Galileo Galilei and the Roman Curia/Appendix 1

by Karl von Gebler

 

APPENDIX.

 

APPENDIX.

I.

HISTORY OF THE VATICAN MANUSCRIPT.^[1]

We know next to nothing of the history of the Vatican MS. up to the time when Napoleon I. took possession of the papal city. During this period, when proud Rome had sunk so low as to be a department of France, in 1811, by the mandate of the then ruler of the world, the treasures of the Vatican archives were removed from Rome to Paris. Among them was the volume containing the Acts of Galileo's trial. It is not known how Napoleon's special attention came to be directed to them; but it is certain that he requested Alexander Barbier, then State Librarian, to furnish him with a detailed report about them.^[2] Barbier handed it to the Minister of Worship and Instruction. He also proposed that the whole of the documents should be printed, in the interests of historical truth, in the original Latin and Italian, with a French translation. The proposal was approved by the Emperor, and the volume was handed over to Barbier that he might have the translation made.

When the convulsions of 1814 had swept Napoleon out of Paris, and transported him to Elba, and the Bourbons again ruled France, the Roman curia repeatedly took steps to regain possession of the volume.

After the return of Pius VII. to Rome in 1814, after his compulsory residence at Fontainebleau, Mgr. Marini was staying at Paris as Papal Commissary, in order to demand from the new French Government the restitution of the archival treasures taken by Napoleon from the Holy See. He first applied for the Acts of Galileo's trial to the Minister of the Interior, who referred him to the Count de Blacas, Minister of the Royal Household.^[3] He assured Marini that he would have a search instituted in the royal library.^[4] He wrote on the same day to Barbier charging him to search for the documents, and to report to him on their historical value.^[5] Barbier's answer is too characteristic not to be given.

 

"A Son Excellence le Ministre de la Maison du Roi,

Paris, 5 Decembre, 1814.

⁠Monseigneur,

⁠Je m'empresse de répondre à la lettre par laquelle votre Excellence me fait l'honneur de me demander s'il existe, dans le dépôt général des bibliothèques de S.M. ou dans l'une de ses Bibliothèques particulières, des pièces qui faisaient partie des Archives Pontificales et qui sont reclamées par le garde de ces Archives, savoir le procès de Galilée.

Il y a plus de trois aus que je possède le procès de Galilée.

Rien n' est plus célèbre que ce procès dans l'histoire des Sciences et dans celle de l'Inquisition. Aussi s'en est on occupé avec un grand zèle jusqu' à ces derniers temps; ce qui est probablement cause qu' après l'avoir examiné avec tante l'attention qu'il merite, je n'y ai remarqué ancun détail qui ne soit connu (sic). L'importance de ce recueil consiste donc principalement dans la réunion des pièces qui ont motivé, dans le XVII^e siècle, la condamnation d'un habile astronome, pour une opinion qui est généralement enseignée aujourd'hui dans toutes les écoles, même ecclesiastiques.

Je suis, Monseigneur, etc.,

Barbier."^[6]

 

It is clear that Barbier expected to find support in the Acts of the trial for the assumed torture of Galileo; and as they reported nothing of the kind, and could not report anything consistently with the facts of history, the librarian entirely overlooked the vast importance of the papers. After this report Count Blacas felt no scruple about letting the Papal Commissary have them. On 15th December the minister wrote a note to Barbier, asking him for the volume of documents, that he might himself hand it to Marini.^[7] He also wrote to the Papal Commissary that the documents had been found, and that it would give him great pleasure to deliver them to him.^[8] Marini accordingly went three times to the minister's hotel, and once to the Tuileries, but without success. He therefore begged, in a letter of 28th January, 1815, to have a day and hour appointed for an audience.^[9] To his dismay he received in reply a letter from Count Blacas of 2nd February, 1815, saying that the King himself wished to look through the trial of Galileo, that the MS. was in his majesty's cabinet, and therefore could not be given up immediately, but it should be done as soon as the King had returned it.^[10]

Marini was therefore on the track of the documents, though he did not get them. But only twenty-four days after he received this explanation the famous hundred days occurred, and Louis XVIII. left his palace in the darkness of night for Ghent. Napoleon had scarcely set out for St. Helena, and the legitimate sovereign made his entry into Paris, than we find the Papal Commissary again eagerly trying to get back the precious MS.^[11] But what must have been his dismay when he was informed by Count Pradel, temporary successor of Count Blacas, on 6th November, 1815, that the documents were no longer to be found in the King's cabinet, and that it was not known what had become of them.^[12] Further efforts were fruitless. All that he could get from the French Government was the doubtful promise that the papers should be restored when found.

