Warburg Institute Colloquia 17
PTOLEMY’S GEOGRAPHY IN THE RENAISSANCE
Edited by Zur Shalev and Charles Burnett
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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.
Zur Shalev Main Themes in the Study of Ptolemy's Geography in the Renaissance
Alexander Jones Ptolemy’s Geography: A Reform that Failed
Dario Tessicini Definitions of Cosmography and Geography in the Wake of Ptolemy’s Geography
Angelo Cattaneo Map Projections and Perspective in the Renaissance
Mario Carpo The Early Modern Renaissance of Digital Images: Alberti, Ptolemy, and a Map of Rome
Benjamin Weiss The Geography in Print: 1475–1530
George Tolias Ptolemy’s Geography and Early Modern Antiquarian Practices
Alfred Hiatt Mutation and Supplement: The 1513 Strasbourg Ptolemy
Margaret Small Warring Traditions: Ptolemy and Strabo in the Geography of Sebastian Münster
Alessandro Scafi After Ptolemy: The Mapping of Eden
Lesley Cormack Ptolemy at work: The Role of the Geography in Geography and Mathematics Teaching in Early Modern England
Appendix Jacopo Angeli's introduction to his translation into Latin of the Geography, translated by Charles Burnett .
Index
253 pp 41 black & white illustrations 2011 Price: £50.00
ISBN 978 0 85481 152 4 ISSN 1352-9986
The Warburg Institute, London - Nino Aragno Editore, Turin
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