THE PROPER MEASURE OF MAN: THE ANTHROPOMORPHIC LANDSCAPE IN RENAISSANCE ART AND THE ORIGIN OF PALEOBIOLOGY

Albrecht Dürer’s (1471-1528) studies of human proportion influenced D’Arcy Thompson’s theory of coordinates published in his book, “On Growth and Form,” in 1917. The theory states that variations in growth rate along geometric coordinates determine transformations in morphology during development and over the course of evolution. To paraphrase Stephen Jay Gould, D’Arcy Thompson saw these transformations both as responses to physical forces, and as simple solutions to morphological problems. Thus, Dürer’s work is a precursor to the science of paleobiology, as is the work of other artists of the fifteenth through seventeenth centuries who, as D’Arcy Thompson pointed out, commonly studied proportion based on classical geometrical antecedents. Leonardo’s “Vitruvian Man,” is a notable example.

It is asserted here that the science of landscape evolution also originated from the proper, geometric measure of man during the Renaissance (ca. fifteenth—sixteenth century). At the very least, Renaissance artists’ use of geometry to reveal the structure of all of nature scaled the landscape to human proportions, facilitating “realistic” representations of it. Dürer’s anthropomorphic rock outcrops in watercolors such as, “The Arco Landscape,” support this assertion. One could include the skeletal grotto in Leonardo’s “Madonna of the Rocks,” and the anthropomorphic landscapes of an anonymous artist of the 16th century Ecole des Pays-Bas Meridionaux (“Zuidnederlandse” School). The resemblance of Byzantine mountains to Gothic cathedrals in some northern European landscapes also anthropomorphizes the landscape in the sense that architecture is scaled to human proportions.

Thus, Renaissance artists were the last common ancestor of both paleobiologists and geologists who study landscape evolution. Whether that origin was gradualistic or punctuated is yet to be determined.