The Atlantic Vision - Olaus Rudbeck and Baroque Science

Olaus Rudbeck (1630-1702), Professor of Medicine at Uppsala University, is best known for his discovery of the lymphatic system, a work of his youth. Besides anatomy, he made considerable contributions to botany and astronomy, was an eminent technician and master builder, and may be seen as one of the earliest Swedish entrepreneurs. In the four huge volumes of the Atlantica, he endeavoured to prove that Sweden had played a significant role in the history of the ancient world by identifying the Scandinavian peninsula with the island of Atlantis, described by Plato, and with numerous other fabulous places described in classical literature, including the Herperian island and the country of the Hyperboreans. According to Rudbeck, astronomy, time reckoning, and the art of writing with letters (runes) were the inventions of the ancient Swedes, knowledge of which was spread throughout the rest of the world by the many conquests of the northern people...