CAMPANELLA, TOMMASO

(b. Stilo, Calabria, Italy, 5 September 1568; d. Paris, France, 21 May 1639)

natural philosophy.

Campanella. the son of Geronimo and Catarinella Martello Campanella, showed remarkable intellectual ability at a very early age. In 158 2. inspired by the lives of Thomas Aquinas and Albertus Magnus, he entered the Dominican order, where his name was changed from Giovan Domenico to Tomaso, by which he has been known since. After his early philosophical studies, based on Aristotle, Campanilla moved to the Dominican house at Cosenza in 1588 to study theology. There he read Telesio’s De rerum nature in the 1570 edition, a work that remained a dominant influence for the remainder of his life. Telesis’s work led him to publish Philosophic sensibus demonstrate (written 1589, published 1591) in response to G. A. Mar-ta’sPugnaculum Aristotelis ad versus principia B. Telesii (Rome, 1587). In 1589 Campanella went to Naples, where he met Giambattista della Porta and a Jewish astrologer named Abraham. He became active in della Porta’s group, participating in its protoexperimentalism; through Abraham he became acquainted with the astrological and pseudo-scientific traditions, which were important factors in his later thought. During this time he put forward his Telesian views more and more openly.

In May 1592 Campanella was denounced to the Inquisition for heresy and was confined to the Convent of San Domenico. Thus began a long series of imprisonments, trials, tortures, and other punishments that ended only with his release in 1629. His internment, in Naples (1599 - 1626) and in Rome (1626–1629), was sometimes under the most brutal conditions, while at other times he was allowed a certain degree of freedom for writing, reading, having visitors, and teaching. During these years Campanella continued his studies as far as was possible, and a number of manuscripts were smuggled out of prison to be published in Germany. They could not be issued in Italy, owing to the regulations imposed by the Inquisition.

After Campanella had had several years of partial freedom in Rome, the Inquisition discovered a plot in Naples (1634) by one of Campanella’s followers and Campanella was implicated. He fled Rome before he could be arrested, reaching Aix-en-Provence in November 1634; there he was enthusiastically received by Peiresc and Gassendi, who had known of him and his work for some years. A few months later Campanella arrived in Paris, There Cardinal Richelieu came to his aid and helped him in various ways for the rest of his life, and he was also received at the court of Louis XIII. Finally accorded the honor he had been denied in Italy for so long, Campanella spent his last years writing and preparing for the press numerous works, which could be published in France with official approval. He died in the Dominican convent on Rue St.-Honoré and was buried in the adjoining Church of the Annunciation, which was destroyed during the Revolution (1795).

Campanella’s writings cover a wide range of subjects. Although perhaps best known for work on political philosophy (Civitas solis) and metaphysics, he also wrote on most of the other branches of the comprehensive seventeenth-century philosophy cursus. The early attraction to Telesian science was never lost, and was reinforced by an attachment to Renaissance Neoplatonism and contact with della Porta’s brand of experimentalism and magic. Although trained as a Dominican, Campanella very early recognized the limitations of Aristotelian philosophy and science, and a strong anti-Aristotelian tendency can be seen throughout his works.

Telesio’s De return natura must be seen as the foundation stone of Campanula’s thought (although not the only one). From it he derived a number of key principles, such as the reduction of active forces operating in the universe to those of heat and cold, and the conception of a void space in which natural events take place. Although Telesio’s empirical view was still emphasized and reinforced by his contacts with the Neapolitan pro-toexperimentalists, Campanlla also grafted strong theological and metaphysical elements onto it. Like Ficino and others before him, he viewed man as composed of the triad body-spiritus-soul. This position gave him scope to place man in a macrocosm-microcosm framework in which the use of magic and astrology could play a central interpretive role. Although scholars disagree somewhat on the precise extent to which magic influenced Campanella’s thought, there is no doubt that it had a significant place. Like Ficino, but unlike Telesio, his world view allowed a key position to astrology and pseudoscience, as evidenced by works such as De sensu rerum et magia (1620) and Astrologi- corum libri VII (1629). The latter work shows that Campanella acted as a consultant for Pope Urban VIII in astrological matters.

