Firearm ownership is correlated with elevated lead levels in children, study finds

Brown-led research found that firearm-related lead ammunition use is an unregulated source of lead exposure in the U.S. that may disproportionately impact children.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BROWN UNIVERSITY

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Childhood lead exposure, primarily from paint and water, is a significant health concern in the United States, but a new study has identified a surprising additional source of lead exposure that may disproportionately harm children: firearms.

A team led by researchers at Brown University found an association between household firearm ownership and elevated lead levels in children’s blood in 44 states, even when controlling for other major lead exposure sources.

Lead exposure from firearms is far less explored than from recognized sources like water or lead-based paint, but may be equally dangerous for children’s health, said Christian Hoover, a Ph.D. candidate in epidemiology at Brown’s School of Public Health, who is the lead author of the study published in the Journal of Pediatrics.

“This is very concerning because we don’t have a system of monitoring lead from firearm use, as we do with residential paint, and there is no system in place to minimize or prevent children’s exposure to lead in firearms,” Hoover said. “Firearm use is a relatively unchecked source of childhood exposure to lead. There’s currently no way to stop the exposure from happening and no interventions when it does.”

In the study, the association between elevated lead levels and firearm use was almost as strong as the association for lead-based paint, Hoover noted.

Lead levels in children in the United States have been persistently high for decades. While public health measures have been put in place to prevent and reduce childhood lead poisoning from paint and drinking water, blood lead levels haven’t concordantly dropped in significant measures, Hoover said.

Firearm-related take-home lead occurs when an individual discharges a firearm that uses lead-based ammunition and primer, which are the most commonly used in the United States, Hoover said. The lead dust settles on clothes and personal items, such as phones or bags, as well as in vehicles and common spaces. Children are more vulnerable to lead than adults due to their tendency to ingest contaminants through normal hand-to-mouth behaviors.

“Typically the places where the firearm-related lead collects, such as in carpets, are places where young children spend a considerable amount of time,” said Hoover, who is a co-investigator at the Harvard Injury Control Research Center.

A previous study led by Hoover found a link between firearms and elevated lead levels in children’s blood in cities and towns in Massachusetts; this new study involved the 44 U.S. states that report public health data on child blood lead levels.

Since there is no governmental database covering firearm ownership across states, the researchers used a widely-accepted proxy measure developed by the RAND Corporation to estimate state levels of household gun ownership. This metric combines data on firearm suicides, hunting licenses, subscriptions to Guns and Ammo magazine and background checks. They compared the data from the proxy measure with reports from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of blood lead concentration surveillance data for children under 6. The analysis spanned the years between 2012 and 2018.

According to the study, for every 10% increase in the number of households that report owning a gun, there is an approximate 30% increase in cases of elevated pediatric blood lead levels.

Childhood exposure to lead increases the risk of behavioral problems, reduced cognitive abilities and poor growth and development. There is no safe level of lead exposure, said Joseph Braun, a professor of epidemiology and director of the Center for Children’s Environmental Health at Brown.

“Despite public health efforts to prevent or reduce childhood lead exposure, a substantial proportion of U.S. children are still exposed,” Braun said. “Thus, we need to identify other modifiable sources of lead exposure in children’s environments to protect their developing bodies and brains.”

The authors concluded that the data suggest firearms are a notable source of child lead exposure that requires more targeted research.

Alan Fossa, a postdoctoral research associate in environmental health at Brown, also contributed to this study.

This research was supported by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (R21 ES034187).

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JOURNAL

The Journal of Pediatrics

DOI

10.1016/j.jpeds.2024.113975 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Firearm-related Lead Exposure and Child Lead Levels in the United States, 2012-2018

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

22-Feb-2024

COI STATEMENT

Declaration of competing interest: JMB has been compensated for serving as an expert witness for plaintiffs involved in PFAS-contaminated drinking water and has NIH funding: R21 ES034187. MR has grants from the CDC and NIH related to firearm injury, and has unpaid roles as Senior Strategic Advisor to AFFIRM at the Aspen Institute and as a Board Member for the NonViolence Institute. The other authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.

