ABSTRACT
While Athanasius Kircher was enormously productive throughout his long life, the years of 1655-57 caused him particular consternation and disruption. At this juncture in time, Kircher faced considerable challenges-and it was not at all clear that he would be able to extricate himself with any sort of grace from his numerous problems. Obstacles seemed to arise at every turn-his patronage ties that he had so carefully cultivated over many years were disintegrating before his eyes; his research agenda had gone awry, and he was quite conscious of having promised more scholarly work than he was in a position to deliver; his right to publish his abstruse works was now being viewed with suspicion within his very own Society of Jesus; his loyal friend and disciple, Kaspar Schott, was sent away from Rome to return to the German provinces. And when plague broke out in Rome in the spring of 1656 and lingered well into 1657, Kircher was deeply moved by the prospect of his own mortality, by the destruction of life around him, and by the possibility of far greater casualties. How did Kircher weather such a stormy period in his life? And what do his actions in these years tell us about strategies he developed to handle crises in his future? I would argue that scrutiny of this troubled phase of Kircher’s life gives the historian a particular insight into both the personality and the coping mechanisms of this elusive figure.
