From the book
A Chymical Dictionary
Gerhard Dorn and John French · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordAn art defined through the handling or alteration of heaviness.
- In the bookMechanopeotica and Organopeotica also classify practical arts by their ends: water-works and warlike instruments.
- A place to readThe historical definition below, 1650 dictionary, unnumbered definition page 32; facsimile PDF page 360.
Historical definition
Mangonaria is an art employed with weights, by which what has been made heavy is readily made light.
Meaning
The definition describes what the art achieves, not the device by which it works. It leaves open whether a particular passage concerns an arrangement of weights, a way of moving a burden, or another application. The reader should not supply an unmentioned mechanism as part of the dictionary’s statement.
Use in the book
Mechanopeotica and Organopeotica also classify practical arts by their ends: water-works and warlike instruments. This family of definitions gives a field of activity without necessarily explaining its engineering.
Places to read
- MangonariaRead the complete historical definition and its commentary.
- MechanopeoticaAn inventive art exemplified by raising and conveying water.
- OrganopeoticaThe invention of warlike instruments.
Source note
Historical source. 1650 dictionary, unnumbered definition page 32; facsimile PDF page 360 — Facsimile
Sources. A Chymical Dictionary 1650, 1650 dictionary, facsimile PDF page 360, Mangonaria