Eyewitnesses to the Phenomenon of Russian Cold: Robert Boyle and the Accounts of Early Travelers North
The article was submitted on 23.08.2021. I want to thank Professor Paul Bushkovitch for his helpful comments and kindness in reading this text. This article examines the Russian cold as reflected in accounts of early travelers to the north. For his study of the phenomenon of cold in the early 1660s,...
| Published in: | Quaestio Rossica |
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| Main Authors: | , |
| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Уральский федеральный университет
2022
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://elar.urfu.ru/handle/10995/116444 https://www.elibrary.ru/item.asp?id=49304739 https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2022.3.716 |
| Summary: | The article was submitted on 23.08.2021. I want to thank Professor Paul Bushkovitch for his helpful comments and kindness in reading this text. This article examines the Russian cold as reflected in accounts of early travelers to the north. For his study of the phenomenon of cold in the early 1660s, Robert Boyle repurposed parts of Giles Fletcher’s travel account of Russia written seventy-seven years earlier. Inspired by Sir Francis Bacon’s work on heat, Boyle sought to understand the extremes of cold but found himself hampered by its absence in northern England. Consequently, he turned, among other sources, to the printed account of Ambassador Fletcher who, sailing north on a Muscovy Company ship, had kept a journal following the Instructions and Ordinances drafted for that Company by Sebastian Cabot. Boyle found verification of the accuracy of Fletcher’s eyewitness description of cold through his friends and compatriots in the Royal Society who had been to Russia. Ultimately, this is the story of the impact of England’s mid-sixteenth century navigational technology and commercial and diplomatic relations with Russia on Robert Boyle’s late seventeenth century early scientific study of cold which, according to the author’s conclusion, demonstrates how the study of the Russian north impacted the early development of natural science in England. Статья посвящена изучению восприятия русского холода, отраженного в свидетельствах иностранцев, совершавших первые путешествия на север. Исследуя в начале 1660‑х гг. физические свойства феномена холода, Роберт Бойль адаптировал под свои задачи сообщения Джильса Флетчера о путешествии по России, написанные 77 годами ранее. Вдохновленный работой сэра Фрэнсиса Бэкона о тепле, Бойль стремился понять характеристики его противоположности – холода, но обнаружил, что его исследованиям мешает отсутствие такового в северной Англии. Поэтому он обратился, среди прочего, к печатному отчету посла Флетчера, который, плывя на север на корабле Московской компании, вел журнал, следуя ... |
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