Scientiae 2025: Istanbul, 16-19 September, Annual Conference

16 Sept 2025, 10:00 → 19 Sept 2025, 22:00 Europe/Istanbul

Istanbul University (Istanbul)

Gaye Danışan (Istanbul University)

The 2025 annual meeting of Scientiae will be held in Istanbul from 16 to 19 September 2025 in collaboration with the Department of the History of Science at Istanbul University. Situated at the intellectual crossroads of Europe and Asia, this year’s conference will focus on global connections, with an emphasis on but not limited to the early modern period.

We welcome proposals for individual papers, organised panels, roundtables, and workshops. The deadline for proposal submissions is 1 March 2025.

Enriched by worldwide scholarly communities, the study of early modern science, literature and scholarship has become increasingly global since Scientiae’s founding in 2012. Building on Scientiae’s interdisciplinary legacy, this year’s conference will underscore the interconnectedness of regions, periods, cultures, and material and intellectual traditions. As always, we welcome proposals on all topics related to the 1400–1800 period.

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Program

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Tuesday 16 September

11:00 → 12:15 Registration & Welcome Coffee

12:15 → 12:45 Opening Remarks

12:45 → 13:00 Brief Pause

13:00 → 14:00 Keynote Lecture: Allegorists, Alchemists and Iatrochemists in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire

Convener: Feza Günergun (Professor emerita of History of Science)

13:00 Allegorists, Alchemists and Iatrochemists in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire

The Early Modern period of Europe is defined as the era spanning from the mid-15th to late 18th centuries. This periodization, however, does not correspond to a similar epoch in Ottoman history. Seated at the confluence of Southern Europe and Westerm Asia, the Ottoman Empire did not experience many of the decisive historical events that paved the way to the European Early Modern. In the domain of science, until the end of the 18th century, Ottomans relied on medieval Islamicate treatises produced in the scholarly centres of the East, by translating, compiling, copying and explicating customized texts. The Ottoman Early Modern commenced in the 17th century when European scientific / technical material was introduced to the Empire albeit with hesitance.

The interpretation and instruction of medieval scientific (i.e. astronomical and mathematical) texts fell upon the scholars of the medrese, the traditional institution of religious learning. As alchemy was excluded from the medrese curriculum, medrese members expressed interest in this field of teaching only exceptionally. Alchemy remained in the realm of the Sufi mystics or dervishes who were regarded as ‘heterodox Muslims’. The motivation of Ottoman Sufis to engage with alchemy appears to be similar to that of their ideological forerunners: to excel as perfect human beings by spiritual purification. Al-Jildaki’s (fl. 14th c. in Egypt) works describing numerous experiments, without renouncing his allegorical vision, were highly praised by Ottoman alchemists, especially by the Sufi mystic Ali Çelebi el-Izniki (d. 1607). His Mücerrebname includes numerous recipes, also attesting to his interest in practical alchemy. The Sufi physicians of the 17th and 18th centuries, heirs to alchemical literature accumulated by their masters, were drawn to European iatrochemical remedies and therapies. They sought to elaborate and disseminate this new knowledge by composing formularies in Ottoman Turkish. Sufi alchemical texts comparing the process of becoming an “ideal man” with the transformation of base metals into silver and gold, continued to be re-created through the 17th and 18th centuries. Although earlier Ottoman alchemical texts can be traced, in absence of patronage and against impediments of alchemical practice, Anatolian Sufis could hardly develop individual techniques and further their chemical knowledge akin to their peers in Early Modern Europe.

Speaker: Feza Günergun (Professor emerita of History of Science)

14:00 → 14:30 Coffee Break

14:30 → 16:00 Round Table - Translation of Scientific Texts into Ottoman Turkish in the Early Modern Era

Conveners: Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu (Professor Emeritus of History of Science, Honorary President of the Turkish Society for the History of Science), Kaan Üçsu (Istanbul University), Ahmet Tunç Şen (Columbia University)

14:30 Translation of Scientific Texts into Ottoman Turkish in the Early Modern Era

Throughout their six-century-long history, the Ottomans experienced two movements of translation: the first started in their early days and continued during the classical age (1300-1600). The second movement occurred during the modernization era until the end of the Ottoman rule. Both movements were mainly conducted by Ottoman scholars relying on their knowledge of languages. In the classical period, the Ottoman ulema were well-versed in three languages, Elsine-i Selase, i.e., Arabic, Turkish, and Persian. When it came to translation among these three languages, it was a smooth practice for them. In Ottoman madrasas, academic teaching focused on the Arabic language and rhetoric. Turkish was not part of the official instruction. Nonetheless, due to cohabitation among Turkish madrasa teachers and Turkish officials with Muslim Bosnians, Albanians, and other Muslims of Rumelia, the Turkish language spread among young madrasa graduates. The third language of Elsine-i Selase, i.e., Persian, was taught as a free course at the madrasas for any interested students. One way students studied Persian was by memorizing didactic poems in verse and then for those who liked to carry on further, they would read the poetry of the Great Persian Poets such as Hafez, Sa‘di, Attar, and Jalal al-Din Rumi.
There was no urge to develop interest among the Ottoman ulema to learn European languages, partly because the scientific and scholarly legacy the Ottomans had inherited from the Seljukid and pre-Ottoman period was sufficient. The answers to the kinds of questions they had existed within the traditional Ottoman scientific learning. By contrast, during the early 17th century modernization period, when interest in European science grew, one of the significant challenges Ottoman scholars faced in the early years of modernization was how to learn European languages.
This plenary session will attempt to shed light on different aspects and ways this tradition was conducted.
Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu will present an analytical overview of this process by touching upon pivotal intellectuals and works spanning from 14th to 18th centuries. His analysis will pave the way for two other speakers’ presentations.
Tunç Şen will explore the role of "mülazims"—recent madrasa graduates or newly dismissed scholarly office-holders awaiting new appointments within the scholarly and judicial bureaucracy of the Empire—in translating Arabic and Persian scientific treatises into Ottoman Turkish in early modern times. By examining a broad range of translated works across diverse scientific disciplines, from medicine and ethics to astral sciences and others, he will investigate the motivations behind these translations, as well as their short- and long-term consequences.
Kaan Üçsu will investigate the translation activities that arose from the Ottomans’ intensifying engagement with European science in the seventeenth century. Focusing on three pioneering intellectuals—Kâtip Çelebi, Hezarfen Hüseyin Efendi, and Ebu Bekir bin Behram ed-Dimaşkî—he will examine how translation functioned as a medium for transmitting, adapting, and reinterpreting scientific knowledge. By analyzing, in particular, Ebu Bekir Efendi’s Ottoman rendering of Joan Blaeu’s lavish Atlas Maior, he will explore the connections among these intellectuals, the motivations behind their work, their translation practices, and the role these efforts played in shaping Ottoman understandings of geography and science.