Firearm access and gun violence exposure among American Indian or Alaska native and Black adults

JAMA Network Open

Peer-Reviewed Publication

JAMA NETWORK

About The Study: In this nationally representative survey study of 3,542 American Indian or Alaska Native and Black U.S. adults, a substantial percentage of both groups reported living in homes with firearms, storing firearms loaded and unlocked, frequently carrying firearms outside the home, and having been exposed directly and indirectly to gun violence. These findings underscore the need for nuanced public health campaigns and policies and highlight challenges for law enforcement in contexts of racial disparities and changing legal frameworks. 

Authors: Michael D. Anestis, Ph.D., of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in Piscataway, is the corresponding author. 

To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ 

(doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.0073)

Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support.

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Embed this link to provide your readers free access to the full-text article 

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About JAMA Network Open: JAMA Network Open is an online-only open access general medical journal from the JAMA Network. On weekdays, the journal publishes peer-reviewed clinical research and commentary in more than 40 medical and health subject areas. Every article is free online from the day of publication. 

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JOURNAL

JAMA Network Open

Firearm access and gun violence exposure are common in Black and native communities

These groups have experienced “heartbreaking levels of gun violence victimization” in the U.S., says Rutgers Health expert

Peer-Reviewed Publication

RUTGERS UNIVERSITY

A  New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center study is the first to provide nationally representative data on gun use, storage and violence within Black and American Indian/Alaskan Native (AIAN) families.

Both Black and native communities have seen increasingly elevated rates of gun violence victimization, including homicide and suicide, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In recent years, minorities have become more represented among new firearm owners. Despite this, research on firearm access, storage and use has focused on samples of white adults. This prevents understanding the access Black and native individuals have to firearms, whether they are stored securely and carry them outside their homes.

“Black and American Indian/Alaskan Native communities have experienced heartbreaking levels of gun violence victimization, but research has told us very little about the extent to which individuals in these communities have access to firearms and how they interact with firearms in their daily lives,” said Michael Anestis, executive director of the New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center at Rutgers Health and the lead author of the study appearing in the journal JAMA Network Open. “If we want to address gun violence within these communities, we need to first understand the ways in which the individuals within the communities are engaging with firearms.”

Rutgers researchers surveyed nationally representative samples of English-speaking Black and native adults in the late spring of 2023 and assessed how many individuals have access to firearms, what types of firearms they have, why they have firearms and how they store them. They also assessed how frequently they carry their firearms, why they do so, and in what locations. Finally, researchers assessed the extent to which individuals in these communities have been victimized by gun violence, know others who have been victimized by gun violence or have experienced incidents of gun violence in their neighborhoods.

The researchers found nearly 1 in 3 (30.4%) Black adults and nearly half (45.5%) of AIAN adults reported keeping firearms in their home. In both samples, home protection was the most common reason for firearm access and handguns were the most frequently owned type of firearm. Although about half of the individuals in each sample reported regularly storing firearms securely, a nearly equal proportion reported never using secure storage.

The researchers also found nearly 1 in 5 adults in each sample regularly carry firearms outside their homes. Self-protection was the most common reason for doing so, but a number of individuals in both groups reported carrying firearms to protect others and because they lack faith in the police.

In both samples, gun violence exposure was startlingly common: Numbers of both Black (21.7%) and native (30.2%) adults reported they had been threatened with a firearm and about 40% in both groups reported personally knowing someone who had been shot. 

To better understand how universal these results are within each sample, the authors examined the extent to which findings varied based upon sex, age, geographic location, rurality and political beliefs.

Although many findings remained similar across each of these subgroups, the authors noticed some variability.

