Editing Mnemonic (section)

==History==
The general name of '''mnemonics''', or ''memoria technica'', was the name applied to devices for aiding the memory, to enable the mind to reproduce a relatively unfamiliar idea, and especially a series of dissociated ideas, by connecting it, or them, in some artificial whole, the parts of which are mutually suggestive.<ref name="EB1">{{EB1911|wstitle=Mnemonics|volume=18|last1= Mitchell |first1= John Malcolm |author1-link= |pages=629–630|inline=1|short=1}}</ref> Mnemonic devices were much cultivated by [[Ancient Greece|Greek]] [[sophist]]s and [[philosopher]]s and are frequently referred to by [[Plato]] and [[Aristotle]].

Philosopher [[Charmadas]] was famous for his outstanding memory and for his ability to memorize whole books and then recite them.<ref>Herwig Blum: ''Die antike Mnemotechnik'', Hildesheim 1969, page. 119f.</ref>

In later times, the poet [[Simonides]] was credited for development of these techniques, perhaps for no reason other than that the power of his memory was famous. [[Cicero]], who attaches considerable importance to the art, but more to the principle of order as the best help to memory, speaks of [[Carneades]] (perhaps Charmades) of [[Athens]] and [[Metrodorus of Scepsis]] as distinguished examples of people who used well-ordered images to aid the memory. The [[Ancient Rome|Romans]] valued such helps in order to support facility in public speaking.<ref>The method used is described by the author of ''Rhet ad Heren.'' iii. 16–24; see also [[Quintilian]] (''Inst. Or.'' xi. 2), whose account is, however, obscure. In his time the art had almost ceased to be practiced.</ref>

The Greek and the Roman [[Method of loci|system of mnemonics]] was founded on the use of mental places and signs or pictures, known as "topical" mnemonics. The most usual method was to choose a large house, of which the apartments, walls, windows, statues, furniture, etc., were each associated with certain names, phrases, events or ideas, by means of symbolic pictures. To recall these, an individual had only to search over the apartments of the house until discovering the places where images had been placed by the imagination.

[[File:Giordano Bruno Campo dei Fiori cropped.jpg|thumb|Detail of [[Giordano Bruno]]'s statue in [[Rome]]. Bruno was famous for his mnemonics, some of which he included in his treatises ''De umbris idearum'' and ''Ars Memoriae''.]]

In accordance with this system, if it were desired to fix a historic date in memory, it was localised in an imaginary town divided into a certain number of districts, each with ten houses, each house with ten rooms, and each room with a hundred [[quadrat]]es or memory-places, partly on the floor, partly on the four walls, partly on the ceiling. Therefore, if it were desired to fix in the memory the date of the invention of printing (1436), an imaginary book, or some other symbol of printing, would be placed in the thirty-sixth quadrate or memory-place of the fourth room of the first house of the historic district of the town. Except that the rules of mnemonics are referred to by [[Martianus Capella]], nothing further is known regarding the practice until the 13th century.<ref name="EB1"/>

Among the voluminous writings of [[Roger Bacon]] is a tractate ''De arte memorativa''. [[Ramon Llull]] devoted special attention to mnemonics in connection with his ''ars generalis.'' The first important modification of the method of the Romans was that invented by the German poet [[Conrad Celtes]], who, in his ''Epitoma in utramque Ciceronis rhetoricam cum arte memorativa nova'' (1492), used letters of the [[alphabet]] for associations, rather than places. About the end of the 15th century, [[Peter of Ravenna]] (b. 1448) provoked such astonishment in [[Italy]] by his mnemonic feats that he was believed by many to be a [[necromancer]]. His ''Phoenix artis memoriae'' ([[Venice]], 1491, 4 vols.) went through as many as nine editions, the seventh being published at [[Cologne]] in 1608.

