Fig. 6: Finding true connections between editions of the Sphaera corpus by searching for a network that converges to the s-curve.

a Comparison of the s-curve of transmission of knowledge among all editions with the transmission inside the original network of the aggregated graph that contains all the semantic connections. R-square of comparison of these two curves shows the value of 0.82. b)Knowledge transmission in the networks built on the connections among editions published in the same city and those editions with the same book format and their comparison with the s-curve does not show a good match and not much improvement with respect to figure (a). c Diffusion of knowledge in three networks built on the basis of data with economic relevance; it shows a small shift toward the s-curve. R-square values for EC1 curve is 0.87, for EC2 is 0.93, and for EC3 is 0.91, showing that EC2 better explains the variability of the original blue s-curve than EC1 and EC3. d Transmission of knowledge in graphs showing mutual social and economic awareness among authors, printers, and publishers, as well as the graphs' convergence to the s-curve for AW1 and AW2 before 1530, and AW3 after 1530. The convergence of the awareness graphs shows the relevance of the meaning of these networks for the mechanisms of knowledge circulation in the early modern period. In particular, the high value of R-square for AW3, 0.98, among the other tested layers, 0.77 and 0.93 for AW1 and AW2, respectively, indicates the high relevance of AW3 for knowledge circulation and accumulation during that time period.