“Our findings show that firearms are frequently present in the homes of Black and American Indian/Alaskan Native adults, with most owning for personal protection, many storing the firearms unsecured, and a meaningful group regularly carrying the firearms when they leave their homes,” Anestis said,

“In addition to the frequent presence of and interactions with firearms, both communities endorsed high levels of gun violence exposure,” he continued. “What this tells me is that firearms are, in many cases, dramatically impacting the daily lives of individuals in these communities and our efforts to prevent gun violence – including through the promotion of secure firearm storage – much adapt to fit the reality of firearms within these particular communities.”

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JOURNAL

JAMA Network Open

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Survey

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Firearm access and gun violence exposure in Black and American Indian/Alaskan Native adults: Results from a representative cross-sectional survey

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-Mar-2024

 

Geologists explore the hidden history of Colorado’s Spanish Peaks

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO AT BOULDER

 

IMAGE: 

SABRINA KAINZ ON AN EXPEDITION TO COLLECT ROCK SAMPLES.

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CREDIT: LON ABBOTT

If you’ve driven the mostly flat stretch of I-25 in Colorado from Pueblo to Trinidad, you’ve seen them: the Spanish Peaks, twin mountains that soar into the sky out of nowhere, reaching altitudes of 13,628 and 12,701 feet above sea level.

In a new study, geologists from the University of Colorado Boulder have laid out a timeline for the emergence of these majestic but isolated mountains. The team’s findings could bring scientists closer to answering one of the most enduring puzzles in Colorado geology: What made Denver, the Mile High City, a mile high?

“For geologists, the big question is: Why are Colorado’s High Plains so high?” said Sabrina Kainz, who led the research as an undergraduate student studying geology at CU Boulder.

The group published its findings March 1 in the scientific journal “Lithosphere.”

Colorado’s craggy, snow-capped Rocky Mountains attract tourists and more. But for researchers like Kainz and CU Boulder geologist Lon Abbott, the High Plains that extend over much of eastern Colorado—the territory of tumbleweeds and prairie dogs—may be even more interesting.

Abbott explained that the world’s highest places tend to be that way because of squishing and squeezing from tectonic plates—giant pieces of Earth’s crust that slam together, crumpling up land masses and raising entire mountain ranges. But Colorado’s High Plains, which are dominated by sedimentary rocks, aren’t crumpled at all. They’re one tall, flat stack of geological pancakes.

“The Colorado High Plains are anomalous, really, in the entire world,” said Abbott, co-author of the study and teaching professor in the Department of Geological Sciences. “They’re not formed the way that mountains are typically formed.”

To get nearer to solving the mystery of the plains, the researchers collected and analyzed rocks from the Spanish Peaks east to Two Buttes, a geologic formation near the Kansas border. 

They found that the rocks forming the Spanish Peaks injected into the crust below Colorado as magma around 24 million years ago, but remained miles underground until about 17 million years ago. What happened to bring them to the surface remains a mystery.

“We can answer when the plains around the Spanish Peaks got so high,” Kainz said. “The ‘why’ of the matter is a little more complicated.”

Colorado landmark

The Spanish Peaks have long been an important monument for generations of people who have called southern Colorado home.

The indigenous Comanche people referred to these formations as “Wahatoya,” which means “Double Mountain.” In the early 1800s, travelers following the Santa Fe Trail, which joined Missouri to what is now the southwestern U.S., formerly the northern reaches of New Spain and then Mexico, used the peaks as a landmark.

“They would spend weeks and weeks traveling in their wagons on the plains,” said Abbott, whose book “Geology Underfoot Along Colorado’s Front Range” is a primer for the state’s rockhounds. “Then, all of a sudden, they'd see those mountains, and they knew they were getting close.”

In 1913, hundreds of coal miners striking against the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company set up a tent camp not far from the mountains—a prelude to the Ludlow Massacre of 1914, which remains among the nation’s deadliest labor disputes.

The peaks have always been a bit mysterious. They are as tall as many of the Rocky Mountain summits to the west, but the Spanish Peaks formed at a different time and from completely different rocks.

For Kainz, now a doctoral student at the University of Washington in Seattle, getting to study those features as an undergrad was a dream come true. She began the project at the height of the COVID pandemic in 2020, and spent hours crammed into cars with dozens of rock samples.

