HISTORIA MATHEMATICA18 (1991), 188-194

REVIEWS

Editedby KARENHUNGERPARSHALL

All books, monographs, journal articles, and other publications (including films and other
multisensory materials) relating to the history of mathematics are abstracted in the Abstracts
Department. The Reviews Department prints extended reviews of selected publications.
Materials for review should be sent to the editor of the Abstracts Department, Prof. David
E. Zitarelli, Department OfMathematics, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA 19122. U.S.A.
Most reviews are solicited. However, colleagues wishing to review a book are invited to
make known their wishes. Comments on books, articles, or reviews should be submitted to
the Correspondence Department. We also welcome retrospective reviews of older books.
Colleagues interested in writing such reviews should consult first with the editor to avoid
duplication.

Kepler’s Geometrical Cosmology. J. V. Field. Chicago, IL (The University of

Chicago Press). 1988. xx + 243 pp. $37.50.
Kepler’s Physical Astronomy (Studies in the History of Mathematics and Physical
Sciences 13). Bruce Stephenson. New York, NY (Springer-Verlag). 1987. v
+ 217 pp. $58.00.

Reviewed by Sheila J. Rabin

Department of Educational Services, Brooklyn College

Despite his outstanding contributions to mathematics and astronomy Johannes

Kepler’s work has suffered relative neglect in the English-speaking world. The
books of Ms. Field and Mr. Stephenson have moved to remedy that neglect. They
nicely complement each other. Each deals with different but related aspects of his
thought; both are essential reading for serious students of Kepler’s achievements.
Field laments that scholars have ignored Kepler’s cosmology as expounded in
his Mysterium cosmographicum and Harmonices mundi libri V. Both works have
been neglected, she maintains, except insofar as the former acts as a precursor to
the Astronomia nova and as the latter includes Kepler’s third law. Field finds
this situation particularly regrettable because Kepler’s cosmology influenced the
development of his astronomical ideas. She thus sets out to reassert Kepler’s
cosmology in the context of his astronomical and mathematical achievements.
Field begins by placing Kepler’s cosmology in the historical tradition of Plato’s
Timaeus and Proclus’s Commentary on the First Book of Euclid’s Elements. In
his Mysterium cosmographicum (1596) Kepler suggested that the ratios of the
distances between the six observable planets were equivalent to the ratios between
the five Platonic solids. As Field notes, Plato’s Timaeus suggested outlines for
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