Message #26758

[Bianca]

It is certainly open to any reader to doubt whether, just because Chaucer attributes a belief in astrology to characters in a work of fiction, he necessarily accepted the theory himself. His Treatise on the Astrolabe, written for his son (and not, of course, a work of fiction) seems to indicate that he entirely rejected judicial astrology - the astrology that claimed to be able to foretell the future. But at the same time it suggests that he considered astrologia naturalis - the astrology that claims the planets affect at least some significant areas of human life - quite another matter.

May it not be significant, too, that at no point in The Canterbury Tales does he actually condemn astrology, even judicial astrology, as stupid, or wicked, or mistaken?

It would have been difficult for Chaucer to avoid taking an interest in the subject, whatever conclusions he eventually reached about it. Few thoughtful men could escape astrology, even if they wished.
Petrarch, who was certainly capable of sharp gibes about superstition, and in his letters to Boccaccio was extremely caustic about indifferent astrologers, corresponded with distinguished doctors about astrological medicine, and in a letter to the Emperor Charles IV confessed (perhaps sycophantically) that long ago an astrologer had promised that he would be on familiar terms with the greatest rulers of his age.

Some time after his death, an historian claimed that Petrarch was himself an astrologer, and had predicted an earthquake in Tuscany and the deaths of various great men.

Unlikely.

But it should at least be noted that Petrarch was far harder on alchemy, magic in general, and the power of gems, than astrology.