The team included Rebecca Flowers, professor of geological sciences; undergraduate geology student Skye Fernandez; James Metcalf, manager of the Thermochronology Research and Instrumentation Laboratory (TRaIL); and Aidan Olsson, then a student at Fairview High School in Boulder now studying biology at CU Boulder.

The project hinged on an approach called thermochronology. Kainz noted that small chemical changes in the crystals within many rocks can give geologists clues about how hot or cold those samples were millions of years ago. Rocks buried deep below the Earth tend to be hotter than those closer to the surface.

More than a mile high

According to the team’s results, the Spanish Peaks first formed when magma welled up from deep within Earth’s crust but didn’t quite break through to the surface.

Then, something happened. In a very short span of time, geologically-speaking, huge tracks of land in southeastern Colorado vanished. Between roughly 18 and 14 million years ago, more than a mile of sedimentary rocks around the Spanish Peaks eroded away, then were swept into the Arkansas River.

The researchers suspect that as-of-yet-unidentified geologic forces were pushing up southeastern Colorado from below—exposing previously underground rocks to rain and flowing water. 

Abbott and his colleagues are now exploring how this disturbance may have fit into the broader evolution of Colorado’s plains. Their preliminary data, for example, suggests that the flat lands around what is now Denver may not have experienced similar upheaval at the same time.

But the study makes one thing clear: Colorado’s High Plains have long been something to behold.

“As high as the High Plains are today, they used to be a lot higher,” Kainz said. “They were as high as the Rocky Mountains are today.”

View from Colorado's Wet Mountains looking south toward the Spanish Peaks in the distance.

The Spanish Peaks rise from Huerfano County, Colorado.

CREDIT

Sabrina Kainz

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JOURNAL

Lithosphere

DOI

10.2113/2023/lithosphere_2023_310 

ARTICLE TITLE

Cenozoic Exhumation Across the High Plains of Southeastern Colorado from (U-Th)/He Thermochronology

 

Research suggests new tool-making timeline for East Asian hominins

Peer-Reviewed Publication

CHINESE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES HEADQUARTERS

 

IMAGE: 

(A-E) SLENDER FLAKES ARE INTENTIONALLY BROKEN AND USED AS BLANKS FOR RETOUCHING TIPPED TOOLS. (G-I) UNIFACIALLY RETOUCHED POINTS. (J-M) BORERS.

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CREDIT: IVPP

A new study from the Nihewan basin of China has revealed that hominins who possessed advanced knapping abilities equivalent to Mode 2 technological features occupied East Asia as early as 1.1 million years ago (Ma), which is 0.3 Ma earlier than the date associated with the first handaxes found in East Asia. This suggests that Mode 2 hominins dispersed into East Asia much earlier than previously thought. 

The study, which was conducted by a joint team led by Prof. PEI Shuwen from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Prof. Ignacio de la Torre from the Institute of History the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), was published in PNAS on Mar. 4 and provide insights into the early dispersals and adaptions of hominins in Eurasia.  

By reconstructing Cenjiawan refit sets from Nihewan basin, the research team discovered organized flaking techniques that aimed at producing slender flakes by core preparation on both the striking platform and flaking surface. The standardized operational process was not only shown by refit sets: Plenty of products detached at each stage of the process, thus provide strong evidence of standardized core preparation.  

Prepared core technologies were characterized by organized methods to obtain predetermined flakes that required detailed planning and a deep understanding of flaking mechanisms, which originated in the Acheulean and particularly more than 1.0 Ma.  

Regarding retouched tools, technological analysis of refitted products detached from the prepared core technology indicates intentional breakage of slender flakes in two halves. One or more of the resulting fragments were then selected as blanks for retouching, with the aiming of creating tipped tools with two convergent sides, thus significantly altering the original shape of blanks.  

