Challenging Newtonian Chronology: Nicolas Fréret and his Contextualisation of Ancient Chinese Astronomy

This article uncovers a little-known aspect of Nicolas Fréret’s work in the Newtonian chronology controversy: his strategic use of ancient Chinese astronomical records. A member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, Fréret maintained a correspondence network linking him with French Jesuits in Beijing and with Parisian astronomers. Based on the astronomical verification he obtained through this network and his own philological knowledge, Fréret was able to propose a revised date for the ‘Zhong Kang eclipse,’ a celestial observation recorded in the Chinese classics that had provoked considerable debate in Europe. By treating such Chinese astronomical records as evidence for a continuous antiquity independent of biblical tradition, Fréret challenged Newton’s dismissal of early Chinese history and called into question the broader validity of Newton’s revisionist chronology. Fréret’s approach was shaped by a combination of intellectual, polemical, and institutional circumstances specific to his expertise in philology and his position at the Académie des Inscriptions. This case study not only offers a fuller picture of Fréret as a critic of Newtonian chronology, but also brings to light the overlooked role that ancient Chinese astronomy played in one of the most heated scholarly debates of eighteenth-century Europe.