Speakers: Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu (Professor Emeritus of History of Science, Honorary President of the Turkish Society for the History of Science), Kaan Üçsu (Istanbul University), Ahmet Tunç Şen (Columbia University)

16:00 → 16:15 Coffee Break

16:15 → 17:45 S.1.1. Staging Knowledge: Performance, Play and Cultural Adaptation

Chair: Samuel Gessner

Conveners: Adam Rzepka (Montclair State University), M. Fatih Çalışır (Istanbul University Institute for Islamic Studies), Matthias Roick (Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences)

16:15 “This Under Globe”: Proprioceptive Worldmaking in Shakespeare’s Public Theaters

My paper treats Shakespeare’s public theaters as microcosmic focal points for macrocosmic feeling. Specifically, I establish a relationship between the architecture of public theaters like Shakespeare’s Globe, which was explicitly designed and named to reflect its representational scope, and the theatrical manipulation of its audiences’ sense of proprioception—the sensation of weight, position, and motion in the body. I show how specific moments in Hamlet, King Lear, and The Tempest align these systems to position audiences in overlapping cosmī, including the globe of the earth.

This argument brings together current research in a range of disciplines, including new work on the dynamics of playgoing in theaters like the Globe, my ongoing research on the history of proprioception in early modern thought, and recent neurocognitive studies of vicarious somatosensation. In combination, these approaches suggest that early modern public performance was invested in fostering what I will call “cosmic feeling” or “global feeling” in its audiences: a visceral sense that they were pendant in radically extensive spheres that reached not only beyond the circle of the theater but far beyond the geographical limits of their knowledge.

Speaker: Adam Rzepka (Montclair State University (USA))

16:35 Cultural Encounters and Adaptations in the Late Seventeenth-Century Ottoman Empire: Theater, Portraiture, and Knowledge Transmission

The late seventeenth century witnessed a dynamic phase of cultural exchange between the Ottoman Empire and Europe, particularly in the realms of theater, portraiture, and intellectual engagement. European theatrical performances gained prominence in Ottoman diplomatic circles, with plays staged in Galata as early as 1612 and later at the French embassy in Istanbul. In 1675, efforts to introduce Venetian opera at the royal circumcision and wedding festival in Edirne reflected the empire’s growing interest in European entertainment. Although logistical obstacles prevented the performers’ arrival, Armenian and Turkish actors presented Persian style plays, showcasing the empire’s established theatrical traditions.
Portraiture similarly emerged as a significant medium of artistic exchange, with European-style depictions of Ottoman rulers, including Mehmed IV, circulating in diplomatic settings. Meanwhile, intellectual interactions with Europe intensified through figures such as Panayiotis Nikousios and Alexander Mavrocordatos, who facilitated the transmission of European works into Ottoman Turkish. Scientific knowledge also permeated Ottoman intellectual circles through scholars like the French orientalist Antoine Galland and the Italian physician Giovanni Mascellini, whose Latin medical treatise was published in Vienna in 1673.
This paper aims to highlight how these cultural exchanges were not instances of passive reception but rather processes of selective adaptation. By examining the transmission of artistic and intellectual traditions, this study demonstrates how the Ottoman elite actively engaged with European influences, integrating them into existing frameworks. This process of adaptation shaped the empire’s evolving cultural and scientific landscape, demonstrating both receptivity and agency in knowledge transfer.

Speaker: M. Fatih Çalışır (Istanbul University Institute for Islamic Studies)

16:55 Playing at the World: Students, Chess Knowledge, and Its Global Dimension

The game of chess is a transnational and global phenomenon, with a long and complicated history of how knowledge of the game was transmitted, transformed, and translated. My paper will zoom in on one particular episode in the transmission of chess to the modern world. In 1604, Lucas Wielius, student at Strasbourg, dedicated a copy of his commented edition of Marco Girolamo Vida’s Schacchia to Duke August the Younger of Braunschweig-Lüneburg. The copy with the handwritten dedication of Wielius and underlinings by Duke August is still preserved in the Herzog August Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel. I will discuss three aspects: the special role played by students in the transmission of chess; the problems associated with the transfer of gaming know-how; and the transnational and global dimension of chess in an early modern perspective.

Speaker: Matthias Roick (Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences)

16:15 → 17:45 S.1.2. Reading, Collecting, and Translating Medicine across Religious and Linguistic Boundaries

Chair: Valentina Pugliano

Conveners: Mustafa Yavuz, Kadir Çelik (Kendisi), Dina Bacalexi (CNRS)

16:15 The Ottoman Reception of Matthioli’s De Materia Medica: Knowledge Transmission and Pharmacobotanical Adaptation

This study examines the reception of Pietro Andrea Matthioli’s commentary on De Materia Medica in the Ottoman Empire, focusing on the 18th-century translation by Osman bin Abdurrahman, a translator based in Belgrade. De Materia Medica, originally authored by Pedanios Dioscorides in the first century CE, was a foundational text in pharmacobotany, influencing both Islamic and European medical traditions. Over centuries, the work was translated into Arabic, Latin, and later European languages, with Matthioli's 16th-century interpretation playing a crucial role in its dissemination.