In addition, patterns of retouching tools like points and borers, which showed standardization of tool shape, were also well documented in the Cenjiawan assemblage, thus suggesting complex mental templates among the Cenjiawan toolmakers.  

The prepared core technology, standardized predetermined products and retouching tool shapes, together with the high level of manual precision, fragmented reduction sequences, long reduction sequences, and organized management of raw materials documented in the Cenjiawan assemblage, provide compelling evidence for complex technical abilities and in-depth planning behaviors among Early Pleistocene hominins in East Asia. 

"The advanced technological behaviors documented at the Cenjiawan site similar to those of Mode 2 technology, rather than the technical simplicity attributed to Mode 1", said Dr. MA Dongdong, first author of the study, who conducted the research during his Ph.D at IVPP and currently is working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of History of CISC.  

The Lower Paleolithic technology in China has long been regarded as simple (Oldowan-like/Mode 1) and homogeneous before late Pleistocene. The compelling evidence in the Cenjiawan assemblage provides a new perspective in understanding the small debitage system in China and may force a reconsideration of current perceptions of technological stasis in East Asia.  

The authors argued that the technological features, rather than the mere presence or absence of specific tool types (e.g., handaxes), should be the basis for studying Early and Middle Pleistocene assemblages in East Asia. This enables a more integrated understanding of Mode 2 technology as well as the human cultural and biological connections between East Asia and other regions of the Old World. 

The CJW site and Lithology of the CJW profile and corresponding magnetic polarity time scale

Operational scheme of prepared core technology (A and B) and predetermined products in CJW (C and D).

CREDIT

IVPP

JOURNAL

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

DOI

10.1073/pnas.2313123121 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Earliest Prepared core technology in Eurasia from Nihewan (China): Implications for early human abilities and dispersals in East Asia

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-Mar-2024

 

Plant Lavender, Marjoram and Ivy on your green wall to clean up the air

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF SURREY

Green walls can strip pollution from the air – and some plants do it better than others, according to new research from the University of Surrey.  

Researchers planted 10 species on a custom-built 1.4m green wall beside the A3 in Guildford.  

Mamatha Tomson, postgraduate researcher at the University of Surrey, said: 

“By planting vertically on a green wall, communities can clean up their air without taking up too much street space.  

“Our study suggests that this process depends not only on the shape of its leaves but on the micromorphological properties of their surfaces. We think a good mixture of species will produce the most effective green walls – and look forward to carrying out further research to see if we’re right.” 

Plants remove air pollution in two steps. First, they catch particles of pollution on their leaves. Then, the rain washes them safely to the ground.  

Evergreen Candytuft and Ivy leaves were found to be especially good at trapping pollutant particles, large and small.  

Meanwhile, rain was able to wash most of the pollution off the hairy leaves of Lavender. Candytuft and Marjoram also performed well in washing off smaller particles of pollution. 

Professor Prashant Kumar, director of the University’s Global Centre for Clean Air Research (GCARE), said: 

“We hope that town planners and infrastructure experts can use our findings to think more carefully about what they plant.  

“Having a green wall is a great way of removing pollution – but what you plant on it can make a big difference to how successful it will be.” 

The study is published in the journal Science of the Total Environment.  

It helps promote the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 3 (good health and well-being), 13 (climate action) and 15 (life on land).  

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JOURNAL

Science of The Total Environment

DOI

10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.170950 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Exploring the interplay between particulate matter capture, wash-off, and leaf traits in green wall species

 

Swapping meat for Quorn lowers bad cholesterol by 10-percent

Regularly substituting meat for mycoprotein such as Quorn could help to lower bad cholesterol by 10-percent, which is comparable to switching to a Mediterranean or vegan diet.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF EXETER

Regularly substituting meat for mycoprotein such as Quorn could help to lower bad cholesterol by 10-percent, which is comparable to switching to a Mediterranean or vegan diet.

New research by the University of Exeter, published in Clinical Nutrition, also found substituting meat for Quorn reduces blood glucose and c-peptide concentrations associated with diabetes, cardiovascular disease and all-cause mortality.

