Comparative Drama

“An engine to catch starres”: Thomas Tomkis and Natural Philosophy¹

Albumazar is a play filled with things, from mundane household goods to lists of ancient and contemporary alchemists and magi to the eponymous astrologer’s collection of astrolabes, horoscopes, and almanacs. It is also the first play in English to feature a scene with a telescope onstage.² However, whether many of the things in Thomas Tomkis’s (c. 1580–after 1615) science farce physically appeared onstage for its March 9, 1614 premiere at Cambridge’s Trinity Hall is uncertain. The questionable material status of Tomkis’s stage properties becomes significant when Albumazar is examined in a context of the history of science as well as the history of theatre. The original college production demonstrates the playwright’s cultural awareness of the emergent disciplinary distinction of astronomy through the incorporation of its star technology: the telescope.³ King James I (1566–1625)—witch-hunter, author of Daemonology (1597), and royal guest at Albumazar’s premiere— likely held a derogatory opinion of the telescope because of its potential use as a tool in the occult craft of astrology. The space between the textual narrative and the telescope scene as it might have been embodied by actors in 1614 reveals the delicate balance that Tomkis achieved by referring to truthful elements of astronomy while poking fun at astrology. The manner in which the telescope was performed—as a physical prop or mimed as part of a dumb show—indicates the range of Tomkis’s engagement with the tools and concepts of the “new science” in the only performance of the play recorded during his lifetime. [End Page 81]

The “new science” advanced the idea of experimentation and experience as a means of exploring the natural world.⁴ This method prioritized embodied encounters and observations of natural phenomena (including things astronomical) over contemplation of Aristotelian causes thereof. The “new science” began to emerge with Galileo Galilei’s (1564–1642) empirical observations and was developed in England most famously by Sir Francis Bacon (1561–1626), who preceded Tomkis at Trinity College, from 1573–1575.⁵ Staged representations of the telescope throughout the seventeenth century evidence a gradual shift in popular opinions about the “new science” and those who adhered to its philosophy.

Tomkis’s use of the telescope in the play references a host of overlapping traditions of science, magic, education, and authority that were at odds with each other at the time of the play’s premiere. In 1614, astrology and astronomy were not entirely distinct disciplines and neither was completely condoned, or forbidden, by religious and scholarly authorities. Astrology had historically been taught at European universities, but the church and university considered certain aspects of astrology less offensive than others.⁶ Act 1 of Albumazar features a telescope (referred to throughout the play as a perspicill) and an otacousticon (a hearing aid).⁷ These devices situate the play at a pivotal moment in the history of science as reports of new discoveries made through the use of “Galilean” tubes spread across Europe.⁸ The traditional narrative of the telescope’s invention goes that in 1608, Dutch spectacle-maker Hans Lipperhey (1570–1619) was granted a patent for his telescope design from the States General in Hague, Holland, and so the chapter of the telescope was added to a global history of astronomical technologies.⁹ Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) announced his application of the telescope to the practice of astronomy in 1610 with the publication of Sidereus Nuncius (The Starry Messenger).¹⁰ What followed was a European battle of philosophies over the veracity of the celestial objects made visible through the telescope’s lenses waged throughout the seventeenth century.¹¹ At the time, knowledge gained through the use of telescopes was not universally accepted because discoveries of new stars and planets, as well as the ability to trace their movements with greater accuracy, challenged a Ptolemaic (geocentric) model of the universe that was still popular within the academy and the church. Galileo’s observations made with the telescope supported a Copernican (heliocentric) model. [End Page 82] Thomas...