Charles S. F. Burnett

Zur Shalev

The rediscovery of Ptolemy's Geography has long been hailed as a key moment in the emergence of Renaissance culture, symbolizing a new rational spatiality, and preparing the way for the Age of Discovery. And yet, the process of the Geography's introduction, integration and impact in Western Europe, as the essays in this volume collectively suggest, was more complex and less predictable than has been traditionally assumed. Whereas previously Ptolemy's maps attracted most scholarly attention, in this volume the textual tradition of the Geography - Ptolemy's text, added prefaces, annotations and treatises - stand at the centre. Bringing together a wealth of previously unexplored sources and contexts, the essays examine the Geography as it took part in and influenced diverse areas of Renaissance culture, such as visual theory and communication, humanistic philological, historical and antiquarian practices, astrology, education and religion. The emerging Geography is perhaps less revolutionary but more satisfyingly embedded into the culture that produced and used it. This volume points to new directions for the study of the remaining questions that still hover around Ptolemy's seminal work and for the study of early modern geography as a whole.

Ptolemy's Geography in the Renaissance

This book examines the scholarly genre of 'geographia sacra' in early modern Europe, tracing its contours, the outlooks and concerns of its practitioners, as well as the intersections of religion and geography in an age that saw dramatic revolutions in both fields.

Geography, Religion, and Scholarship, 1550-1700

Sacred Words and Worlds

Ilana Zinguer

Abraham Melamed

This collection of essays offers a fresh look into Christian-Jewish cultural interactions during the Renaissance and beyond. Christian scholars, it is shown, were deeply immersed in a variety of Hebrew sources, while their Jewish counterparts imbibed the culture of Humanism.

Zur Shalev

About

Books

Join the club