With one in six UK adults suffering from raised cholesterol, the findings indicate that mycoprotein - the high protein, high-fibre food source that’s the main ingredient in Quorn - could play a key role in cholesterol management and improving heart health.

Dr George Pavis, of University of Exeter, led the study and said: “We’re really excited about these results and what they mean for public health. Previous laboratory studies, where all food eaten is controlled and alcohol and caffeine consumption regulated, have clearly shown that daily consumption of mycoprotein reduces bad cholesterol. But this is the first study of its kind to explore the impact of such a dietary intervention in a real-world, home-based setting where participants were not restricted in terms of what else they consumed or did.

“The findings demonstrate that introducing Quorn foods into a diet on a regular basis helps to significantly lower bad cholesterol, blood glucose and c-peptide concentrations, which is important for boosting heart health and reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease.

“It was particularly interesting to see the scale of the impact that Quorn consumption had in terms of reducing harmful cholesterol, with its performance over four weeks comparable to what we might expect to see from well-established approaches, such as following a Mediterranean diet.”

The remotely delivered study involved 72 overweight adults with high cholesterol levels. Researchers found that participants who ate 180g of Quorn products on a daily basis - equivalent to two servings of Quorn mince - saw a 10-percent reduction in ‘bad’ LDL cholesterol over the four-week study period. This equates to a 0.3 millimole per litre (mmol/l) decrease in bad cholesterol levels in less than one month.

Research has shown how more wholesale healthy dietary changes, such as switching to a Mediterranean or vegan diet, will typically deliver a 0.2 – O.3 mmol/l reduction in bad cholesterol levels after 12 weeks. Researchers at the University of Exeter also noted that typical doses of atorvastatin, the most popular statin prescribed by the NHS to treat high cholesterol, commonly yield a 0.3 – 1.3 mmol/l reduction after 12 months.

According to medical research, a decrease of 0.39 mmol/l in bad cholesterol levels is associated with a 25% lower lifetime risk of heart and circulatory disease. With pharmaceutical trials suggesting that reductions increase in a linear way over time, the researchers suggested further studies should be undertaken to see if the results improve even further when Quorn is eaten over a longer period.

The study – which saw half of the participants (39) given meat and fish products to eat on a daily basis as part of their regular diet, while the other half (33) were provided with Quorn products – also revealed further heart health benefits.

High blood sugar levels and c-peptide concentrations are commonly associated with diabetes and an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and all-cause mortality. The researchers found that study participants who ate Quorn products experienced, on average, a 13-percent drop in blood glucose levels and a 27-percent fall in c-peptide concentrations, compared with the control group. With current data showing that 2.4 million people are at an increased risk of type 2 diabetes in the UK based on high blood sugar levels, these findings demonstrate how mycoprotein could also play a key role in tackling a disease that currently costs an estimated £14 billion a year to treat.

The findings come after the latest annual Health Survey for England estimated that well over half (59-percent) of adults suffer from raised cholesterol and one in ten from diabetes, with both conditions known to cause cardiovascular disease - meaning millions of people could be at risk of a potentially fatal heart attack or stroke.

Sam Blunt, Quorn’s director of sustainability and corporate affairs, said: “The potential cholesterol-lowering effects of Quorn’s mycoprotein were first identified nearly four decades ago and, since then, numerous studies have helped us to understand more about the extent of its cholesterol management capabilities, with its high-fibre content thought to play a key role in this.

“While the benefits of adopting a Mediterranean diet are clear, it’s not always easy to do and this study highlights how, by simply introducing Quorn products into their diet on a regular basis, people may be able to quickly reduce their cholesterol levels and improve their heart health with minimal effort."

The study, entitled ‘A four-week dietary intervention with mycoprotein-containing food products reduces serum cholesterol concentrations in community-dwelling, overweight adults: a randomised controlled trial’ is published in Clinical Nutrition Journal.

