Attraverso il carteggio di uno dei primi direttori del Museo, Tito Vignoli, l'articolo ripercorre la storia del Museo milanese intrecciata con i rapporti intercorsi con Haeckel.
Paolo Coccia
Ecco il carteggio:
CANADELLI Elena. Tito Vignoli ed Ernst Haeckel dal carteggio di un direttore dimenticato. Atti della Società italiana di scienze naturali e del Museo civico di storia naturale in Milano, 2006 , vol. 147 , no 2 , pp. 239 - 266
Abstract :
From 1893 to 1911 the anthropologist and psychologist Tito Vignoli was the director of Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano. Although today he is almost forgotten, Vignoli was in correspondence with many scientists and scholars of his time. Amongst them Ernst Haeckel stood out as one of the most popular German evolutionists in the second half of the 19th century. In Italy Haeckel was renowned for his evolutionistic theory, and also for his struggle against the Church, in support of freedom of science and thought. This commented introduction and transcription of the letters between Vignoli and Haeckel allow to investigate Vignoli's unknown attitude and way of thinking in relation to his position as a general director of Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano, in the light of his support of evolutionism and the important position given to science and to natural history museums. Beside reconstructing the correspondence between the two authors on the basis of the material achieved, this article also investigates the appointment of Vignoli as a director, the sometimes difficult relationship with his collaborators and the trends of his management in a lively but difficult phase for the museum: the museum collections being moved from Palazzo Dugnani to the new building in Porta Venezia.
2 comments:
Reading this abstract on the correspondence between Haeckel and Vignoli was a pleasant surprise. I can add to this that there was some influence of Tito Vignoli in The Netherlands (and still there is: I am translating in Dutch his Mito e scienza on the base of the German (authorised by Vignoli) and the American translantions).
In 1883 the Dutch freethinker, jurist and natural scientist, H. Hartogh Heys van Zouteveen wrote in his book Over den oorsprong der godsdientige denkbeelden van een evolutionistisch standpunt [On the origin of religious concepts from an evolutionistisch point of view] the following:
"In 1879 a very curious book of the Italian Tito Vignoli was published. The titel of this book Mito e scienza (...) seems to me (Zouteveen) that it will get the same importance for the study of religion, as Darwins Origins of species had for the study of zoology." Hereafter Zouteveen gaves an long explanation of Vignoli's point of view as an introduction to his own ideas.
But Zouteveen, like Vignoli is almost forgotten. Helas. In the Netherlands there was until recent times only one copy of Vignoli's Mythos und Wissenschaft in the Stadsbibliotheek van Deventer. Probably due to the fact that another Dutch freethinker, Johannes van Vloten was a professor at the formerly Deventer Atheneum about 1880.
Ernst Haeckel who was more influential in The Netherlands, is still in the collective memory of Dutch freethinkers.
I myself discovered the work of Vignoli as I was seeking for scientist who didn't already include in their definition of religion, religion as something like answering to something else beyond human beings and this should be a universal caracteristic for the human race. So explaining religion by religion itself, which is not a very scientific explanation, as it seems to me.
Vignoli's clarifying point of view is that he is not explaining religion by religion, but by analyzing it as a way of perception of animal and man alike during evolution. From this point of view there is only a gradual difference between myth and and science, indeed.
Dr Gerrit Drost
Rijswijk, The Netherlands
PS. I should like to know where I can order a copy of the article of Elena Canadelli
Dear Gerry
for more information on this article please contact the Director of the Journal:
Anna Alessandrello
Curator of Palaeontology
Editor (ATTI,NATURA and MEMORIE SISN-MSNM)
Vice-President Società Italiana di Scienze Naturali
Museo di Storia Naturale di Milano
C.so Venezia, 55
20121 Milano -Italia
Ph.: ++39 0288463316
fax: ++39 0288463281
www.comune.milano.it/museostorianaturale/index.html
Paolo Coccia
Post a Comment