The Competitiveness of Nations
in a Global Knowledge-Based Economy
December 200
3This introduction is meant to be neither
ground-breaking nor earth-shattering; rather I plan to present the mechanical
arts as they stood in medieval intellectual thought. The following papers in this session and the
next will deal with “how things move and work,” but here I want to give a brief
overview of where these “mechanical arts” fit into the scholastic world. The thesis of the “Dark Ages” often suggests
that there was a discontinuity in knowledge between Antiquity and the
Renaissance, and perhaps nowhere so obviously as in
the mechanical arts. This is certainly
false - the mechanical arts thrived throughout the Middle
Ages. Nevertheless, they didn't enter
philosophy as an object of analysis until the twelfth century, coincident with
the birth of the scholastic movement. It
might be too ambitious to say that the emergence of the mechanical arts into
philosophy was caused by scholasticism, or conversely, to say that it was
independent of scholasticism. The
evidence shows that they were coincident, and that some of the same forces
drove both endeavors. It is fair to say,
however, that scholastic thought helped justify the mechanical arts, though was
not necessary for their justification. Here
we will look at Hugh of St. Victor, Dominicus Gundissalinus, and Robert Kilwardby
as characteristic of the scholastics who accepted the mechanical arts, but
first, let's consider what they had to work with.
The first use of the term “mechanical
arts” is in the commentary of the Carolingian thinker, John the Scot, on Martianus Capella's Marriage
of Philology and Mercury. Here he
refers to the seven artes mechanicae that Mercury gave to his bride, Philology,
after he had given her the seven artes liberales.”[1] The
seven liberal arts are the classical trivium
(grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic) and the quadrivium
(arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music). John never specifically enumerates the seven
mechanical arts here but he makes the distinction clear by saying that the
liberal arts are “naturally in the soul”, while the mechanical arts arise from “some
imitation or human devising.”[2] The
later medieval tradition arrayed the mechanical arts in a range from
technological to economic subjects: shoemaking, armaments, commerce, tailoring,
metalwork, and alchemy, and occasionally agriculture, navigation, and music,
among others.
Even though the term artes
mechanicae was an invention of the ninth century,
they certainly existed well before then, but they appear in no classical ordering
of knowledge or philosophy. That is,
while they were obviously common categories of knowledge, they did not warrant
inclusion in the philosophical canon. Lynn
White Jr., among others, has claimed that the primary reason that the
mechanical arts did not enter into classical conceptions of philosophy was the
social stratification of antiquity. Both Greek and Roman civilizations were
based upon class distinctions. Slavery was the norm, and citizenship was
reserved for only the elite. Since the slaves and lower classes were the
workers and the artisans in these societies, the intelligentsia, it is argued,
considered any mechanical art correspondingly degrading.[3] In the late classical period, the primary
preservation of the better components of Western civilization fell to the
Christian monasteries. If the mechanical arts were so little favored, then it
might be reasonable to assume that they would not have been “saved” after the
fall of
The ancients clearly considered the
realm of material things and the realm of intellectual things as separate and
distinct areas that did not, and should not, overlap. Archimedes repudiated
engineering because of its “mere utility and profit,”[7] and Aristotle treats mechanics as a branch of
mathematics, but only in a theoretical sense, not the practical sense which is
the essence of the medieval concept. In the sixth century, St. Augustine
believed that the mechanical arts (both technology and magic) both sought to
gain control over nature, hence perverting God's design, and were therefore
both anti-Christian.[8] In his City of
Among other arts some are concerned with the
manufacture of a product which is the result of the labor of the artificer,
like a house, a bench, a dish, or something else of this kind. Others exhibit a
kind of assistance to the work of God, like medicine, agriculture, and
navigation.... A knowledge of these arts is to be
acquired casually and superficially in the ordinary course of life unless a
particular office demands a more profound knowledge.... We do not need to know
how to perform these arts but only how to judge them in such a way that we are
not ignorant of what the scripture implies when it employs figurative locutions
based upon them.
He continues, saying that “among the
other teachings to be found among the pagans,...
including the theory of the useful mechanical arts, I consider nothing to be
useful.”[10] At this point, the mechanical arts are not in
a position to be included in any organized schema of knowledge; indeed
Augustine's legacy helped exclude the mechanical arts from philosophy until the
twelfth century.
