Il discorso astrologico sulla "cometa" del 1572 del carmelitano Francesco Giuntini: aspettative e inquietudini dal cielo alla terra nell'epoca della Controriforma

The nova star that appeared in 1572 (known today as Tycho’s supernova) was considered to be a comet, rather than a star, by many astronomers and observers of that time. Francesco Giuntini (1522-1590), a Florentine man of letters, Carmelite theologian, and skilled astrologer, was among those who regarded the unexpected nocturnal light as a sublunary comet, albeit with some inconsistencies. The identification of the nova with a cometary phenomenon was in accordance with the “standard physics” of the late Renaissance, namely Aristotelian natural philosophy, which was still being taught and learned as the common basis of knowledge in universities and colleges all across Europe. From this point of view, Giuntini conformed his understanding of the nova to the general scientific framework of his age, even though in the end he mixed up his own interpretation with a different view, which had been advanced in the meantime by the Flemish astronomer Cornelius Gemma (1535-1578). Nevertheless, the short astrological discourse, or giudicio, that Giuntini composed on the topic and published in Venice in the immediate aftermath of the stunning astronomical sighting does present a few original elements, which are briefly examined and discussed in the present contribution. Giuntini’s Discorso sopra la cometa apparsa nel mese di novembre 1572 fully belongs to the genre literature of vernacular prognostications on comets with prophetic overtones. As late as the end of the sixteenth century, this kind of literature was still in high demand among a wide range of readers and patrons, whose anxieties in this case were as deep as their fear of an impending threat from the sky. For us today the astrological plaquette by Giuntini works like a prism of those fears, disquietudes and old beliefs, which were widespread among both laymen and the learned society of the Italian peninsula and France in the age of the Counter-reformation.