Two years later, in August, 1817, he again attacked Count Pradel on the subject,^[13] and was assured that they were not in the cabinet of the royal palace; he might have a search made among the archives in the Louvre, they might have been put aside there.^[14] Marini suspected that the papers had been purloined, and asked the minister of police, Count Decazes, to help him in his search. He, however, referred him to the Minister of the Interior,^[15] that is, to the place where he had begun his inquiries three years before. Afterwards he applied to the president of the ministry, the Duke of Richelieu, and to the influential M. de Lainé, but with no more success than before.

In 1820 Venturi applied to Delambre, Secretary of the Academy of Sciences, with the request to get for him, if possible, extracts from and copies of the Acts of the trial, as he was urgently in want of them for the second volume of his "Memorie e lettere inedite fuora o disperse di Galileo Galilei." Delambre eagerly took up the question. Some light is thrown on the steps he took by the following note to Barbier of 27th June, only published a few months ago:—

 

"Le secretaire perpétuel de l'Académie pour les Sciences Mathématiques est venu pour avoir l'honneur de converser avec M. Barbier, sur un article intéressant de biographie astronomique, le procés de Galilée et les pièces originales dont M. Barbier a été longtemps dêpositaire. Il desire cette conversation pour lui-même et pour M. Venturi, etc., Delambre."^[16]

 

Three days later Delambre wrote to Venturi that the original Acts certainly had been at Paris some years ago, but had disappeared, and it was not now known whether they were still there or had been taken away. He told him that during the Empire the publication and translation of the documents had been projected, but political events had prevented it from being carried out; the extracts, however, then made, and the French translation which had been begun, were in existence. These, which M. Barbier had placed at Delambre's disposal, he sent to Venturi. Delambre expressed his great regret that the material which he could obtain was not complete; but he consoled himself with the opinion that by the publication of the documents in Riccioli's "Almagestum novum," 1651, and in the first volume of Venturi's work, nothing essential would be wanting; and "that unfortunate business, which would be ridiculous if it were not so repulsive, is now as widely known as can be desired." Delambre, as it seems, was only concerned with the clearing up of the torture question; and as the fragments which had come to his knowledge contained no evidence of torture, and as he might have been informed by Barbier that there was no trace of it in any of the papers, he wrote as above in calm conviction to Venturi.

Eight years afterwards Count Darü, who was intending to bring out his work on astronomy, made inquiries of Barbier about the existence of the Acts of Galileo's trial. The information he received must have been wholly unsatisfactory, as appears from the following letter from the Count to Barbier of 16th October, 1828:—

 

"J'ai reçu Monsieur . . . les deux lettres que vous m'avez fait l'honneur de m'écrire. J'ai trouve, joint à la seconde, le billet de M. l'abbé Denina^[17] qui prouve que la traduction du procès de Galilée a existé au moins en partie. Du reste, nous en avions déjà la preuve par l'extrait de M. Delambre. Je suis persuadé que le procès existe quelque part à Paris, et ce me semble, il doit se trouver dans quelque bibliothèque du roi, peut être même aux Archives de la liste civile. J'en parlerai a M. le baron de la Bouillerie.

Recevez, etc.,

Darü."^[18]

 

But Darü's further inquiries seem to have been unsuccessful; anyhow, the long-sought-for volume remained concealed for seventeen years longer. In 1845 Gregory XVI. requested Pelegrino Rossi, French ambassador at Rome, who was devoted to the papacy, to use his influence to get the Acts restored, if they should be discovered at Paris. This shows that it was disbelieved at Rome that they could not be found. At first Rossi's urgent mediation only obtained the assurance from Louis Philippe that the Pope's cherished wish should be fulfilled, provided that the papers should be found, but on the express condition that they should be published entire at Rome. And as the curia, of course, promised to comply, the MS. which had been mysteriously concealed for thirty-one years was "found" and restored.