The paper outlines Dioscorides' contributions to medical botany, highlighting his classification methods and the impact of his work on medieval and early modern pharmacology. It traces the transmission of Dioscorides' text from Greek to Arabic in the 9th-12th centuries, then to Latin and vernacular European languages in the Renaissance, culminating in Matthioli’s influential commentary. The role of Ottoman intellectuals in this knowledge transfer is examined through Osman bin Abdurrahman’s 18th-century translation of Matthioli's text into Ottoman Turkish, marking a significant phase in the diffusion of pharmacological knowledge.

The study contextualizes this translation within the Ottoman “search for new medicine” period, analyzing how Ottoman scholars engaged with European medical advancements while maintaining connections to Islamic medical traditions. It also explores how Matthioli’s visual and textual contributions, enriched by Ottoman botanical knowledge, facilitated the integration of Dioscorides’ legacy into early modern Ottoman pharmacology.

By assessing manuscript evidence and tracing intellectual exchanges, the paper highlights the fluid and interconnected nature of scientific knowledge circulation across linguistic, cultural, and geographical boundaries. The case of De Materia Medica exemplifies how medical knowledge was adapted and transformed through centuries, demonstrating the dynamic interplay between translation, commentary, and scientific innovation.

Speaker: Mustafa Yavuz

16:35 A Non-Muslim Source of Ottoman Medicine: The Case of Garshuni Manuscript in Mardin

This study aims to analyze an anonymous Garshuni-Arabic medical manuscript, which refers to Arabic text written in Syriac script, cataloged by the Hill Manuscript Museum and Library under project number CFMM00557. Studies on Ottoman medicine have primarily focused on Muslim sources, while non-Muslim sources, such as Hebrew, Armenian, Greek, Syriac and Garshuni manuscripts, have yet to be recognized as significant contributions to Ottoman medical historiography. The Garshuni-Arabic manuscript examined in this study, dated 1754, is housed in the Church of the Forty Martyrs in Mardin. It encompasses a diverse range of materials, including folkloric, religious, and historical content, within the domains of medicine, anatomy, and pharmacology. The anonymous author of the work references not only Greek, Persian and Turkish sources, but also incorporates the knowledge of European and Ottoman scholars. The unique script, along with the Christian elements within the manuscript, highlights the distinct characteristics of the Anatolian Assyrians within the broader context of Ottoman and Mediterranean medicine. For this reason, our study aims to analyze this medical manuscript by an anonymous non-Muslim author, which offers valuable insights into the development of medicine in Anatolia and sheds light on the non-Muslim sources of Ottoman medicine, thereby contributing to a more comprehensive understanding of the field.

Speaker: Kadir Çelik (Istanbul Medeniyet University and Izmır Ege University)

16:55 What’s in a Book Collector’s Mind? Delving into the Renaissance Medical Library of Laurentius de Rubeis

In an era where erudite medical education was based mostly on bookish culture, and learned physicians were prominent educators, book collection and medical activity were interwoven. The collections, drawing on ancient (mainly Greek) and contemporary medical authorities, showcase the eagerness of humanist physicians for knowledge update and professional accuracy.
In this framework, as a continuation of our Scientiae 2024 presentation, we pursue the study of the (still mysterious) Laurentius de Rubeis’ library: 317 books, mostly medical and of Jesuit provenance, printed between 1501 and the mid-17th cent., currently in the National Library in Rome. We will share our new findings on some important aspects of this library and place it in the ecosystem of humanistic medicine.
We will focus on the following:non-medical books; Rubeis’ preferred Medieval and contemporary medical authors; Arabic medicine; books on obstetrics and “andrology”; samples of marginalia providing clues about the educational and professional utilization of these books and showing reading habits or controversies.
Even though Rubeis’ identity has not yet been unveiled, we will share hypotheses about him and his possible interrelations with scholars, medical professionals and personalities in Rome, Italy and beyond. We will present the latest developments of the BUDE database featuring the place of this library in the networks that shaped early modern scholarly communities, and the Rubeis’ virtual library in preparation.

Speaker: Dina Bacalexi (CNRS)

16:15 → 17:45 S.1.3. Echoes of Antiquity: Myth, Philosophy, and the Stars in Early Modern Thought

Chair: Divna Manolova

Conveners: Giulia Beccaria (Istituto Italiano per gli Studi Storici (Naples) - National and Kapodistrian University (Athens)), Monika Frazer-Imregh (Károli Gáspár University of the Reformed Church in Hungary), Agata Starownik (University of Warsaw)