We can begin to see one of the
characteristics that fed both scholasticism and the mechanical arts in what has
been called the “Renaissance of the Twelfth Century”: a period marked by
urbanization, nationalism (at least the French & English), and cultural
unity based on the Church.[11] The twelfth century marked a turning point in
the political, economic, and intellectual life of
There are, however, two figures who hindered the adoption of the mechanical arts, Boethius and Isidore of Seville. Boethius (c.475-524) was called “the last Roman and the
first scholastic,”[12] but had nothing to add to the classification
of knowledge that pertained to the mechanical arts. He planned reconcile the
differences between Platonism and Aristotelianism,
and his classification of philosophy most probably influenced Isidore a century later. It does contain a “practical”
division, but it is not that which we use to survive, the mechanical arts, but
rather, it is the practical details of how we ought to act, that is, ethics.[13] Boethius firmly
based his thought on the Christian metaphor: a progression from the lowest
(nature) to the highest (God), essentially through mathematics; in other words
from concrete to abstract, but without the mechanical arts. Isidore
of Seville (d. 636) was known for his great compendium of knowledge, the Etymologiae, which became a sourcebook for many
subjects throughout the Middle Ages. The Etymologiae does not classify any mechanical art as
a part of philosophy but echoes the classical indifference. Although he
contributed nothing to the classification of the mechanical arts, Isidore's influence was felt strongly in scholastic
thinking.
If Boethius
and Isidore alone were known in the twelfth century,
one wonders whether the mechanical arts would have ever risen out of their
servile status to become an accepted division of knowledge. That they did was
due primarily to the thinking of the scholastics, foremost among them, Hugh of
St. Victor. In the 1120's, Hugh composed the Didascalicon,
whose modern translator claims that, “the Didascalicon
is important not only because it recapitulates an entire antecedent tradition,
but because it interprets that tradition in a special and an influential way at
the very dawn of the twelfth-century renaissance.”[14] Hugh's special interpretation incorporates
the mechanical arts in a systematic way, and the ramifications of his inclusion
are far reaching, perhaps even to the scientific revolution of the seventeenth
century. In any evaluation, though, Hugh of St. Victor set a standard for the
scholastics in terms of classifying the mechanical arts with all other forms of
knowledge. Still, Hugh was not typical of the monastic clergy who preserved the
mechanical arts through the Dark Ages; rather, he lived and wrote in
Hugh's classification strikes a modern
eye in that the mechanical arts appear at the top level. Suddenly, after having
no place in philosophy whatsoever, they become one of four primary divisions.
As I mentioned, John the Scot claims that there are seven mechanical arts, to
balance the seven liberal arts, and Hugh chooses them to parallel the trivium
and quadrivium:. personifying nature, he says, “three pertain to
external cover for nature, by which she protects herself from harm”
(fabric-making, armament, and commerce) and “four to internal, by which she
feeds and nourishes herself” (agriculture, hunting, medicine, and theatrics).[18] Hugh explains that the trivium is
external and the quadrivium is internal in nature, and he thereby
partially justifies his inclusion of the mechanical arts in what had previously
been closed to them. In order to fulfill his claim that “These four [divisions]
contain all knowledge,”[19] his classifications encompass more than is immediately
suggested by their titles. For example, through some circuitous reasoning, Hugh
classifies “all such materials as stones, woods, metals, sands, and clays”
under “armament.”[20] He thereby includes here all technologies
such as carpentry, masonry, cooperage, joinery, and metal casting.
Soon after Hugh of St. Victor, Dominicus
Gundissalinus was active as a translator in
To consider the mechanical arts' legacy,
we need to look at Robert Kilwardby, perhaps the most practical thirteenth
century scholastic. His work, On the Origins of the Sciences (De ortu
scientiarum), presents the mechanical arts fully developed and
integrated into philosophy and brings together the Augustinian, Boethian, and
Arabic schools of thought. In Kilwardby's scheme, completed around 1250, we
find the trivium and the quadrivium intact from Aristotle, the
equation of the seven liberal and seven mechanical arts of Hugh of St. Victor,
ethical divisions from Boethius, an echo of Gundissalinus' theoretical topics,
and a fully practical Arabic division of mechanics. Kilwardby is also the first
scholastic to deny the difference between theory and practice, seeing them
dependent upon each other in such a way that one could not exist without the
other.[24] His openness to the mechanical arts is shown
in that he admits that there is, “no other compelling reason why about so
countless an array of arts we should number... precisely as seven, save for a
certain superficial correspondence with the seven liberal arts.”[25] While Kilwardby seems thoroughly modern, and
while the mechanical arts are an important part of his classification, they
still do not hold a place of great esteem: “the last found [art], and least
important knowledge of all belongs to mechanics.”[26] Still the prejudice lingers, and the
mechanical arts remained not quite as “legitimate” as the liberal arts.