In 1848–9, when the Papal See was attacked by the revolutionary spirit which pervaded Europe, the fugitive Pope, Pius IX., confided the hardly-won documents to the prefect of the Secret Archives, Marino Marini. He not only took good care of them, but took the opportunity of fulfilling the obligation to the French Government incurred on their restoration. On 12th April, 1850, the Pope returned from Gaeta to his capital under the protection of French bayonets, and his thoughts must soon have recurred to these documents, for on 8th May of the same year he presented them to the Vatican Library. In the same year, also, Marini's work, "Galileo Galilei e l'Inquizione," appeared at Rome, intended to be the fulfilment of the French conditions.

We purposely say "intended to be," for they were not really so at all. The entire contents of the Vatican MS. were thereby by no means given to the public, but such a sight of it as the editor thought proper, and which was, as far as possible, an apology for the Inquisition. Instead of the full original text of the Acts, the world only received disjointed extracts, arbitrary fragments—in many instances nothing at all. Perhaps it was perceived at head-quarters that a comparison of Marini's work with the documents would bring strange things to light, for they were suddenly removed from the too public Vatican Library and placed among the papal archives.

And for a long time there seemed to be no disposition to place these important historical materials at the disposal of independent historians. Thus we learn from Albèri, editor of "Le Opere di Galileo Galilei," Florence, 1842–1856, in 16 vols., in which all the materials for the history of Galileo are collected, that Marini had made obliging offers to him about the Vatican MS.; but his death put an end to the hopes thus raised, and Albèri had to content himself with reproducing the extracts and documents given by Venturi and Marini. It is obvious that the MS. was not accessible to him, or he would surely have included the Acts in his great work. Professor Moritz Cantor, who asked to see them ten years later, met with no better success. He complains bitterly in his essay, "Galileo Galilei," that the attempts he made through the good offices of an eminent savant, with Father Theiner, keeper of the Secret Archives, had been without avail.

However, though neither Albèri nor Cantor attained their wish, Henri de L'Epinois, a few years later, was more successful. In the introduction to his work, "Galilée, son procès sa Condemnation," 1867, he relates that in a conversation with Theiner at Rome, he expressed his regret at the inadequacy of Marini's book, and his desire to see the subject of Galileo's trial cleared up. Theiner liberally responded to this appeal by placing the documents at his disposal. But Epinois had only just made hasty copies of the most important, and indices of others, when he was compelled by urgent private affairs to return to France. The copies of the Vatican MS. which he took with him were therefore in many respects inaccurate and incomplete, and even the indices left much to be desired. Nevertheless, historical research will always be indebted to Epinois for publishing his notes, in spite of their shortcomings, which were best known to himself.^[19] The melancholy picture of Galileo's trial was first presented in faithful outline, and it became possible to weave the story with approximate accuracy. Many details, however, were still wanting; and though the fictitious stories of many writers were considerably checked by Epinois's communications, some scope was still left for them. What was wanted was the entire publication of the Vatican MS., and if possible with diplomatic precision.

Nine years again went by, during which Epinois seems to have found no opportunity of completing his work. Meanwhile, Professor Domenico Berti asked for the favour of a sight of the papers, and in 1876 he was engaged in Theiner's room in copying the documents.^[20] In the same year his work, "Il Processo Originale di Galileo Galilei," appeared, bearing upon the title page the unwarranted addition, "publicato per la prima volta da Domenico Berti." Epinois had been the first to publish the Vatican MS., though only partially; the words would only have been correct if Berti had published them complete. This he professes to have done,^[21] but as five documents are wanting, and the contents of fifty others only shortly given, it cannot be regarded as complete.

Besides, Berti's publication is very disappointing to the historian. Instead of giving the reader as good an idea as possible of this interesting MS., the documents are taken out of all connection, and given numbers and superscriptions of which there is not a trace in the original, and the marking of the folios is omitted. "Improvement" of the orthography, punctuation, etc., is consistently carried out. One of the numberings is quite left out (the oldest, upper paging), and, following Epinois, he reads the second incorrectly.

In the same year in which Berti's book appeared, Sante Pieralisi received an invitation from high quarters to inspect the volume. He accepted the flattering offer with no small satisfaction, but does not seem to have known how to turn it to account. He confined himself to comparing the most important documents in Epinois and Berti with the originals, and to giving a list, by no means complete, of their deviations from them.^[22]

In consequence of the controversy as to the genuineness of the document of 26th February, 1616, we resolved in the spring of 1877 to attempt to get a sight of the papers, our sole reason being the desire to see for ourselves whether external evidence was for or against falsification, or whether any certain conclusions could be drawn from it. We had then no idea whatever of publishing the Vatican MS. ourselves, as we at that time considered Berti's publication of it to be nearly complete.

