J'r(ethod for the EASY COMPREHENSION of HISTORY By JEAN BODIN TRANSLATED BY BEATRICE REYNOLDS w. W· NORTON & COMPANY ' INC . New York COPYRIGHT 1945 BY COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS First published in this edition 1969 b'y arrangement with Columbia University Press PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 1234567890 IT is a pleasure to give thanks to Mr. Roger Howson, formerly Librarian of Columbia University, for per mitting me to borrow the editions of 1583 and 1595; to Drs. Lynn Thorndike and P. O. Kristeller for a critical reading of the manuscript; to Dr. A. P. Evans, editor of the "Records of Civilization," for hiseditorial labors; to variouscolleagues from whom I havesought informa tion, as well as to the staffs of the libraries of Columbia and Yale universities and Connecticut College. BEATRICE REYNOLDS New London, Conn. January, 1944 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION IX DEDICATION I 9 PREAMBLE I. WHAT HISTORY IS AND OF HOW MANY CATEGORIES IS II. THE ORDER OF READING HISTORICAL TREATISES 20 III. THE PROPER ARRANGEMENT OF HISTORICAL MATERIAL 28 IV. THE CHOICE OF HISTORIANS 4-1 V. THE CORRECT EVALUATION OF HISTORIES 85 153 VI. THE TYPE OF GOVERNMENT IN STATES VII. REFUTATION OF THOSE WHO POSTULATE FOUR MON- ARCHIES AND THE GOLDEN AGE 291 VIII. A SYSTEM OF UNIVERSAL TIME 303 IX. CRITERIA BY WHICH TO TEST THE ORIGINS OF PEOPLES 334- x. THE ORDER AND COLLECTION OF HISTORIANS 365 38 BIBLIOGRAPHY I INDEX 389 INTRODUCTION JEAN BODIN, by birth Angevin, acquired his legal education at the Uni versity of Toulouse and later lectured on Roman law in the same town, spending there about a decade of his life. The university, in the sixteenth century, was one of the largest in France, comprising more than four thousand students, both French and foreign, but the traditional method of instruction wasunderfire. A new way of interpreting the Code had been introduced at the universities of Bologna and Padua, and the older waysof Toulouse received unfavorable criticism. Visiting professors from Italian institutions and French scholars who had studied in Italy underAlciati were making the attack. The school of post-glossators, of whom the greatest was Bartolus of Sassoferrato, had attempted to apply the Code and the Gloss to four teenth-eentury conditions, with interpretations necessarily somewhat strained. In addition, they used the scholastic method. But the humanists ofthe Italian Renaissance reproached the legists for their neglect, on the one hand, of the conditions producing the law and, on the other, of the value of the Roman statutes as a source for historical knowledge. One of the most outspoken criticsof the Bartolists wasLaurentius Valla. Politian and Bude both undertook to reform legal instruction, the latter publish ing a work on the first twenty-four books of the Digest, which he treated inthe lightof the revived knowledgeof classicalantiquity. From Alciati developed the historical school of law. He studied classi cal culture at Milan, under Parrhasius, and obtained his legal training from Jason of Mayno and Philip Decius at Pavia. His humanist and ju risticinterests led him to believe that the literature and the history of an tiquity, as well aspurity of diction, could make a weighty contribution to the interpretation of Justinian's Code. The newer method he taught at Avignon in 15I 8and at Bourgesin 1529, aswell asat Italian universities. His influenceisreflected in the teachingofseveral French professors,such asCujas and Duaren.AsLemonniersuggests, theysoughtto placeagiven text inits propersequence inthe lifework of a jurist, then the juristin his proper school, and the school in its own epoch. This was a very different thing from attempting to applyan old law to currentconditions. Co-oper ation between humanists and lawyers was essential for the successof a method which ledLeCaron at least to proclaim that the ultimate philos 1 ophy wasLaw. 1Loys Charondas Le Caron, 1536-1617, a poet and jurisconsult, composed Le Grand x INTRODUCTION This conclusion might also have occurred to Bodin, who lived in Tou louse from 1550to 1560.Theuniversity,whileconservative initsappoint ments, was nevertheless aware of the importance of Alciati and of his followers, since Cujas was lecturing in Toulouse in 1547. Bodin's desire to achieve a synthesis of universal law may well have developed from a similar interpretation of its significance."As a humanist, with some train ing in theology and agreateremphasis on law, he wasstirred to integrate the three into a philosophy of history. His interest in the question of method isevidenced by his Gratia demstituendain republicajuventute,a plea to open a school of classicalculture in connection with the legal fac ulty. France, at the mid-century, was passing from the exuberance of her first Renaissance under Francis I into a more troubled period when the court ceased to be tolerant of nonconformity. Henry II, lesssympathetic to innovation, actively persecuted dissent. During the reigns of his two youngsonsCatherinede' Medici strove to retain for the dynasty the pow ers which Francis had firmly grasped, but by the time Bodin was moving from Toulouseto Paris,the kingdom wason the eve of civiland religious warfare. In addition, then, to the universal and eternal question of the interpre tation of history, there was also the narrower and more timely problem of the nature of government in France. Both these questions, I think, were in the mind of Bodin when he wrote his treatise in 1565. It isonly in the light of increasingly alarming political conditions, from 1565 to 1576, that one can explain the change that took place in his political phi losophy between the writing of the Methodus and of the Republic. Too much stress has been placed