympathetische Werking,” translated by Peter Rabus. De Boekzaal van Europe, January-February, p. 123-140.Google Scholar
Lufneu, Herman. 1697c. Natuurkundig vertoog over de onmogelijkheid der zoo genaamde sympathetische werking. Rotterdam: Bos.Google Scholar
Lufneu, Herman. 1697d. De Boekverkooper P: vander Slaart, In sijn valsheid duidelijk ontdekt en kortelijk afgewezen. Rotterdam: Bos.Google Scholar
Lufneu, Herman. 1697e. Een Spiegeltje voor Thomas Cremer, Advocaet der Pisbewerkers, en Groot hervormer der Hollandsche Tale. Rotterdam: Bos.Google Scholar
Mandelbrote, Scott. 2017. “Witches and Forgers: Anthonie van Dale on Biblical History and the Authority of the Septuagint.” In Scriptural Authority and Biblical Criticism in the Dutch Golden Age, edited by van Miert, Dirk, Nellen, Henk, Steenbakkers, Piet and Touber, Jetze, 270–306. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Mencke, Johann Burkhard. 1715. De Charlataneria Eruditorum. Leipzig: Gleditsch.Google Scholar
Naudé, Gabriel. 1679. Considérations politiques sur les coups d’Estat. Google Scholar
Nasim, Omar. 2013. “Was ist historische Epistemologie?” In Nach Feierabend, edited by Hagner, Michael and Hirschi, Caspar, 123–144. Zurich & Berlin: Diaphanes.Google Scholar
Ossa-Richardson, Anthony. 2013. The Devil’s Tabernacle: The Pagan Oracles in Early Modern Thought. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Pelling, Margaret. 2003. Medical Conflicts in Early Modern London: Patronage, Physicians, and Irregular Practitioners 1550-1640. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pomata, Gianna. 1998. Contracting a Cure: Patients, Healers, and the Law in Early Modern Bologna. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Porter, Roy and Bynum, W. F. (eds.). 1986. Medical Fringe and Medical Orthodoxy 1750-1850. London: Croom Helm.Google Scholar
Porter, Roy. 1986. “Quack Medicine in Georgian England.” History Today 36 (11):16–22. https://www.historytoday.com/archive/feature/quack-medicine-georgian-england (Last accessed: 31 October 2021).Google ScholarPubMed
Porter, Roy. 1989. Health for Sale: Quackery in England 1660–1850. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Povey, Charles. 1711. The Visions of Sir Heister Ryley. London: Printed for the author.Google Scholar
Proctor, Robert N. and Schiebinger, Londa (eds.). 2008. Agnotology: The Making and Unmaking of Ignorance. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Rabus, Pieter. 1697a. “‘Naschrift’ and ‘Tweede Naschrift.’” De Boekzaal van Europe, May-June, p. 435-437.Google Scholar
Rabus, Pieter. 1697b. “Historie van overzeldzame genezingen.” De Boekzaal van Europe, January-February, p. 67-76.Google Scholar
Rabus, Pieter. 1697c. “Nog Wat.” De Boekzaal van Europe, May-June, p. 560.Google Scholar
Rabus, Pieter. 1697d. “Een opregt verhaal van eenige proeven der WICHELROEDE.” De Boekzaal van Europe, May-June, p. 389-437.Google Scholar
Ramsey, Matthew. 1988. Professional and Popular Medicine in France, 1770-1830: The Social World of Medical Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Renaud, André. 1693. Critique sincère de plusieurs écrits sur la fameuse baguette. Lyon: Langlois.Google Scholar
Rettwich, George Henrik von [Reddewitz, Henricus Georgius]. 1697. Disputatio Medica Inauguralis de Vero Catharticorum Usu. Harderwijk: Sas.Google Scholar
Schilperoort, Jan. 1697. De aloude bekende mogelijkheid van de sympathetische werkinge. Rotterdam: vander Slaart.Google Scholar
Smith, Pamela H. 2018. “Epistemology, Artisanal.” In Encyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy, edited by Sgarbi, Marco. Dordrecht: Springer.Google Scholar
Sturm, Samuel. 1663. Discursus medicus de medicis non-medicis, in salutem periclitantis proximi. Wittenberg: Hartmann.Google Scholar