16:15 Leopardi as a Byzantine Scholar, Translator of George Gemistos Plethon

This paper focuses on Giacomo Leopardi as a translator of George Gemistos Plethon (1355–1452), whom Silvia Ronchey refers to as the “first true Italian Byzantine scholar.” Plethon, described by Woodhouse as “the last of the Greeks”, was a Byzantine Neoplatonic philosopher and the founder of the Academy of Mistra in the Peloponnese. His intellectual legacy inspired Cosimo de’ Medici to establish the Florentine Platonic Academy. A prominent figure of his time, Plethon was not only a refined writer but also a scholar in grammar, mathematics, astronomy, theology, jurisprudence, and history. His work exemplifies one of the most compelling representations of late Byzantine humanistic thought. Following the fall of Constantinople, Plethon played a pivotal role in revitalizing Humanist and Renaissance thought in Europe, particularly in Italy.
The scholarly relationship between Leopardi and Byzantine civilization remains, however, largely underexplored. This paper aims to address this gap by offering an analysis of several key passages in Leopardi’s work, with a focus on the remarkable endurance of the Greek language through the centuries. This longevity was largely due to the preservation and transmission of Greek language and culture by Byzantine scholars and philologists, who brought the intellectual legacy of Byzantium into the Renaissance and Humanism.
A central concern of this paper is the exploration of the stylistic motivations behind Leopardi’s decision to translate Plethon’s Ἐπιτάφιος ἐπὶ Βασιλίσσῃ Ἑλένῃ Παλαιολογίνῃ (Orazione in morte della imperatrice Elena Paleologina), preceded by his significant Discorso in proposito di una orazione greca, written between November 1826 and early January 1827 in Recanati. Leopardi was drawn to Plethon by the latter’s elegant style and his complex, archaizing syntactic structures. This paper will examine the distinctive features of Leopardi’s translation,identifying both affinities and divergences between the original text and its Italian rendering. A detailed analysis will be provided based on linguistic, textual, and stylistic annotations, comparing Plethon’s Ἐπιτάφιος and Leopardi’s translation (as found in the manuscript Discorso in proposito d’un’orazione di Giorgio Gemisto Pletone e Volgarizzamento della medesima, Paolina Leopardi’s autograph with Giacomo’s corrections, Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli, Carte Leopardi, C.L. X.5.2ρ). Plethon emerged for Leopardi as a model of “solemn simplicity,” an ideal of prose style where modernity and antiquity converge—an aesthetic which Leopardi himself aspired to emulate.

Speaker: Giulia Beccaria (Italian Institute for Historical Studies (Naples) - National and Kapodistrian University (Athens))

16:35 Ascensio ad Deum, a Neoplatonic Program in Renaissance Disguise: The Reception of the Teachings of Ficino and Pico in H. C. Agrippa von Nettesheim’s De Occulta Philosophia

H. C. Agrippa von Nettesheim’s main work, De occulta philosophia, entered the history of thought in the 20th century as an encyclopedia of Renaissance magic. This is how D. P. Walker talks about it, who describes it in connection with the grouping of “spiritual” and “demonic” magic, Frances Yates, who mentions it when discussing the “new religion” of modern Hermeticism, Charles Nauert, who analyzes it by claiming the crisis of Renaissance thought, and finally Herman F. Kuhlov, who examined Agrippa’s doctrine of ascension from the perspective of Lutheran theology. A new direction in research was indicated almost simultaneously in 1991 by Michael Keefer’s study, which compared Agrippa’s two most important works (DOP and De incertitudine et vanitate scientiarum atque artium) with reference to the “Hermetic rebirth”, and in 1992 by Vittoria Perrone Compagni’s introduction to the critical edition of De occulta philosophia, who, there and in her 2007 study, refuted the claim that Agrippa’s main work was merely an encyclopedia of magic. She calls Agrippa a reformer of epistemology, magic, and the morals of her time, because she believes that Agrippa created a new epistemology by incorporating magic into the Christian religion. Following in the footsteps of Perrone Compagni, Noel Putnik continued his research into the intellectual structure of De occulta philosophia, representing this view. However, these investigations did not extend to the immediate philosophical antecedents whose reception can be clearly demonstrated in the work, namely the teachings of Marsilio Ficino and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola on man’s ascent to God and ultimate bliss. In my presentation, I will trace the origins of this history of reception.

Speaker: Monika Frazer-Imregh (Károli University)

16:55 The Cycle of Seven Planets – Iconography and Applications

The paper will discuss the cycle of seven planetary deities, popular in 15th and 16th century prints. Iconographic variants of the motif represent different conventions, e.g. in orientalising, antikizing, modernising the appearance of planets. They are accompanied by a specific set of attributes, including signs of the zodiac or elements known from mythology. There are certain trends visible, depending on the specific period, but also some general, gradually changing trends in Renaissance culture. Both selected and all planets appear in various cultural texts, obviously, most often linked to astrology. These include self-contained graphic series, medical works, calendars, prognostications, astrology manuals, treatises on iconography, but also accounts of allegoric spectacles to celebrate a ruler or a carnival. These examples show the specificity of the presence of astrology in Early Modern culture: it permeated various spheres of life: entertainment, scholarly exploration of the mysteries of the world, everyday life, politics and power propaganda. However, the cycle of seven planets is not only a source for learning about astrological culture. It also points to the wide potential uses of mythological allegorical motifs, in this case linked to cosmic thought, but also deeply rooted in erudite humanist culture.

Speaker: Agata Starownik (University of Warsaw (Poland))

17:45 → 19:00 Free Time / Transfer to Welcome Reception (self-arranged)

19:00 → 21:30 Welcome Reception at Orient-Institut Istanbul

Wednesday 17 September

09:15 → 10:45 P.2.1. The Concept of the Sciences in Bernard de Fontenelle's Philosophy

Chair: Sophie Serra

Conveners: Daniel Špelda (Masaryk University), Dagmar Pichová (Masaryk University Brno), Eszter Kovács (Vrije Universiteit Brussel)

09:15 The Concept of the Sciences in Bernard de Fontenelle's Philosophy

Description of the panel:
We focus on texts by Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle (1657–1757), secretary of the Académie royale des sciences, who published the annual yearbooks Histoire de l’Académie royale des sciences (HMARS, 1699-1740) summarising the activities of the Académie. These handbooks contained articles by academics, Fontenelle's summaries of the articles, and Fontenelle's eulogies (Éloges des académiciens) for academics who had died that year. In our panel, we focus on the various ways Fontenelle explained scientific research at the Académie and on selected aspects of its reception. First, we address the strategy that Fontenelle used for legitimating scientific research in a society that based its education on Greek and Roman literature. Second, we pay attention to the way Fontenelle represented the lives of academics, their importance in the history of science, and their moral virtues. Thirdly, we describe Fontenelle's conception of the history of the sciences, the mechanisms of their progress, the appreciation of the role of individual scientists – and the reception of this conception by Marquise du Châtelet. These themes intersect in our three papers, and we hope contribute to a better understanding of the significance of Fontenelle's work and its influence on later representatives of the Enlightenment.

