George Sarton

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George Sarton 1941

George Alfred Leon Sarton (born August 31, 1884 in Ghent , Belgium , † March 22, 1956 in Cambridge , Massachusetts , United States ) was a Belgian-born American natural science historian.

Life

Sarton studied in Ghent, among other things, philosophy, mathematics and chemistry with a degree in 1906. In 1908 he received the university gold medal for one of his theses on chemistry. In 1911 he received his doctorate in mathematics in Gent. When the First World War broke out, he went to England and from 1915 to the United States , where he stayed afterwards. He lectured at Harvard University from 1916 to 1918 and worked for the Carnegie Foundation. In 1920 he became a lecturer at Harvard and from 1940 to 1951 he was professor of the history of science at Harvard. From 1919 to 1948 he was also a researcher at the Carnegie Institution in Washington, DC

In 1927, Sarton began writing an extensive introduction to the history of science , for which he also learned Arabic and visited the countries of the Middle East to study original sources by Islamic scholars. Of the planned nine volumes, Sarton was only able to complete the first three by his death. Of the planned eight volumes of his work A history of science , only two volumes were created, the second volume was published posthumously. Sarton edited several Arabic source editions. He was also engaged in science in the Renaissance, especially Leonardo da Vinci .

Since 1913 he has published numerous papers from the field of the history of science in the Isis magazine - founded by him in 1912 . In 1924 he founded the History of Science Society (HSS) together with Lawrence Joseph Henderson . In 1936 he founded the annual journal Osiris , which, like its sister magazine Isis, is an official publication of the HSS.

Since 1911 he was married to the English artist Mabel Eleanor Elwes, with whom he had a daughter, the writer May Sarton (1912-1995).

Awards and honors

The History of Science Society awards the George Sarton Medal annually . The first medal was awarded to George Sarton himself in 1955.

Sarton was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1927), the American Philosophical Society (1934), the Academy of Naturalists Leopoldina and the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1936). In 1928 he was one of the founding members of the Académie internationale d'histoire des sciences . He was awarded an honorary doctorate from Brown University and the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main , among others .

Fonts

  • Introduction to the history of science. 4 volumes (I – III, 2). Williams & Wilkins Co., Baltimore MD / Washington 1927-1948 (= Carnegie Institution of Washington. Volume 376); Reprints: New York from 1950.
    • Volume 1: From Homer to Omar Khayyam. 1927;
    • Volume 2: From Rabbi Ben Ezra to Roger Bacon. 2 volumes. 1931;
    • Volume 3: Science and learning in the fourteenth century.
      • Volume 3, Part 1: First half of the fourteenth century. 1947;
      • Volume 3, Part 2: Second half of the fourteenth century. 1948.
  • with James Westfall Thompson, George Rowley and Ferdinand Schevill: The Civilization of the Renaissance (= Mary Tuttle Bourdon Lectures. 1928/1929). University of Chicago Press, Chicago IL 1929.
  • The history of science and the new humanism (= Colver Lectures. 1930, ZDB -ID 1004053-5 ). H. Holt and Co., New York NY 1931, (Reprints).
  • The Life of Science. Essays in the history of civilization (= The Life of Science Library. Vol. 1, ZDB -ID 412738-9 ). Foreword by Max H. Fisch. Schuman, New York NY 1948, (Reprints).
  • A history of science. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA 1952-1959;
    • Volume 1: Ancient science through the Golden Age of Greece. 1952, (Reprinted. Dover Publications, New York NY 1993, ISBN 0-486-27495-0 );
    • Volume 2: Hellenistic science and culture in the last 3 centuries BC 1959, (Reprint. Dover Publications, New York NY 1993, ISBN 0-486-27740-2 ).
  • A guide to the history of science. A first guide for the study of the history of science. With introductory essays on science and tradition. Ronald Press, New York NY 1952, (In German: The Study of the History of Natural Sciences. Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main 1965).
  • Ancient Science and modern civilization. Euclid and his time, Ptolemy and his time, the end of Greek science and culture (= Montgomery Lectureship on Contemporary Civilization. 1954, ZDB -ID 1439882-5 ). University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln NE 1954, (Reprints).
  • Galen of Pergamon. (= Logan Clendening Lectures on the History and Philosophy of Medicine. 3, ISSN  0459-6897 ). University of Kansas Press, Lawrence KS 1954, (Reprints).
  • Six wings. Men of science in the Renaissance. Indiana University Press, Bloomington IN 1955; Reprints.
  • The Study of the History of Mathematics. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA 1936; Reprints

literature

  • MF Ashley Montagu (Ed.): Studies and Essays in the History of Science and Learning offered in Homage to George Sarton on the Occasion of his Sixtieth Birthday. August 31, 1944. Schuman, New York NY 1944, (Reprints).
  • Christoph Meinel . Sarton, Science, and the End of History . In: Reports on the History of Science 8 (1985) 173–179

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Fellows Directory. Biographical Index: Former RSE Fellows 1783–2002. (PDF file) Royal Society of Edinburgh, accessed April 5, 2020 .
  2. ^ Entry in the membership directory of the Académie.

Web links

Wikiquote: en: George Sarton  - Quotes


personal data
SURNAME Sarton, George
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sarton, George Alfred Leon (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American historian of science
DATE OF BIRTH August 31, 1884
PLACE OF BIRTH Ghent , Belgium
DATE OF DEATH March 22, 1956
Place of death Cambridge , Massachusetts, United States