Beyond these scholastics, there are many
who either predicted or adopted parts of the Victorine classification system
such as Aldhelm of Malmesbury (8th C),[27] Rabanus Maurus (9th C),[28] Clarenband of Arras (12th C),[29] and Robert Grossteste (c.1168-1253).[30],[31],[32] St. Anselm, in the second half of the
eleventh century used an interesting mechanical argument that would have been
thoroughly out of place in an Augustinian or Boethian knowledge system. Anselm
was speaking to “a certain abbot, who was looked upon as a very fine monk,”
about the beatings the abbot used to discipline his students. Anselm felt that
this was wrong and said,[33]
Do you intend to form their character for goodness
with nothing but blows and beatings? Did you ever see a craftsman form an image
out of a plate of gold and silver by blows alone? I do not think so. What then?
To form a suitable design from the plate, he now gently presses and strikes it
with one of his tools, and now raises and shapes it more gently with careful support.
To use such a clearly practical,
mechanical analogy demonstrates some level of acceptance of the mechanical
arts, even at this early date.
Finally, there is one source from the
first half of the twelfth century that indicates the increase in stature of the
mechanical arts. Theophilus' On Diverse Arts (De diversis artibus),
gives detailed information on glass making, enameling, metallurgical
techniques, foundry methods, pigment manufacture, and a host of other arts. He
created this work, not for any intellectual endeavor, but “to increase the
honor and the glory of His name.”[34] The interesting attitude put forth is that
craftsmanship was seen as good and virtuous. Theophilus opens by blessing all
those “who are willing to avoid and spurn the idleness and the shiftlessness of
the mind by the useful occupation of their hand and the contemplation of
new things.”[35] It has been noted that the monasteries were
the preservers of the mechanical arts and that they valued manual labor, and
here is a text which clearly states that these arts are not servile or inferior
in any way. In fact, Theophilus justifies these crafts by citing Exodus 31
(1-11), where Moses is commanded to build a tabernacle and where God directly
interceded and “filled [the masters of the crafts] with the spirit of wisdom
and understanding and knowledge in all learning for contriving and making works
in gold and silver, bronze, gems, wood, and in art of every kind.”[36] Clearly, the twelfth century was more than
receptive to the notion of the mechanical arts as useful.
The artes mechanicae, then, came
into their own right in the twelfth century renaissance that also gave birth to
scholasticism. The greatest thinkers of scholasticism incorporated technology
rigorously into their classifications of knowledge and philosophy without the
great indifference and even animosity that had until then held sway. Hugh of
St. Victor was not the first thinker to do so, but his classification of the
mechanical arts as one of the four branches of all knowledge set the pattern
for future thinkers, among them Dominicus Gundissalinus and Robert Kilwardby.
The mechanical arts in these classifications never did alter the established
curricula at the universities, but the legitimacy gained by their inclusion
allowed more and more technical matters to be incorporated in formal learning.
From the scholastic age, crafts were recognized as a useful, legitimate, and
necessary arts that thereafter could become increasingly central features of
Western civilization.
[1] Elspeth Whitney,
[2] John the Scot, Annotationes, 170,14 (in
Whitney, p. 71)
[3] See Lynn White, Jr., “Cultural Climates and
Technological Advance in the Middle Ages,” in Medieval Religion and
Technology (Berkeley : University of California Press, 1978), and Moses I.
Finley, “Technical Innovation and Economic Progress in the Ancient World,” Economic
History Review, 2nd ser. 18 (1965), pp. 29-45 (Whitney, p. 15, n. 61)
[4] Jean Gimpel, The Medieval Machine : the industrial
revolution of the Middle Ages (London : Book Club
Associates, 1977), p. 4.