Presenter: Daniel Špelda

Title of the paper: Bernard de Fontenelle's Histoire de l'Académie royale (1699-1714): Science Pulls Back the Veil of Nature

Between 1699 and 1740, Bernard de Fontenelle prepared an annual Histoire de l'Académie royale des sciences (HARS), in which he tried to explain the nature of scientific research to his contemporaries, who were educated in classical literature. Fontenelle liked to refer to the metaphor of a mysterious Nature hidden behind a veil – the veil of Isis. The metaphor served him as a means of articulating and describing the epistemological problems that the members of the Académie des sciences faced in their research. The personified Nature served as an antagonist to the personified Académie: sometimes the uncovering of Nature's secrets turned into a hunt and a chase; at other times Nature flirtatiously winked at the academics. Focusing on HARS volumes 1699-1714, I argue that Fontenelle used the metaphor to explain to the public the epistemological challenges academics faced in learning about nature. I further assert that the culmination of Fontenelle's intelligent work with metaphor was its incorporation into an overall philosophy of history that understood the history of humankind as a gradual progression of human knowledge from fables to modern sciences. According to this philosophy, no one could further question the legitimacy of the sciences because they represented the necessary and logical outcome of a long development that began in ancient Greece.

Presenter: Dagmar Pichová

Title of the paper: The Deaths of Academicians in Fontenelle’s Éloges des académiciens

In his Éloges des académiciens, French philosopher and secretary of Académie des sciences Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle employed various strategies to build the credibility of scientists, promote scientific institutions, and justify scientific research in general. The Éloges des académiciens highlighted personal qualities that enabled scientists to develop, share, and apply their knowledge, emphasising their ability to explain discoveries in simple terms and engage in scientific debate with openness, modesty, and peacefulness.
Fontenelle chronologically recounted the lives of academicians, including their physical and mental conditions and ultimately, their deaths. In my paper, I examine the role of the “good death” in shaping the new scientific persona in Fontenelle’s Éloges des académiciens. I hold that the depiction of the deaths of academicians coheres with the persona of scientists and the virtues Fontenelle attributed to them, reflecting an implicit ethical perspective.

Presenter: Eszter Kovács

Title of the paper: Giants in a Scientific Battlefield: Du Châtelet’s Annotations on Academic Eulogies

Two series of miscellaneous manuscript notes prove the interest that Émilie Du Châtelet took in the genre of the academic eulogy. One of them is currently housed among Voltaire’s manuscripts in Saint Petersburg; it was first published by I.O. Wade in 1958. These notes were recently republished by the Center for the History of Women Philosophers and Scientists (see https://stp.historyofwomenphilosophers.org/documents/view/notes ). The other series figures in one of Du Châtelet’s notebooks found in 2010 (currently in a private collection); it has not been published. The second series contains excerpts from academic eulogies interspersed with Du Châtelet’s reflections on the laws of motion.
As I aim to show, this material can be considered more than simple working notes. The eulogies, in which Fontenelle excelled as the perpetual secretary of the Academy, were important sources for Du Châtelet’s scientific activity while seeking her own methodology. Du Châtelet respects intellectual giants in the spirit of the image nanos gigentum humeris insidentes (see the Preface to the Foundations of Physics, 1740) but she also regards national impartiality and open dialogue as necessary conditions to scientific progress.
The theory of universal attraction is the real focus of her annotations. Several of her remarks point to Fontenelle’s refusal to admit Newton’s discoveries because of the French academic loyalty to Cartesian vortex theory. A study of these notes shows that Du Châtelet believed in scientific progress as a continuous development and also – and more importantly – as a change of paradigm. Her annotations on the eulogies can thus be interpreted as a more polemical first approach, nuanced in the Preface to the Foundations.

Speakers: Daniel Špelda (Masaryk University), Ms Eszter Kovács (Vrije Universiteit Brussel), Ms Dagmar Pichová (Masaryk University Brno)

09:15 → 10:45 S.2.1. The Interaction of Knowledge, Collections, and Instruments: From Encyclopedic Arrangements to Astronomical Simulations

Chair: Ahmet Tunç Şen

Conveners: Samuel Gessner (CIUHCT, University of Lisbon), Gaye Danışan (Istanbul University), Jindra Kubickova & Zuzana Vařáková (Charles University)

09:15 Instruments of Insight: Revealing the Tangible Dialogue Between Books and Instruments in Libraries

While libraries are celebrated as havens of textual knowledge, they often also house a surprising array of instruments—from paper tools like volvelles embedded in books to robust three-dimensional objects such as globes, astrolabes, and sundials. This presentation serves as an open call to the scholarly community to remain vigilant in uncovering these hidden presences—whether encountered in actual collections, catalogues, or even in the idealized conception of libraries. By spotlighting examples from institutions like the Laurenziana in Florence and the library of D. Teodósio in Vila Viçosa, the talk will explore pressing questions: Why do instruments appear in library contexts, and in what ways do they complement or transform the role of books? How does their interplay reflect broader practices of knowledge in the early modern era? Ultimately, the talk aims to ignite an inquiry on the multifaceted dialogue between texts and instruments in libraries.