upon Bodin as the author of the Republic; too little notice has been paid to his earlier and more liberal work, which wasissued in thirteen Latin editions between 1566and 1650.3 In a prefa tory notice in the 1608edition of the Republic,the author disclaimed any support ofabsolutism, quoting bookand chapterto prove that heobjected to the increase of royal power. He called attention to his activities on be half of the Third Estate during the meeting at Blois, where his resolute Coutumier de France, Pandectes du droit [rancais, and some works on Roman law. The quotation isgivenin Lavisse, Histoirede France, v (2"partie), JIJ. 2Francis Baudouin in De institutione historiae et coniunctione eius cum jurisprudentUJ (1561) isanother who supports this opinion. aThomas Heywood, in his introduction to an English translation of Sallust in 1608, translated chapter IV of the Iv!etlJodm. INTRODUCTION XI stand exposed him to some peril. An alleged Apologia de Rene Harpin pottrla Republique, really written by Bodin and published in 1599, com plainedthat hiscritic,AugerFerrier,had usedthe leastaccurateedition of thework,and built against the authoracaseactually basedonthe printer's errors. The feudal regime, in allying itself with the Huguenot constitution alists,was making its last stand against concentration of authority in the hands of its overlord. Calvin's ecclesiastical pattern had furnished to his French followers a model for distributing governmental functions in a manner which would grant to their faction some voicein administrative policy. Alarge number of the nobles, particularly those without influence at court, sawin the program of federalization offered by the Huguenots a chanceto revive provincial strength and their own claims to local au thority. It wastherefore the problem of sovereignty which Bodin had to consider in analyzing the government of France. He dealt with this vital problemagainst the wider background ofan interpretation of history. His expressed aim in writing the Methodus wasthe study of universal law,for inthe narrative of human affairs,he said, the bestpart of univer sal law lay hidden. Furthermore, he had not been able to discover any historian who explained the art and the method of hissubject, or anyone whoderivedalessontherefrom.The bookisofvalue inthat itgivesusthe intellectual content of a mind of the transitional period between the me dievaland the modern age.To someextent he took all knowledge for his province-with a consequent loss in specialization-and his division of knowledge into human, natural, and divine led him to write booksin all three fields.ChapterVI ofthe Methoduswasadraftofthe laterRepublic; chapter VIII foreshadowed the Theatrum naturae.Throughout are scat tered sentences and paragraphs leading toward the Heptaplomeres. He revealed the trends of his era in that his philosophy of history moved awayfrom the authoritarian toward the natural-in this case,toward the pseudoscientific-for,while hedevotedanentire chapter tothe theorythat thecourseofevents wasdetermined bypopulartraits, and these inturn by climate, yet he added as further natural causesthe influence of numbers and of heavenly bodies propelled by the Prime Mover. The medieval theory of a providential determination of history wasnot entirely foreign tohisthought,although he introduced variables not immediatelyderived from the Prime Mover. As he borrowed from the past, so future writers borrowed from him. XIl INTRODUCTION Eventhe eighteenth-centuryrationalists found someof histheoriesaccept able. One might, for instance, trace the lineage of the influence-of-climate idea from Hippocrates down to the twentieth century." Since knowledge of human affairs, or history, wasin this book hischief concern, he wished to establish order and manner in historical events; thatis,theirtimesequence,which involved an investigationofchronologi cal systems, and their logical correlation, which required a critical ap praisal of the degree of objectivity of the historian. Hissecondchapterand alarge partof the thirddeal with methodology. An elaborate program of reading on the deductive plan isindicated. The reader should move from brief general accounts to more detailed nar ratives; he should startwith stories of earliest times and advance through the centuries. Biographies are of value in furnishing guides to conduct. Subjects allied to history, such as cosmography and geography, are es sential for a proper comprehension of the whole. Here again the ap proach is from universals to particulars. The reader should study the entire universe, then the geography and the topography of separate por tions, as he studies universal history before the histories of different countries. Such voluminous reading entails systematic arrangement of notes. Human activities concentrated upon the defense of society may be classified under forms of control: self-discipline, familial discipline, and civic discipline. Here the author digressed to analyze government into its three functions-ruling (imperium), counseling, and fulfilling orders. Thus he recognized specialization, but left responsibility with those having imperium. There is no division of final authority, for sovereignty rests in one group only. The reader should arrange his notes in accordance with a main heading, following the above classification. Before the notes are taken, however, the material must be critically appraised. Chapter IV quotes Aristotle's advice to readers of history do not believe all or discredit completely. One should take into con sideration the background and training of the historian. What are his qualifications for writing? Natural ability developed by education and practical experience produces the most suitable type of writer. Lack of emotional bias is desirable, and it is more nearly