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ADELARD (or AETHELARD)

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Originally appearing in Volume V01, Page 189 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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ADELARD (or AETHELARD) of See also:Bath (12th See also:century), See also:English scholastic philosopher, and one of the greatest savants of See also:medieval See also:England. He studied in See also:France at See also:Laon and See also:Tours, and travelled, it is said, through See also:Spain, See also:Italy, See also:North See also:Africa and See also:Asia See also:Minor, during a See also:period of seven years. At a See also:time when Western See also:Europe was See also:rich in men of wide knowledge and intellectual See also:eminence, he gained so high a reputation that he was described by See also:Vincent de See also:Beauvais as Philosophis Anglorum. He lived for a time in the See also:Norman See also:kingdom of See also:Sicily and returned to England in the reign of See also:Henry I. From the See also:Pipe See also:Roll (31 Henry I. 1130) it appears that he was awarded an See also:annual See also:grant of See also:money from the revenues of See also:Wiltshire. The See also:great See also:interest of Adelard in the See also:history of See also:philosophy lies in the fact that he made a See also:special study of Arabian philosophy during his travels, and, on his return to England, brought his knowledge to See also:bear on the current See also:scholasticism of the time. He has been credited with a knowledge of See also:Greek, and it is said that his See also:translation of See also:Euclid's Elements was made from the See also:original Greek. It is probable, however, from the nature of the See also:text, that his authority was ax Arabic version. This important See also:work was published first at See also:Venice in 1482 under the name of Campanus of See also:Novara, but the work is always attributed to Adelard, Campanus may be responsible for some of the notes. It became at once the text-See also:book of the See also:chief mathematical See also:schools of Europe, though its See also:critical notes were of little value. His Arabic studies he collected under the See also:title Perdifficiles Quaestiones Naturales, printed after 1472.

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form of a See also:dialogue between himself and his favourite See also:nephew, and was dedicated to See also:Richard, See also:bishop of See also:Bayeux from 1113 to 1133. He wrote also See also:treatises on the See also:astrolabe (a copy of this is in the See also:British Museum), on the See also:abacus (three copies exist in the Vatican library, the library of See also:Leiden University and the Bibliotheque Nationale in See also:Paris), See also:translations of the Kharismian Tables and an Arabic Introduction to See also:Astronomy. His great contribution to philosophy proper was the De Eodem et Diverso (On Identity and Difference), which is in the form of letters addressed to his nephew. In this work philosophy and the See also:world are personified as Philosophia and Philocosmia ix conflict for the soul of See also:man. Philosophia is accompanied by the liberal arts, represented as Seven See also:Wise ' Virgins; the world by See also:Power, See also:Pleasure, Dignity, Fame and See also:Fortune. The work deals with the current difficulties between See also:nominalism and See also:realism, the relation between the individual and the genus or See also:species. Adelard regarded the individual as the really existent, and yet, from different points of view, as being himself the genus and the species. He was either the founder or the formulator . of the See also:doctrine of indifference, according to which genus and species retain their identity in the individual apart altogether from particular idiosyncrasies. For the relative importance of this doctrine see See also:article SCHOLASTICISM. See Jourdain, Recherches sur See also:les traductions d'Aristote (2nd ed., 1843); See also:Haureau, Philosophie scolastique (2nd ed., 1872), and See also:works appended to See also:art. SCHOLASTICISM.

End of Article: ADELARD (or AETHELARD)

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