Joseph Sáenz de Escobar y su tratado sobre geometría práctica y mecánica: Un manual sobre geometría aplicada para personas no cualificadas en la materia, escrito en Nueva España (México) alrededor del año 1700
- Autores: Herbert J. Nickel
- Localización: Historia y grafía, ISSN 1405-0927, Nº. 15, 2000, págs. 241-267
- Idioma: español
- Títulos paralelos:
- Joseph Sáenz de Escobar and his Treaty on Practical Geometry and Mechanics: A Manual of Applied Geometry for not Qualified People in the Subject, written at New Spain (Mexico) near 1700
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Resumen
About 1700 Joseph Sáenz de Escobar , a lawyer at the Audiencias de Guadalajara and México, wrote a manual about practical geometry, divided into three treatises about measures and meassuring methods applied to land, mine and water. He wanted to support lawyers and administration officials without being trained as surveyors but had to deal with the regulation of propietary titles and claims and with their conversion into definitive legal tenure. In his treatises he deals in particular with the regular size and shape of royal land grants, with traditional measures, with figures of plain geometry and their use in measuring land calculating surfaces. The manual was never published completely, however several times partially adopted. At least seven copies of the manual, each with some variations in completeness and ornamentation, are accessible in different archives. The version of the manual of the National Library in Madrid is, however, attributed to Francisco de Guzmán y Luzón who apparently tried to gain the support of a cousin in Spain to have the manuscript printed. Guzmán, who died in 1726, was accountant of the City of Puebla and responsible for the administration and surveying of the city's ejidos. Some authors perceive Saenz de Escobar as an important figure since he introduced modern techniques into New Spain for surveyors. This is disputed in the essay, but it is also emphasized that he was very important indeed in clarifying procedures how to deal with traditional measures, how to converse property claims into legitimate tenure, and how to put them into effect in the country.
