Martín Martínez y la Ilustración española

Martín Martínez (1684-1734) was one of the leading Enlightenment scholars of the early 18th century whose work and intellectual figure have been neglected by historiography. He was Professor of Anatomy at the General Hospital in Madrid and also devoted his life to the defence of the Enlightenment, philosophical reflection and the articulation of a novel poetics of prose and a scientific Castilian language on an equal footing with the most advanced practices in Europe at the time. Like many of the Enlightenment writers, he was an active polemicist against the stale and anachronistic Spain that refused to die and whose greatest representative was Diego de Torres Villarroel. It is against him, and in defence of the «Teatro crítico universal», that we are publishing today, the «Juicio final de la Astrología» (1727), a brief burlesque writing halfway between «Medicina escéptica» (1722) and «Filosofía escéptica» (1730), in which our doctor and philosopher displays his exceptional satirical skills and his very extensive scientific, philosophical and literary knowledge.