Through the good offices of the Austrian ambassador, we were promised that when we came to Rome, Cardinal Simeoni, Secretary of State, would permit us to see the documents. Two days afterwards we were on our way to Rome, and soon had the volume in our hands. As we turned over the pages with a curiosity easy to be imagined, and compared it with Berti's publication, we discovered, to our no small surprise, its many omissions and inaccuracies. The idea then occurred to us of making a copy of all the documents in the collection with the greatest possible precision. Not the least "improvement" should be made; the text should be reproduced exactly, with its peculiar orthography, accentuation, and punctuation, its abbreviations, errors, and special marks, so far as it was possible by means of typography.

We made known our intention to the first prefect of the Vatican Library, Mgr. Martinuzzi, to whom Cardinal Simeoni had referred us; he not only made not the slightest objection, but showed great interest in our project. During our long daily tarriance in the Vatican afterwards, he was most obliging, and heaped attentions upon us which lightened the labour.

We might have been engaged about three weeks in copying the MS., sending the pages copied during the day to Messrs. Cotta, at Stuttgard, to be printed, when we were surprised one morning by a visit in the Vatican from M. de L'Epinois. He told us that he had been two months at Rome, and had undertaken a correction of Berti's book from the original. We informed him of our enterprise, which he spoke of as "quite a different thing"; and when we returned his call, he again spoke of a correction of Berti, and regretted that he had not copied the whole MS. Of any intention of publishing it complete he said not a word. We therefore contentedly went on with our work; the copying was nearly finished and the printing in progress, when one afternoon on our return from the Vatican we found a letter from Epinois, in which he said that he had not had time to call on us again, and informed us of the speedy appearance of his complete publication of the Vatican MS., and that we should receive a copy in a few days. This announcement was most surprising. We went at once to seek M. de L'Epinois, but learnt that he had left Rome early that morning.

Our work was too far advanced to be given up, and so we went on, in the hope that even now there might be some little place in the world for it. By the time Epinois's book reached us the copying was finished, and we were correcting the proofs by the originals. It was not without value, even for our enterprise, for we compared our proofs with it line by line and word by word, made notes of deviations, and then went to the Vatican to see which was right. We readily acknowledge that in this way we discovered and corrected many errors which had crept into our copy. The variations which still exist are all well known to us, and are left, either because Epinois is mistaken, or we consider our reading to be the best. This is not the place for a criticism of his work; we will only bear witness, after comparing it with the original, to its accuracy.

1. Somewhat abridged, as are also the Description and Estimate of the Vat. MS.—[Tr.]
2. See for this and what immediately follows, "Le Manuscrit Original du Procès de Galilée," par L. Sandret. Revue des Questions historiques, 1 Oct., 1877, pp. 551-559
3. Marini, p. 144.
4. Ibid. pp. 144, 145.
5. See Sandret's Essays before cited, p. 553.
6. Ibid. pp. 553, 554.
7. Sandret, p. 554.
8. Marini, pp. 145, 146.
9. Marini, p. 146, 147; Sandret, pp. 554.
10. Marini, p. 147; Sandret, p. 555.
11. Marini, p. 147.
12. Marini, p. 147.
13. Ibid. p. 148.
14. Ibid. p. 148
15. Ibid. p. 151.
16. Sandret, p. 556, note 1.
17. Denina was at Paris from 1805 till his death in 1813, and may therefore have seen the Acts, which were in Paris from 1811, as well as the translation which was begun.
18. Sandret, pp. 556, 557.
19. Revue des questions historiques, Paris, July, 1867.
20. . . . "e avernmo fra le mani il desiderato volume nella stanza del padre Theiner testè rapito dolorosamente ai vivi." ("Il Processo Originale," etc., p. x.)
21. "Egli è adunque per la prima volta che i due processi Galeleiani sono publicati nella loro integrità." Page xii.
22. See "Correzioni al libro Urbano VIII. e Galileo Galilei proposte dall' autore Sante Pieralisi con osservazioni sopra il Processo Originale di Galileo Galilei publicato da Domenico Berti." Roma, 30 Settembre, 1876, pp. 9-16.