KIRCHER, ATITANASIUS, 1602-1680; b. Guysen, near Fulda; entered the order of the Jesuits at an early age, educated at the university of Wfirzburg, where he afterwards taught philosophy and the oriental languages. At the commencement of the thirty years' war he returned to France, and spent two years in the Jesuits' college at Avignon, occupied entirely in the study of antiquities. By advise of the learned Peiresc he applied himself with great zeal to the task of deciphering the Egyptian hieroglyphics. He was preparing to return to Germany as professor of mathematics at Vienna, to which he had been appointed, when he reeeived an order to repair to Rome, which he obeyed. In 1637 lie was charged by the pope to accompany cardinal Frederick of Saxony to Malta, and was received with great honor by the knights of St. John. Having visited Sicily and the kingdom of Naples, he took the chair of mathematics in the Roman col lege, which he filled for eight years. In ins researches and experiments he received fitfcfnl aid from German, Italian, and Spanish princes and nobles, and also collected a splendid museum of antiquities, which he left to the Roman college. He was a man of
extensive and varied but ill-digested erudition, and a copious writer on mathematics, physics, philology, hieroglyphics, history, and antiquity. He had a vast memory and untiring perseverance, but he lackedjudgment and critical skill; his theories arc often fanciful, and he self-complacently believed that he could solve any question however difficult. Of Ins numerous works the most important arc: Prodromus Coptus sire ./Eggp tiacus; Latium, with maps and figures: Institutions Granimaticales et Lexicon Copticum; China lllnstrata; Mundus Subterranens; Cgdipus tEgyptiacus. The most valuable are those relating to the Coptic and Egyptian tongues, and his Latium, which, with its maps and plans, is interesting and instructive.