Speaker: Samuel Gessner (CIUHCT, University of Lisbon)

09:35 Simulating Lunar Motions: Gıyās ed-Din Ibn Fath-Allah al-Kātib al-Baghdādī’s Heart-Shaped Diagram in the Context of Ottoman Volvelles

This study explores the role of volvelles in Ottoman astronomy, focusing on Gıyās ed-Din Ibn Fath-Allah al-Kātib al-Baghdādī’s heart-shaped figure within a circular diagram in Ta‘rīb Tāj al-Madākhil fī ʿIlm al-Nujūm. Until now, Ottoman volvelles have primarily been encountered in practical works, such as calendars, with available information mainly limited to their usage. However, al-Baghdādī’s heart-shaped diagram appears to function as an intermediate layer of a volvelle, aiding in the simulation of various aspects of lunar motion—including the phases of the Moon, the Moon’s distance from the Sun, solar eclipses, and lunar eclipses—thus offering a deeper perspective on the theoretical foundations of volvelles used in 16th- and 17th-century Ottoman astronomy.

Although the origins of the Ottoman volvelle tradition remain insufficiently documented, al-Baghdādī’s theoretical explanations provide valuable insights into their design's symbolism and astronomical functions. By situating this diagram within the broader context of Ottoman astronomical practices, this study sheds light on the symbolic and scientific roles of Ottoman volvelles and enhances our understanding of paper instruments in Ottoman astronomy.

Speaker: Gaye Danışan (Istanbul University)

09:55 The Encyclopedic Nature of the Collection of Kunstkammer of Emperor Rudolf II in Prague

During the late 16th century, collecting became an increasingly significant element in the pursuit of understanding nature (e.g.: Findlen 1994; Bredekamp 1995; Daston, Park 1998; Findlen 2006). The Kunstkammer of Emperor Rudolf II constituted one of the most valuable collections of its kind in Renaissance Europe, and as evidenced by its preserved inventories, was characterized by a considerable variety of collected items. These may also serve as evidence of the interconnectedness of the court of Rudolf II with distant and exotic regions, cultures and other similar collections.
Given the study collection purpose of the Kunstkammer, the presented paper aims to enrich the existing research of the Rudolfian collection by broadening the perspective to include the history of science and to take into an account the collection’s encyclopedic nature. To this end, the paper will present and examine the results of a data analysis of the Rudolfian inventory written between 1607–1611 with regard to the composition, organization and classification of its objects. Finally, the paper will discuss the extent to which the categorization of collected items corresponds with the assumed pivotal role of these collections in establishing modern scientific inquiry.

Speakers: Jindra Kubickova (Charles University), Ms Zuzana Vařáková (Department of History and Philosophy of Science, Faculty of Science, Charles University)

09:15 → 10:45 S.2.2. Text and Transmission: Interpretive Practices and Scholarly Networks in Early Modern Europe

Chair: Gerhard Wiesenfeldt

Conveners: Lenka Řezníková (Institute of Philosphy, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague), Vladimír Urbánek (Institute of Philosophy, Czech Academy of Sciences), Jiri Michalik (Palacky University, Olomouc)

09:15 Rooted or Planted? The Power of Etymology in J. A. Comenius and Early Modern Culture of Knowledge

Etymology is often regarded as a branch of linguistics that explores the historical origins of words by tracing their sound changes. However, in the early modern period, etymology was a strongly presentist concept deeply connected to knowledge. Scholars searched for the supposed original meanings to uncover hidden truths, recover ancient wisdom, and reaffirm divine revelation. In many fields of knowledge, the allegedly original semantics of words served to legitimise intellectual constructs and theoretical frameworks. Etymology was a specific "Denkform" (E. R. Curtius) in which language was not just a medium of communication but a source of inherent meaning shaped by divine will or natural order. In my paper, I will analyse how John Amos Comenius, a member of Samuel Hartlibs' correspondence network, employed etymology, distinguishing its functions as a tool of thinking, a means of legitimisation, and an instrument of scholarly self-fashioning. I will explore how etymology structured his conceptual framework, reinforced the authority of his definitions and how it functioned as a demonstration of his erudition, particularly his command of Greek.

Speaker: Lenka Řezníková (Institute of Philosphy, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague)

09:35 News and Prophecy Between Upper Hungary and Amsterdam: Mikuláš Drabík, Jan Amos Comenius and Learned Communication

This paper focuses on textual practices related to the creation, communication and circulation of mid-seventeenth-century prophetic texts. They have been studied as tools of political propaganda during the Thirty Years War, in relation to apocalyptic discourses and to biographies of individual actors, including one of the most active promoters and disseminators of early modern prophecies, educational reformer and theologian Jan Amos Comenius (1592-1670). The paper offers a new interpretative perspective by analyzing the transfer and circulation of prophetic texts originally written in Czech in the exiled community of Bohemian Brethren as a specific case of cultural translation across geographical, linguistic and social boundaries. Comenius’ communication network made it possible to connect local communities in Upper Hungary with Dutch and English centers of information and knowledge. The paper shows how prophecies and visions of Mikuláš Drabík from Upper Hungary were received by local networks of supporters and opponents, and how they became a topic of learned discussion within the international network of scholars in Amsterdam and London. An attempt to translate and adapt them to the Muslim environment in East-Central Europe in order to convert the Turks predictably failed. The causes of this limited transcultural adaptability of prophecy are also discussed.

Speaker: Vladimír Urbánek (Institute of Philosophy, Czech Academy of Sciences)

09:55 Early Critics of the Rosicrucian Manifestos: Budovec and Libavius

The Lutheran physician and alchemist Andreas Libavius is known as one of the first critics of the Rosicrucian manifestos. However, his criticism has received little analysis to date. The Czech Brethren theologian, politician and religious scholar Václav Budovec of Budov has also written critically on the reception of the Rosicrucian manifestos. Budovec's criticism has not yet been systematically studied and analysed. Both Libavius' and Budovec's criticism were published around the same time and are based on analogous positions. The basis of their criticism is a religiously informed attack on the theology of the Rosicrucian brotherhood, and the argumentation of both critics is similar regardless of denominational differences.
The paper compares the critiques of the two scholars, tracing the basic structural elements of both critiques. Libavius' critique is longer and more systematic, while Budovec's, on the other hand, exhibits original elements not found in any other critique of the Rosicrucian manifestos. The aim of the paper is to identify and analyze the intellectual patterns that lie behind both critiques. This will enable a better understanding of how the critical reception of the Rosicrucian manifestos took place in Central Europe between 1614 and 1616.

