Acknowledgments

I WAS FORTUNATE ENOUGH to receive guidance from three of the world’s leading authorities on Descartes and his philosophy: Jean Robert Armogathe, director of studies of the History of Religious and Scientific Ideas in Modern Europe program at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes at the Sorbonne; Theo Verbeek, professor of philosophy at Utrecht University; and Richard Watson, professor of philosophy emeritus at Washington University in St. Louis. I thank them for their help with this book and at the same time disassociate them from any errors it might contain. I am also particularly grateful to Philippe Mennecier, director of conservation at the Musée de l’homme in Paris, for giving me private viewings of the skull of Descartes, for sharing with me his dossier of documents related to its history, and for putting me in contact with other seekers after Descartes’ bones.

My thanks also to the following: Susanna Åkerman, Swedish historian and biographer of Queen Christina, for showing me around Christina’s Stockholm; Jane Alison, for Latin translations; Hisao Baba, director of anthropology, National Science Museum, Tokyo, Japan; Michael Baur, professor of philosophy, Fordham University, for philosophical guidance and advice; ErikJan Bos, Utrecht University, coeditor of the new critical edition of the correspondence of Descartes, for his incisive critique of the manuscript; Friso Broeksma, for putting me up at his house on Prinseneiland; Veronica Buckley, biographer of Queen Christina; Jennifer Carter, McGill University, for her generous help with documents related to the Museum of French Monuments and for her thoughts on the quixotic figure of Alexandre Lenoir; Bernard Cartier, medical doctor and historian of French medicine; Hampus Cinthio, Historiska Museet, Lund, Sweden; Anne Deneufbourg, Maison Descartes, Amsterdam; I. M. L. Donaldson, emeritus professor of neurophysiology at the University of Edinburgh; Theodor Ebert, professor emeritus of the history of philosophy at the Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, for sharing the manuscript of his monograph on Descartes’ death with me; Marnie Henricksson, who had a great deal to do with the creation of this book; Suzanne Hoeben, for fact-checking; Beth Johnson and Jan Kat, for the loan of their beach house in Egmond aan Zee, which gave me a chance to steep in a land- and seascape where Descartes lived; Mami Kamei, for Japanese translations; Michael Martin for reading and critiquing the manuscript; Ann-Britt Qvarfordt, for Swedish translations; and Dominique Terlon, genealogist, for providing me with information on her seventeenth-century ancestor who carried Descartes’ bones from Sweden to France and kept a piece for himself.

Thanks also to Armelle Aymonin, American Library in Paris; Marijke Bartels and Martijn David of Mouria Publishers, Amsterdam; Philippe Comar, Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris; Melissa Ann Danaczko; Maite Frost; Charles Gehring; Cobie Ivens; Jaap Jacobs; Raymond Jonas, professor of history, University of Washington; Birgitta Lindholm, keeper of manuscripts, Lund University Library; Therese Oltramari, librarian, Bibliothèque nationale de France; Emilie Stewart; Pamela Twigg; Theresa Vann, Hill Museum and Manuscript Library, St. John’s University, College-ville, Minnesota; Ulla von Wowern, Lund University Historical Museum, Lund, Sweden; Caroline van Gelderen; and Charles Wendell.

I would also like to acknowledge the main institutions where I carried out my research: the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the library of the Universiteit van Amsterdam, the New York Public Library, the American Library in Paris, the Bibliothèque Ste.-Geneviève, the Lund University library in Sweden, and Maison Descartes in Amsterdam.

As always, the greatest thanks to my agent and friend Anne Edelstein and to my brilliant editor, Bill Thomas.