Western Civilization

scientific experiments. Marie-Anne Lavoisier is a re-

minder that women too played a role in the Scientific

Revolution.

Women in the Origins of

Modern Science

Q FOCUSQUESTION: What role did women play in the

Scientific Revolution?

During the Middle Ages, except for members of reli-

gious orders, women who sought a life of learning were

severely hampered by the traditional attitude that a

woman’s proper role was as a daughter, wife, and

mother. But in the late fourteenth and early fifteenth

centuries, new opportunities for elite women emerged

as enthusiasm for the new secular learning called

humanism led Europe’s privileged and learned men to

encourage women to read and study classical and

Christian texts. The ideal of a humanist education for

some of the daughters of Europe’s elite persisted into

the seventeenth century, but only for some privileged

women.

Margaret Cavendish

Much as they were drawn to humanism, women were

also attracted to the Scientific Revolution. Unlike girls

educated formally in humanist schools, women inter-

ested in science had to obtain a largely informal educa-

tion. European nobles had the leisure and resources

that gave them easy access to the world of learning.

This door was also open to noblewomen, who could

participate in the informal scientific networks of their

fathers and brothers.

One of the most prominent female scientists of the

seventeenth century, Margaret Cavendish (KAV-un-

dish) (1623–1673), was not a popularizer of science for

women but was able to participate in the crucial scien-

tific debates of her time because of her aristocratic

background. Despite her achievements, however, she

was excluded from membership in the Royal Society

(see “The Spread of Scientific Knowledge” later in this

chapter), although she was once allowed to attend a

meeting. She wrote a number of works on scientific

matters, includingObservations upon Experimental Phi-

losophyand Grounds of Natural Philosophy. In these

works, she did not hesitate to attack what she consid-

ered the defects of the rationalist and empiricist

approaches to scientific knowledge and was especially

critical of the growing belief that humans through sci-

ence were the masters of nature: “We have no power at

all over natural causes and effects... for man is but a

small part.... His powers are but particular actions of

Nature, and he cannot have a supreme and absolute

power.”^4

As an aristocrat, Cavendish, the duchess of New-

castle,wasagoodexampleofthewomeninFrance

and England who worked in science (see the box on

p. 396). Women interested in science who lived in

Germany came from a different background. There

the tradition of female participation in craft produc-

tion enabled some women to become involved in

observational science, especially astronomy. Between

1650 and 1710, one in every seven German astrono-

mers was a woman.

Maria Winkelmann

The most famous of the female astronomers in Ger-

many, Maria Winkelmann (VINK-ul-mahn) (1670–1720),

was educated by her father and uncle and received

advanced training from a local self-taught astronomer.

When she married Gottfried Kirch, Germany’s foremost

astronomer, she became his assistant at the astronomi-

cal observatory operated in Berlin by the Academy of

Science. Here she made some original contributions,

including the sighting of a hitherto undiscovered comet,

as her husband related:

Early in the morning (about 2:00A.M.) the sky was clear

and starry. Some nights before, I had observed a variable

star, and my wife (as I slept) wanted to find and see it for

herself. In so doing, she found a comet in the sky. At

which time she woke me, and I found that it was indeed a

comet.... I was surprised that I had not seen it the night

before.^5

When her husband died in 1710, she applied for

a position as assistant astronomer. Although highly

CHRONOLOGYImportant Works of the Scientific

Revolution

Copernicus,On the Revolutions of the Heavenly

Spheres

1543

Vesalius,On the Fabric of the Human Body 1543

Galileo,The Starry Messenger 1610

Harvey,On the Motion of the Heart and Blood 1628

Cavendish,Grounds of Natural Philosophy 1668

Newton,Principia 1687

Women in the Origins of Modern Science 395

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