Zilsel’s Thesis, Maritime Culture, and Iberian Science in Early Modern Europe

This article analyzes scientific practices in the early modern Iberian world in light of what Edgar Zilsel (1891-1944) argued about the social roots of modern science and its artisanal origins. The well-known "Zilsel thesis" is a broad argument connecting the emergence of modern science in Europe to sociological and economic factors-namely, to the breakdown of social barriers between scholars and artisans. Zilsel maintained that the separation of artisans and natural philosophers into different social strata prevented the emergence of modern science before 1600. Eventually, sometime in the sixteenth century, as scholars approached the world of artisans, especially those involved in mechanical arts and applied mathematics, social barriers were reduced or even nullified. Whereas most attempts to explain the origins of scientific modernity had focused on intellectual events (theories, ideas, debates, publications, etc.), in the 1930s Zilsel proposed a decidedly sociological picture. In Zilselian terms, attention must therefore be focused on social contexts where empirical practices prevailed and technical creators were actively engaged in the making of knowledge. Zilsel insisted on the importance of disciplines hitherto considered auxiliary and on the need to see artisanal culture not as peripheral but central to early modern European societies.