attained when the au thor deals with a period long past or a country not his own. He should make use of official records and should avoid prejudicing the reader by 4See,for instance, H. Busson, in his introduction to Pomponazzi's Les Causesdesmer veilles de La nature, p. 25, and Lucien Febvre, A Geographical Introduction to History, p. 108, where hesaysof Montesquieu, Buckle, and MissSemple,"ItisBodin, revised,cor rected, and considerablyenlarged, but it isnever anythingbut Bodin." INTRODUCTION Xlll offeringmoral judgments, unless he has authority in that field, asCaesar had on military matters. The rest of chapter IV is devoted to criticism of many historians. If Bodin actually read them all, he spent years in preparation for his task, and he did reveal a niceacumen in his estimates of the ulterior motives behind the statements of many authors. Prejudices against race, classes, and political affiliations did not escape him. It is true that he himself was not free from nationalist bias, and we detect his childlike pride in the achievements of famous Angevins along with a more serious exag geration of the virtues of the Celts, the Franks, and the French, who to him represented the Aristotelian mean. It is in the fifth chapter that we meet a seminaturalistic theory of his tory. The author carried on the thought of the previous chapter criticism of historians-by saying that the disagreement among writers necessitated the establishment of standards for the reader. If we could decideupon the fundamentals ordinarily motivating the trend of events and the course of empire, we could then judge the probable accuracyof the account of a single country given by any individual writer. The destiny of a nation is determined partly by the character of its people. This is implicit in his discussion. His main emphasis, however, was on the means whereby character is formed. These were, of course, nature and training. But what shaped the nature? Why was the training of a given type? He found hisanswer in the influenceof geography. Other factors affecting the course of empire were the harmony of numbers and the stars in so far as they reflected greater forces beyond them. Bodin denied the Ptolemaic theory that the triplicities of the zo diacexercise compulsion, and he did so on grounds in part philosophic, but in part scientific, based on actual astronomic data. He revealed here an acquaintance with the writings of Jerome Cardan," whom he chal lenged more often than heaccepted. Racial peculiarities, the influence of the planets, and Pythagorean numbers fit into the pattern of the Platonism of the Renaissance. It is in his treatment of geographic determinism that he made a contribution somewhat more ample, by combining with Platonic doctrines the the oriesof Hippocrates and Strabo. The earth was divided into areas of thirty degrees from the equator ad~ 6Jerome Cardan, 1501-1576, an Italian physician and astrologer. In to his more celebrated work on thesolution of cubical equations, he produced De subtilitate, and Dererumoarletate tosummarize hisideason metaphysics. XIV INTRODUCTION northward according to temperature. This, of course, was an imitation of the Ptolemaic zones. The author did little with the southern hemi sphere, but he was aware that it existed and that some sections were inhabited. Each of these thirty-degree areas was in turn divided into two parts, the fifteen-degree units around the pole and below the tropic being most sparsely inhabited. From the tropic north to seventy-five degrees he found it possible to make generalizations as to the character of the inhabitants. They differed in coloration, going from dark to me dium, to blond, to reddish, with more variety in the mean area than elsewhere. They differed in temperament: those in the south were con templative and religious, developing great wisdom, but lacking in en ergy. They were "the old men." Those in the north were active and strong, but of no great sagacity, corresponding to youth. Men dwelling in the intervening lands were endowed with the good qualities of both and showed no excess. They were like men in middle life, prudent and most fit to take control. Other parallels with wisdom, prudence, and activity he found in the attributes of the planets Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars, which were assigned, respectively, to south, temperate, and north, or in what for him were the physical functions of the brain, the heart, and the liver. Thus, in analyzing the population of his own hemisphere he found that different peoples complemented each other in the same way asdid parts of the body, or the classesof a well-constituted state, or the celestial spheres." Men from south, north, and the intervening area formed the republic of the world." Throughout, he stressed the superiority of the inhabitants of the tem perate zone. They were the mean between the extremes, the virtue be tween vices. They showed more varied types and more versatility in talents. These advantages they owed partly to fusion with immigrants, but more to a proper blending of the elements within themselves and around them. Hence he linked history to man, man to his nature, na ture to the cosmic powers working through the elements. The concept of unity in plurality is interpreted as unity in diversity, a world where each group fulfills a function determined by its geographic environ ment. Such a world corresponds to the microcosm; it is an extension of the Platonic republic; it displays in miniature the concord existing throughout the universe. Education would in time alter the customs and ideas of a people, but unless it was consistently maintained, primitive traits would reassert themselves. The Romans once rose to a position of eminence in many oSee below, p. 122. 7Ibid., p. 119.