[5] See, for example, the Benedictine Rule, cap. 49: “The
Daily Manual Labor.”
[6] Whitney, p. 58.
[7] Whitney, p. 29.
[8] See Whitney p. 10, on Bert Hansen and A.C. Crombie's arguments (n. 34-6).
[9] Augustine, De Doctrina
Christiana, trans. D. W. Robertson (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill,
1958), bk. II, ch. 30 (p. 66).
[10] bk.II,
ch. 39 (pp.7 3-4)
[11] See Eugene R. Fairweather, A
Scholastic Miscellany: Anselm to Ockham
(Philadelphia, Westminster Press, 1956), p. 22.
[12] Martin Grabman, quoted in Weisheipl, “Classification
of Sciences in Medieval Thought,” Mediaeval Studies 27 (1965): 58.
[13] The terms that Boethius
used for the major division of philosophy were inspectiva
and actualis, here translated as “theoretical”
and “practical”, though perhaps something like “active” or “driving” might be a
better translation of actualis, deriving from actus.
[14] Hugh, of Saint-Victor, The Didascalicon
of Hugh of St. Victor : a medieval guide to the arts, trans. by Jerome
Taylor, Records of civilization, sources and studies, no. 64 (New York :
Columbia University Press, 1961), p. 4. [Hereafter HSV]
[15]
M.D. Chenu (in Whitney, p. 12, n. 45).
[16] This casts a slight shadow over the arts, although
this connection between “adulterate” and “mechanical” appears to have come from
a faulty ninth century etymology. See Whitney, pp. 84-5.
[17] HSV, bk. II, ch. 20
(Taylor, p. 75).
[18] HSV, bk. II, ch. 1 (Taylor,
p. 74).
[19] HSV, bk. II, ch. 1 (Taylor,
p. 62).
[20] HSV, bk. II, ch. 22
(Taylor, p. 76).
[21] Al-Farabi, active in the
middle of the tenth century, included such things as carpentry and
stone-working as part of geometry, the “science of devices” as part of
mathematics, and medicine, alchemy, navigation, and agriculture as part of
physics. See Whitney, p. 131.
[22] Weisheipl, “Classification,”
p. 71.
[23] George Ovitt, Jr., The
Restoration of Perfection: labor and technology in medieval culture (New
Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, 1987), p.
98.
[24] Ovitt, p. 103.
[25] Kilwardby, De ortu scientarum, 40.378 (in
Whitney, p. 119).
[26] Kilwardby, De ortu scientarum, 133 (in Ovitt, p. 103).
[27] See Whitney (the other one) - he had mechanics under
medicine?
[28] In the ninth century he wrote his De universo, in which he included arithmetic, astronomy,
astrology, geometry, music, and mechanics under physics. See Weisheipl, “Classification,” p. 65.
[29] He accepted Hugh's classification but this did little
to affect the teaching in the schools at
[30] Grossteste believed in
knowledge before belief which implies the primacy of practical over theoretical
knowledge. See Weisheipl, “Classification,” p. 74-5.
[31] Michael Scot (c.1200-1235) wrote his own De divisione philosophiae and
returns to a class distinction within his classification of knowledge. The
mechanical arts (under practica) are broken
down into those that are contemplative of knowledge (civilem)
and those that use tools (vulgarem). So even
though part of his classification, a trace of disdain for the mechanical arts
still remains. See Ovitt, p. 100.
[32] Saint Bonaventure (mid-13th century) in his Reduction
of Art to Theology (De reductione artium ad theologiam),
described the parts of philosophy as lights coming from God. The first light,
he defined as the mechanical because it completes that which is foreign or
strange (exterius). See Ovitt,
p. 96.
[33] From “Excerpt from Eadmer:
The Life and Conversion of Saint Anselm,” bk. I, ch. 22 (in Fairweather,
pp.213-5).
[34] Theophilus, The Various Arts, trans. by C.R. Dodwell
(London, T. Nelson, 1961), bk. I, preface (p. 4).
[35] Theophilus, bk. I, preface (Dodwell, p. 1),
italics added.
[36] Theophilus, bk. III,
preface (Dodwell, p. 62).
The Competitiveness of Nations
in a Global Knowledge-Based Economy
December 200
3