In addition to his interests in the astrological side of stellar phenomena. Campanella was a sup-porter of the Copernican system as defended by Galileo. In several works, principally the Apologia pro Galilaeo (1622), he sided with the embattled Florentine, not only in supporting the Copernican theory but also on broader issues, including those involving the competing claims of religion and science. Like Galileo, Campanella held that natural truth was not revealed in Scripture, but in the physical world. Thus the study of natural phenomena was seen as an important step toward theological understanding. Science and theology were to be clearly distinguished, however; both led to an understanding of God, who had revealed Himself in two books (codices), Nature and Scripture. While Galileo was essentially satisfied with an understanding of natural, physical reality, Campanella endeavored to go beyond this and to find the ultimate metaphysical truth of things. Again like Galileo, Campanella stressed –unfortunately for him, counter to the dominant opinion of his fellow Italians–the necessity of a libertas philosophandi. He was perhaps the first to use this particular formulation, later popularized by Spinoza and others.

Campanula’s writings encompass a very broad range of scientific topics, and he must be viewed as one of the important systematizers of the seventeenth century. Iconoclastic and antitraditional, he attempted to provide a new system of natural knowledge based on the empirical, Neoplatonic, and astrological traditions at his disposal. While scientific knowledge played a more important role in his thought than most interpreters have admitted, it was basically subjugated to his very strong metaphysical and theological orientation, which aimed for ultimate causal explanations of physical phenomena. Thus Campanula’s importance in the history of science was not so much through his own scientific discoveries as through his animistic. yet empirical, interpretation of the world, which influenced a number of contemporaries and successors.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

I. Original Works Campanella’s output was voluminous. Owing to the circumstances of his life, many of his writings were destroyed; others were rewritten several times in various forms ; some were circulated or even published without his knowledge; and others remained hidden until recent times. All of this makes for a very confusing state of affairs that is impossible to cover briefly yet in detail. For a thorough treatment see L. Firpo, Bibliografia degli scritti di Tommaso Campanella (Turin, 1940), and his biographical article cited below.

Among the works most important for the aspects of Campanella’s work discussed in this article are Philosophia senibus demonstrata (Naples, 1591); Prodromus philosophiae instaurandae (Frankfurt, 1617); De sensurerum et magia (Frankfurt, 1620; Paris, 1637), also in Italian as Del senso delle cose e della magia, A. Bruers, ed. (Bari, 1925); Apologia pro Galilaeo (Frankfurt, 1622), repr. with intro. and Italian trans. by s. Femiano (Milan, 1971); Astrologicoram libri VII (Lyons, 1629; Frankfurt. 1630): Medicinalium juxta propria princcipia libri VII (Lyons, 1635); Philosophia realis(Paris, 1637); Lettere, V. Spampanato, ed.(Bari, 1927); Mathematica, R. Amerio, ed., in Archivim Fraturm Praedicatorum,V (1935), 194–240; and Epilogo magno, C. Ottaviano, ed. (Rome, 1939).

II. Secondary Literature The literature on Campanella is vast, and the reader is referred to the following bibliogarphies by L. Firo: “Campanella nel settecento,”m in Rinascimento,4 (1953), 105–154; “Cinquant’anni di studi sul Campanella (1901–1950),” ibid.,6 (1955), 209–348; Campanella net secolo XIX (Naples, 1956), repr . from Calabria nobilissima,6–10 (1952–1956); and “Un decennio di studi sul Camanella (1951–1960),” in Studi scenteschi,3 (1960), 125–164. The best and most recent brief account of his life and activities, with an excellent bibliographical survey, is Firpo’s article in Dizionario biografico degli Italiani, XVII (1974), 372–401. Still fundamental are L. Amabile, Fra Tommaso Campanella, la sua congiuria, isuoi processi e la sua pazzia,3 vols. (Naples, 1882); and FraTommaso Campanella ne’castelli di Napoli, in Roma e in Parigi,2 vols. (Naples, 1887). Also see L. Firpo, Ricerche campanelliane(Florence, 1947). Of the vast interpretive literature, the more importance studies include the following, listed chronologically: L. Blanchet, Campanellam (Paris, 1920); G. di Napoli, Tommaso Campanella. filosofo della restaurazione cattolica (Padua, 1947); A. Corsano, Tommaso Campnella (Bari, 1961); N. Badaloni, Tommaso Campanella (Milan, 1965) ; and G . Bock, Thomas Campanella: Politisches Interesse und philosophische Spekulation (Tubingen, 1974). Anumber of publication appeared in connection with the 400th anniversary of his birth, including Tommaso Campanella (1569–1638) (Naples, 1969).

Charles B. Schmitt