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JOURNAL

Clinical Nutrition

DOI

10.1016/j.clnu.2024.01.023 

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

A four-week dietary intervention with mycoprotein-containing food products reduces serum cholesterol concentrations in community-dwelling, overweight adults: A randomised controlled trial

Rare astrolabe discovery reveals Islamic – Jewish scientific exchange

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE

 

IMAGE: 

THE VERONA ASTROLABE

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CREDIT: FEDERICA GIGANTE

The identification of an eleventh century Islamic astrolabe bearing both Arabic and Hebrew inscriptions makes it one of the oldest examples ever discovered and one of only a handful known in the world. The astronomical instrument was adapted, translated and corrected for centuries by Muslim, Jewish and Christian users in Spain, North Africa and Italy.

 

Dr Federica Gigante, from Cambridge University’s History Faculty, made the discoveries in a museum in Verona, Italy, and published them today in the journal Nuncius.

 

Dr Gigante first came across a newly-uploaded image of the astrolabe by chance on the website of the Fondazione Museo Miniscalchi-Erizzo. Intrigued, she asked them about it.

“The museum didn’t know what it was,” Dr Gigante said. “It’s now the single most important object in their collection.”

“When I visited the museum and studied the astrolabe up close, I noticed that not only was it covered in beautifully engraved Arabic inscriptions but that I could see faint inscriptions in Hebrew. I could only make them out in the raking light entering from a window. I thought I might be dreaming but I kept seeing more and more. It was very exciting.”

“This isn’t just an incredibly rare object. It’s a powerful record of scientific exchange between Arabs, Jews and Christians over hundreds of years,” said Dr Gigante.

“The Verona astrolabe underwent many modifications, additions, and adaptations as it changed hands. At least three separate users felt the need to add translations and corrections to this object, two using Hebrew and one using a Western language.”

Astrolabes were the world’s first smartphone, a portable computer which could be put to hundreds of uses. They provided a portable two-dimensional model of the universe fitting in their user’s hand, enabling them to calculate time, distances, plot the position of the stars and even forecast the future, by casting a horoscope.

 

Islamic Spanish origins

Dr Gigante, an expert on Islamic astrolabes and previously a curator of Islamic scientific instruments, dated and located the creation of the ‘Verona astrolabe’ by analysing key scientific, design, construction and calligraphic characteristics. She identified the object as Andalusian, and – from the style of the engraving, and the arrangement of the scales on the back – matched it to instruments made in Al-Andalus, the Muslim-ruled area of Spain, in the eleventh century.

One side of a plate is inscribed in Arabic “for the latitude of Cordoba, 38° 30',” while the other side “for the latitude of Toledo, 40°,” لعزض طليطلة م. Dr Gigante suggests that the astrolabe might have been made in Toledo at a time when it was a thriving centre of coexistence and cultural exchange between Muslim, Jews and Christians.

The astrolabe features Muslim prayer lines and prayer names, arranged to ensure that its original intended users kept to time to perform their daily prayers.

The signature inscribed on the astrolabe reads / صنعة يونس[...]لاسحاق, that is, “for Isḥāq [...]/the work of Yūnus.” This was engraved sometime after the astrolabe was made probably for a later owner.

The two names, Isḥāq and Yūnus, that is Isaac and Jonah in English, could be Jewish names written in the Arabic script, a detail that suggests that the object was at a certain point circulating within a Sephardi Jewish community in Spain, where Arabic was the spoken language.

A second, added plate is inscribed for typical North African latitudes suggesting that another point of the object’s life, it was perhaps used in Morocco, or Egypt.

 

Hebrew inscriptions

Hebrew inscriptions were added to the astrolabe by more than one hand. One set of additions are carved deeply and neatly, while a different set of translations are very light, uneven, and show an insecure hand.

Dr Gigante said: “These Hebrew additions and translations suggest that at a certain point the object left Spain or North Africa and circulated amongst the Jewish diaspora community in Italy, where Arabic was not understood, and Hebrew was used instead.”