Speaker: Jiri Michalik (Palacky University, Olomouc)

10:45 → 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 → 12:00 P.2.2. Making Science Global: Examples from Mesmerism and Newtonianism

Chair: Stefano Gulizia

Conveners: Rob Iliffe & Derya Gürses Tarbuck, Kapil Raj

11:00 Gottfried Kirch’s Observational Journals (1677–1710) and the Secrets of Early Modern Astronomical Observations

Gottfried Kirch (1639–1710), a German astronomer, calendar-maker, and author of ephemerides, kept observational journals throughout his astronomical career. In these journals, he documented astronomical, meteorological, and occasionally magnetic observations. Kirch’s observational journals, written between 1677 and 1710, are preserved in the collections of the Paris Observatory Library and the Archive of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences. The paper aims to explore these sources by examining their history, structure, and Kirch’s note-taking methods. The proposed study investigates their significance for astronomical and meteorological research, their value in biographical studies, and their role in reconstructing the work of astronomers and their families in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.

Speaker: Justyna Rogińska (Institute for the History of Science of the Polish Academy of Sciences)

11:20 Sobieski Moves the Sun. Poems Dedicated to King Jan III of Poland by Johannes Hevelius's Correspondents

In 1684, Johannes Hevelius, an astronomer from Gdańsk, honored Jan III Sobieski, the King of Poland, by naming a new constellation Scutum Sobiescianum – after the King's coat of arms. This fact was commemorated at that time in several poems which can be found in the collection of Hevelius's astronomical correspondence. They are examples of non-scientific endeavors originating from astronomical studies.

Poems, preserved both in manuscripts and as published pamphlets, were authored mostly by people from Gdańsk. Among their authors, there were notable individuals with whom Hevelius corresponded (e.g. Michał Antoni Hacki, the Abbot of the Oliwa Monastery near Gdańsk), the astronomer's learned colleagues (e.g. Adam Adamandus Kochański, a Jesuit mathematician), and professional poets (e.g. Johann Peter Titius (Titz), the professor of poetry at the gymnasium academicum in Gdańsk). They praise – in varying degrees – the King and his constellation, and the astronomer who proposed it.

In my paper, I will discuss the poems and their function in the corpus of Hevelius's letters. I will attempt to determine their role in the astronomer's pursuit of royal patronage. I will analyze the literary tropes in these works, the extent of astronomical knowledge they contain, and how the former relate to Hevelius’s astronomical studies.

Speaker: Maciej Jasiński

11:00 → 12:00 S.2.3. From Observations to Representations: The Cultural Lives of Astronomy

Chair: Vladimír Urbánek

Conveners: Justyna Rogińska, Maciej Jasiński

11:00 Making Science Global: Examples from Mesmerism and Newtonianism

Presenter: Rob Iliffe and Derya Gurses Tarbuck

Title of the paper: Newtonianisms in Action: the Making of a Global Movement

This chapter challenges the long-standing notion of a “universal” Newtonianism by situating it within the global turn in the history of science. Newtonianism, we argue, never possessed the conceptual unity to claim universal validity; rather, what made it distinctive was the geographical breadth of its circulation. Recent scholarship demonstrates that scientific knowledge does not travel in a linear, uniform manner, but is continually adapted, reconfigured, and contested within local contexts. Building on Bruno Latour’s Science in Action, we treat Newtonianism as a“science-in-the-making” and Show that its claims to universality emerged through the stabilization of controversies and the silencing of alternatives.

Presenter: Kapil Raj

Title of the paper: What does it Take to Make Science Global? Moving Mesmerism from France to Britain to Colonial India in the mid-19th Century

As the positivist foundations of the history of science weakened in the 1960s and 70s, attention radically shifted from recounting its inexorable progress grounded in a perception of knowledge as being disembodied and universal — an ‘everywhere and nowhere’ view — to demonstrating the crucial importance of the historical, cultural, social, gendered and geographical contexts of its production. In this post-positivist view, then, science is locally created, and only subsequently, through a series of investments and deliberate strategies, does it become transferable beyond its place of elaboration. Circulation has thus become a crucial problematic. Science is then not simply diffused thanks to its universal nature, but is locally created, and only subsequently, through a series of investments and deliberate strategies, does it become mobile and circulate beyond its site of elaboration.
This talk will describe some of these strategies and investments and will use the example of mesmerism in the mid-19th century to illustrate the efforts required to universalise a practice that was born and developed within the intellectual and political context of post-Revolutionary France.

Speakers: Derya Tarbuck (Bahcesehir University), Kapil Raj, Rob Iliffe

11:00 → 12:00 S.2.4. Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Knowledge, Belief, and Cultural Imagination

Chair: Matthijs Jonker

Conveners: Brian Li, Juan Acevedo (University of Lisbon)

11:00 The Stone-Eaters: Lithophagy and Scholarly Fantasies of Ascetic Diets in Late Imperial China

This paper discusses lithophagy (i.e., the eating of stones), a common if not bizarre literary trope in late imperial China (ca. 1550–1800). Why were well-educated literati so keen on writing and circulating accounts of such a strange diet? This paper argues that lithophagy became an object of great symbolic importance to disaffected scholars, as this fascination had roots in Daoist hermetic and medical texts which emphasized the virtues of a “rustic” lifestyle with precepts that also implicated dietary practices. Such visions appealed to academics confronting the emergence of mercantilist trading practices and changing employment prospects, particularly during the massive expansion of the imperial civil service examinations during the late imperial period. A life of officialdom became increasingly tenuous even among literate populations, and this resulted in a renunciation of worldly habits among many disenfranchised literati. There was a corresponding shift in the objectives of literati identity from classical cultivation to eccentricity. Lithophagy represented an extension of this zeitgeist, for Daoist self-cultivation offered the fantasy of physical immortality, which contrasted with immortality by scholastic reputation, a more "traditional" aspiration under neo-Confucian orthodoxy. Lithophagy therefore represented an extreme yet idealistic embodiment of this subculture that privileged self-cultivation over worldly pursuits.