Swift, Jonathan. 1710. The Virtues of Sid Hamet the Magician’s Rod. London: Morphew.Google Scholar
Thijssen-Schoute, Caroline Louise. 1960. “Hermanus Lufneu, Stadsarts te Rotterdam.” In Rotterdams Jaarboekje, edited by Hendrik Cornelis Hazewinkel, 180-227. Rotterdam: Brusse.Google Scholar
Thijssen-Schoute, Caroline Louise. 1967. Uit de Republiek der Letteren. Elf studiën op het gebied der Ideeëngeschiedenis van de Gouden Eeuw. The Hague: Nijhoff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vallemont, Pierre le Lorrain de. 1696. La physique occulte, ou traité de la baguette divinatoire. Amsterdam: Braakman. (Expanded version of the 1693 edition)Google Scholar
van Dale, Anthonie. 1683. De oraculis ethnicorum. Amsterdam: Boom.Google Scholar
van Dale, Anthonie. 1687. Verhandeling van de Oude Orakelen der Heydenen. Amsterdam: Boom.Google Scholar
van den Elsen, Juliëtte. 2002. “The Rotterdam Sympathy Case (1696-1697): A Window on the Late Seventeenth-Century Philosophical Discourse”. Aries 2 (1):34–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van den Elsen, Juliëtte. 2003. “Monsters, demonen en occulte krachten.” Ph.D. diss., KU Nijmegen.Google Scholar
vander Slaart, Pieter. 1697. Verantwoordinge van P. vander Slaart, tegen de beschuldiginge hem opgetigt in het Natuerkundig vertoog over de onmogelijkheid der zoo genaamde sympathetische werkinge van Dr. Herman Lufneu. Rotterdam: vander Slaart.Google Scholar
van Helmont, Johan Baptista. 1648. Ortus medicinæ. Amsterdam: Lodewijk Elsevier.Google Scholar
van Leeuwenhoek, Antonie. 1697. “Part of a Letter from Mr. Antony van Leuwenhoeck, Dated Apr. 5. 1697. Giving an Account of Several Magnetical Experiments; and of One Who Pretended to Cure or Cause Diseases at a Distance, by Applying a Sympathetick Powder to the Urine.” Philosophical Transactions 19:512–521.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van Leeuwenhoek, Antonie. 1989a. Leeuwenhoek to the Royal Society, 5 April 1697 (Letter No. 184). In Alle de brieven. Deel 12: 1696-1699, edited by L.C. Palm, 136-159. Lisse: Swets & Zeitlinger. (Manuscript: Royal Society, MS. 1966, Early Letters L.3.1.)Google Scholar
van Leeuwenhoek, Antonie. 1989b. Leeuwenhoek to Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus, 1699 (Letter No. 205). In Alle de brieven. Deel 12: 1696-1699, edited by L.C. Palm, 354-373. Lisse: Swets & Zeitlinger.Google Scholar
vander Vinne, Izaak. 1697. “Ondervindingen wegens de Wichel-roede” [Manuscript UVA hs. VIII E 2].Google Scholar
Vermeir, Koen. 2005. “The ‘Physical Prophet´ and the Powers of the Imagination. Part II: A Case-study on Dowsing and the Naturalisation of the Moral (1685-1710).” Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 36 (1):1–24.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Vermeir, Koen. 2011. “Circulating Knowledge or Superstition? The Dutch Debate on Divination.” In Silent Messengers: The Circulation of Material Objects of Knowledge in the Early Modern Low Countries, edited by Sven Dupré and Christoph Herbert Lüthy, 293-328. Berlin: LIT Verlag.Google Scholar
Vermeir, Koen. 2012. “The Dustbin of the Republic of Letters: Pierre Bayle’s “Dictionaire” as an Encyclopedic Palimpsest of Errors.” Journal of Early Modern Studies 1 (1):109–149.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vermeir, Koen. Forthcoming. “From Psychosomatic and Maternal Fancy to Demonic and Cosmic Imagination. Wonders, Imagination and Spirit of Nature in Henry More.” In Animating the Mechanical World: New Perspectives on Cudworth and More, edited by Martine Pecharman and Laurent Jaffro. Hildesheim: Olms Verlag.Google Scholar
Vilbussière. 1712. Discours du boiteaux sur la baguette divinatoire qui parait depuis quelque temps en France, et de ses conséquences envers la philosophie. Amsterdam.Google Scholar