Clelia Crialesi

I work on medieval philosophy and history of science. I am mainly interested in the interplay of medieval philosophy and mathematics, geometrical reasoning and atomism, Boethian arithmetic – and I find all their metaphysical and epistemological implications really fascinating.

I am currently a FWO Junior Postdoctoral Fellow at KU Leuven (De Wulf-Mansion Centre), where I investigate the way geometry was used to argue for and against atomism in the late Middle Ages. More precisely, I retrace the main geometrical arguments that oriented and fostered the debate about the nature of space and extension. Concerning the methodology, my current research puts together the history of philosophy and the history of texts, as I am also preparing the critical edition of pseudo-Aristotle’s De lineis indivisibilibus, within the Aristoteles Latinus project. To know more about my research project, see Breaking the Lines.

Below you can find a concise survey of my professional appointments, education, teaching, and list of publications.

Professional appointments

  • (2021 – present) FWO Junior Postdoc (De Wulf-Mansion Centre).
  • (2019 – 2020) Mellon Fellow at PIMS, Toronto. See Speculative Arithmetic for the research project.

Education

  • (2019 – present) Licence in Mediaeval Studies (LMS) at PIMS, Toronto.
  • (2015 – 2019) PhD in Philosophy at the University of Rome ‘Tor Vergata’ & the École Pratique des Hautes Études (double degree). My thesis concerns the Neopythagorean philosophical tradition of the Early Middle Ages. More specifically, I thoroughly examined a 10th-century text on philosophy and arithmetic written by Abbo of Fleury, namely, the Commentary on the Calculus of Victorius of Aquitaine. I am currently translating my dissertation into English, and hopefully it will be published soon.
  • (2013 – 2015) MA at the University of Pisa.

Teaching

  • (2022) Next spring I will be teaching a course titled ‘Natural Philosophy: The Atomism Before the Scientific Turn’ at the University of Rome ‘Tor Vergata’.
  • (2019 – present) I am honorary fellow at the University of Rome ‘Tor Vergata’. Since my dissertation and depending on my commitments, I have been assisting teaching within the course ‘History of Medieval Philosophy’ and ‘Teaching Philosophy’ at the same university.

Societies

  • (Jan. 2022 – May 2022) Secretary General of SIEPM (Société Internationale pour l’Étude de la Philosophie Médiévale)
  • (2022 – present) Coordinator of the commission ‘Mathematization of Philosophical Thought’ of SOFIME (Sociedad de Filosofía Medieval)

Publications

Articles and book chapters

  • [in progress] Geometry and Indivisibilism in the Middle Ages: Albert the Great’s and Roger Bacon’s Philosophy of Mathematics.
  • [forthcoming] Les « raisons » des mathémathiques : Aspects de la ratio dans la pensée mathématique médiévale.
  • [forthcoming] The Medieval Latin Reception of the Pseudo-Aristotelian De lineis indivisibilibus: Reassessing the State of the Art.
  • (2021) Excerptiuncula: A Short Introduction to Boethius’ De arithmetica of the Early Middle Ages, «Journal of Medieval Latin» 31: 265-287.
  • (2020) The Status of Mathematics in Boethius. Remarks in the Light of His Commentaries on the Isagoge, in L. Giovannetti (ed.), The Sustainability of Thought. An Itinerary through the History of Philosophy, Naples: Bibliopolis, 95-124. [runner up of the SIEPM Junior Scholar Award]
  • (2019) Un approccio matematizzante nell’analisi della realtà naturale: l’Explanatio in Calculo Victorii di Abbone di Fleury, in O. Grassi – G. Catapano (eds.), Rappresentazioni della natura nel Medioevo, Florence: SISMEL – Edizioni del Galluzzo, 41-58.
  • (2018) La γυμνασία matematica del Parmenide: alcuni esempi di esercizi mentali, «Fogli di Filosofia» 8: 65–84.
  • (2016) Le opere dei sei giorni: aritmetica ed esegesi secundum physicam in Teodorico di Chartres, «Medioevo. Rivista di storia della filosofia medievale» 41: 67–102.

Reviews

  • [forthcoming] in «Revue d’Histoire Ecclésiastique»: I. Lystopad, Un platonisme original au XIIe siècle. Métaphysique pluraliste et théologie trinitaire dans le De unitate et pluralitate creaturarum d’Achard de Saint-Victor, Turnhout: Brepols 2021.
  • (2020) in «Revista Española de Filosofia Medieval» 28: C. Lévy – J.-B. Guillaumin (eds.), Plato latinus. Aspects de la transmission de Platon en latin dans l’Antiquité, Turnhout: Brepols, 2018.
  • (2019) in «Studi Medievali III Serie» 60, 2: C. Panti – N. Polloni (eds.), Vedere nell’ombra. Studi su natura, spiritualità e scienze operative o erti a Michela Pereira, Firenze: SISMEL-Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2017.
  • (2019) in «Studi Medievali III Serie», 60, 2: L. Bianchi – O. Grassi – C. Panti (eds.), Edizioni, traduzioni e tradizioni filosofiche (Secoli XII-XVI). Studi per Pietro B. Rossi, Canterano: Aracne, 2018, 2 vols.