About the end of the 16th century, [[Lambert Schenkel]] (''Gazophylacium'', 1610), who taught mnemonics in [[France]], Italy and [[Germany]], similarly surprised people with his memory. He was denounced as a [[Magician (paranormal)|sorcerer]] by the [[Old University of Leuven|University of Louvain]], but in 1593 he published his tractate ''De memoria'' at [[Douai]] with the sanction of that celebrated theological faculty. The most complete account of his system is given in two works by his pupil Martin Sommer, published in [[Venice]] in 1619. In 1618 John Willis (d. 1628?) published ''Mnemonica; sive ars reminiscendi'',<ref>[[English language|English version]] by Leonard Sowersby, 1661; extracts in [[Gregor von Feinaigle]]'s ''New Art of Memory'', 3rd ed., 1813.</ref> containing a clear statement of the principles of topical or local mnemonics. [[Giordano Bruno]] included a ''memoria technica'' in his treatise ''De umbris idearum,'' as part of his study of the ''ars generalis'' of [[Ramon Llull|Llull]]. Other writers of this period are the [[Florence|Florentine]] Publicius (1482); [[Johannes Romberch]] (1533); [[Hieronimo Morafiot]], ''Ars memoriae'' (1602);and B. Porta, ''Ars reminiscendi'' (1602).<ref name="EB1"/>

In 1648 [[Stanislaus Mink von Wennsshein]] revealed what he called the "most fertile secret" in mnemonics—using consonants for figures, thus expressing numbers by words (vowels being added as required), in order to create associations more readily remembered. The philosopher [[Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz]] adopted an alphabet very similar to that of Wennsshein for his scheme of a form of writing common to all languages.

Wennsshein's method was adopted with slight changes afterward by the majority of subsequent "original" systems. It was modified and supplemented by [[Richard Grey (priest)|Richard Grey]] (1694–1771), a priest who published a ''Memoria technica'' in 1730. The principal part of Grey's method is briefly this:
{{blockquote|To remember anything in [[history]], [[chronology]], [[geography]], etc., a word is formed, the beginning whereof, being the first syllable or syllables of the thing sought, does, by frequent repetition, of course draw after it the latter part, which is so contrived as to give the answer. Thus, in history, the [[Genesis flood narrative|Deluge]] happened in the year [[before Christ]] two thousand three hundred forty-eight; this is signified by the word Del-''etok'', Del standing for Deluge and ''etok'' for 2348.<ref name="EB1"/>}}Wennsshein's method is comparable to a [[Hebrew alphabet#Numeric values of letters|Hebrew system]] by which letters also stand for numerals, and therefore words for dates.

To assist in retaining the mnemonical words in the memory, they were formed into memorial lines. Such strange words in difficult [[hexameter]] scansion, are by no means easy to memorise. The [[vowel]] or [[consonant]], which Grey connected with a particular figure, was chosen arbitrarily.

A later modification was made in 1806 [[Gregor von Feinaigle]], a German [[monk]] from [[Salem, Baden-Württemberg|Salem]] near [[Lake Constance|Constance]]. While living and working in [[Paris]], he expounded a system of mnemonics in which (as in Wennsshein) the numerical figures are represented by letters chosen due to some similarity to the figure or an accidental connection with it. This alphabet was supplemented by a complicated system of localities and signs. Feinaigle, who apparently did not publish any written documentation of this method, travelled to [[England]] in 1811. The following year one of his pupils published ''The New Art of Memory'' (1812), giving Feinaigle's system. In addition, it contains valuable historical material about previous systems.

Other [[mnemonist]]s later published simplified forms, as the more complicated mnemonics were generally abandoned. Methods founded chiefly on the so-called laws of association (cf. [[Mental association]]) were taught with some success in Germany.<ref name=Paris>A simplified form of Feinaigle's method was published by [[Aimé Paris]] (''Principes et applications diverses de la mnémonique'', 7th ed., Paris, 1834). The use of symbolic pictures was revived in connection with the latter by Antoni Jaźwińsky of Poland. His system was published by the Polish general J. Bem, under the title ''Exposé général de la méthode mnémonique polonaise, perfectionnée à Paris'' (Paris, 1839). Various other modifications of the systems were advocated by subsequent mnemonists right through the 19th century. More complicated systems were proposed in the 20th century, such as the ''Keesing Memory System'', the ''System of Memory and Mental Training'', and the Pelman memory system.</ref>