Unusually, one of the Hebrew additions, engraved neatly above the Arabic marking for latitude 35°, reads “34 and a half” rather than “34 ½”, which suggests that the engraver was not an astronomer or astrolabe maker.

Other Hebrew inscriptions are instead translations of the Arabic names for astrological signs, for Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, Pisces, and Aries.

Dr Gigante points out that these translations reflect the recommendations prescribed by the Spanish Jewish polymath Abraham Ibn Ezra (1089–1167) in the earliest surviving treatise on the astrolabe in the Hebrew language written in 1146 in Verona, exactly where the astrolabe is found today.

 

Jewish Verona

Twelfth-century Verona hosted one of the longest-standing and most important Jewish communities in Italy. Ibn Ezra’s treatise assumes pre-existing knowledge of the astrolabe among the Verona Jewish community, showing that the instrument must already have been popular.

Ibn Ezra’s description has a lot in common with the ‘Verona astrolabe’ which would have been in circulation by the time Ibn Ezra was in Verona. He warned his readers that an instrument must be checked before use to verify the accuracy of the values to be calculated.

Dr Gigante suggests that the person who added the Hebrew inscriptions might have been following such recommendations.

Close up of the Verona astrolabe showing inscribed Hebrew, Arabic and Western Numerals

Close up of the Verona astrolabe showing Hebrew inscribed (top left) above Arabic inscriptions

CREDIT

Federica Gigante

Incorrect corrections

The astrolabe features corrections inscribed not only in Hebrew but also in Western numerals, the same we use in English today.

All sides of the astrolabe’s plates feature lightly scratched markings in Western numerals, translating and correcting the latitude values, some even multiple times. Dr Gigante thinks it is highly likely that these additions were made in Verona for a Latin or Italian language speaker.

In one case, someone lightly scratched the numbers “42” and “40” near the inscription reading “for the latitude of Medinaceli, 41° 30'”.

Dr Gigante said: “Not only do both numerals differ from the value given in the Arabic, they don’t agree between themselves. It may be that a later user of the instrument thought the original Arabic value was wrong and amended it. But the correct, modern value for the latitude of Medinaceli is 41°15', indicating that the Arabic value was more accurate than either amendment.”

Elsewhere on the instrument, Gigante found similar conflicting and erroneous amendments relating to the latitudes of Cordoba and Toledo.

 

Star map

The astrolabe features a ‘rete’ – a pierced disk representing a map of the sky – which is one of the earliest known made in Spain. Remarkably, it features similarities with the rete of the only surviving Byzantine astrolabe made in AD1062 as well as with those of the earliest European astrolabes, made in Spain on the model of Islamic ones.

A calculation of the star position allows a rough timing of the sky for which it was created. Dr Gigante explains that “due to a phenomenon called the precession of the equinoxes, whereby the earth rotates on its axis not in a straight line, but in a “wobbly” manner, like a spinning top about to stop, the stars’ apparent positions above our heads change constantly, about 1 degree every 70 years.”

By analysing the position of the stars on the rete, it is possible to calculate that they were placed in the position that stars had in the late 11th century, and that they match those of other astrolabes made, for example, in AD 1068.

 

Later life

The astrolabe is thought to have made its way into the collection of the Veronese nobleman Ludovico Moscardo (1611–81) before passing by marriage to the Miniscalchi family. In 1990, the family founded the Fondazione Museo Miniscalchi-Erizzo to preserve the collections.

“This object is Islamic, Jewish and European, they can’t be separated,” Dr Gigante said.

References

F. Gigante, ‘A Medieval Islamic Astrolabe with Hebrew Inscriptions in Verona: The Seventeenth-Century Collection of Ludovico Moscardo’, Nuncius (2024). DOI : 10.1163/18253911-bja10095

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JOURNAL

Nuncius

DOI

10.1163/18253911-bja10095 

ARTICLE TITLE

A Medieval Islamic Astrolabe with Hebrew Inscriptions in Verona: The Seventeenth-Century Collection of Ludovico Moscardo

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-Mar-2024