ON THE LIFE OF PEIRESC

1580.

...neck, so that when she herself turned her head, she could vibrate the spirits In the physiology of the time, "spirits" were subtle fluids in the body that carried signals through the nerves. with such tension of the nerves that she might turn the head of a person at a distance in the same way. By the same force, she could restrain another person’s tongue just as she did her own. Neither would the head be relaxed, nor the tongue loosened, until she herself, relaxing her own stiffness, slackened those stretched but seemingly unfeeling cords. Indeed, many such things are usually attributed to evil spirits original: "Cacodæmonas," from the Greek for bad demons.. Truly, although the best God might permit innocent infants to be subject to their malice, and although these spirits might apply themselves to such duties and to the service of certain wretched old women, it is nevertheless certain that a great part of what is reported is fabled. At the very least, these stories rest on no other foundation than the unusual symptoms of certain diseases to which infants are prone. It is well known that such beliefs are especially common among the lowest common people and in the countryside, where any small opportunity gives rise to and nourishes credulity. A year and a half later, in the month of June of the year
1582.

one thousand five hundred and eighty-two, a year memorable for the reformation of the Calendar This refers to the Gregorian Calendar reform instituted by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582 to correct the drift of the solar year., his brother was born and named Palamedes. It was he who was afterwards called Valauesius Valavez from a dependent estate. From that same time, Nicolaus also began to be called Peireskius Peiresc. Indeed, until they reached late adolescence, they were called sometimes Fabricij Fabri and sometimes Calasij, which was also the common name of their father and uncle, derived from the lordship of the town of Calas. When Palamedes was born, his father was away in Grenoble original: "Gratianopoli" on business. His mother died two months after this second birth, at the age of twenty-two. His father, Reginald, later brought home another wife...