Speaker: Brian Li

11:20 Non-Western Science and Arts: A View from Latin America Through the Works of J.M. Briceño Guerrero

In The Labyrinth of Three Minotaurs (1994),Venezuelan philosopher J.M. Briceño Guerrero (1929–2014) posited a threefold scheme to explain the complexities of Latin American culture. Three intertwining inner “discourses” which took shape and were rooted from the late 15th to the mid-19th centuries through conquest, colonisation and independence wars. They manifest in every aspect of Latin American societies, hindering and prodding one another. First is the modernist, Eurocentric “Discourse of Enlightenment”; second, the chivalrous, colonial-minded “Discourse of the Aristocrats”; third, the “Wild Discourse,” heir to indigenous and slave grievances, averse to civilisational projects, furtively disrupting the efforts of the other two. I will try to apply this analytic scheme to Asian contexts, in particular to matters concerning the Great Divergence. As Briceño argued for the central role of art in the synthesis and concordance of the conflicting discourses, I will look at technoscientific and artistic examples from Asian history. To what extent, and how can a Latin American hermeneutics shed light on the modernisation struggles of Asia, from Early Modern times to the dynamics of the industrialised nineteenth century? My talk will be exploratory, looking for parallels between cultures of the postcolonial Global South, especially their technoscientific development.

Speaker: Juan Acevedo (University of Lisbon)

12:00 → 14:30 Lunch & Optional visit to the IU Turkish Hamam Culture Museum, Rıdvan Çelikel Archaeology Museum or IU Rare Books Library Collections (Registration Required)

14:30 → 16:00 P.2.3. Cross-Cultural-ness of Astronomical Instrumentation Reconsidered

Chair: Taha Yasin Arslan

Conveners: Silke Ackermann & Taha Yasin Arslan, Afra Akyol, Beyzanur Topçuoğlu, Feyzanur Şaşmaz Akyüz

14:30 Cross-Cultural-ness of Astronomical Instrumentation Reconsidered

History of science was often used as an arena for creating disassociation between regions and/or periods. This was mostly spearheaded by scholars who focused on only one side of the story, usually with an ideological perspective. The concept of ‘Islamic science’ is one of the outcomes of this endeavour. Although it sounds quite promotive of the religion of Islam, it creates a hidden but firm barrier between the knowledge in the West and the Islamic world. This panel aims to discuss the validity of this argument by first providing instruments-based evidence of what is common and what is not between the scientific knowledge of different regions from the same periods. Then it will argue that what can be offered as a solution to revamp the centuries old narrative of the disassociation of the naturally bound scientific knowledge.

Presenters: Silke Ackermann, Taha Yasin Arslan

Title of the paper: What do we mean by “Islamic Science” in museums?

Using labels and categorisations make things more comprehensible in both museum environments and academic studies. However, one has to be very careful in doing so because -as Francis Bacon said- ‘sometimes the remedy is worse than the disease.’ This may be particularly valid when it comes to the concept of ‘Islamic science’. It sounds fancy and right-to-the-point, but is it really the right label or categorisation? Or is it just a ruse to highlight independency(!) of Eurocentric scientific knowledge from its roots? There is plethora of evidence on Islam being a driving force for exact sciences. But does it make the scientific works from the Islamic world different than from other regions? For instance, isn’t a mathematical formula the same for whoever employs it? So, in a broader sense what would make science ‘Islamic’? In that regard, what should we make of the works of non-Muslim scholars in the Islamic world? These are the questions seldom discussed as if it does not cause any problem. This talk argues that understanding the association of knowledge accumulated and produced in different regions and periods would reveal the proper assessment of the development of scientific knowledge which is universal in nature.

Presenter: Afra Akyol

Title of the paper: Cross-Cultural Perspectives on the Front of the Astrolabe’s Mater

The astrolabe is the most widely used instrument among pre-modern astronomical instruments. In addition to their standard applications, such as determining time or measuring the heights of structures, astrolabes often contain drawings that reflect both the scientific and cultural tendencies of the period and geography in which they were constructed. As an example, the main part of the astrolabe, known as the mater, features a variety of drawings on the back, such as sine graph, zodiac scales, and curves for the sun’s noon altitude, a calendar, and a shadow square while the base of the front seldom engraved before the 16th century. From this point, astrolabes from both the Islamic world and the West began to show several types of engravings on the front. In the Islamic world, a geographical atlas known as gazetteer, which contains the numerical values of longitudes, latitudes, and qibla angle for selected localities, while in the West, astrolabes often featured the Quadratum Nauticum, which contains diagram and names of the winds, scales, and navigational tools. This presentation will discuss these drawings and time-wise similarities and application-wise differences in different cultural basins.

Presenter: Beyza Topçuoğlu

Title of the paper: Al-Shāmila as a Sundial: Tracing Its Influence Across Civilizations

In the 13th century, al-Marrākushī classified astronomical instruments based on their functions and forms. According to his classification, instruments that are spherical in nature are three: the astrolabe, the celestial globe, and al-shāmila. While the astrolabe and celestial globe date back to antiquity, al-Shāmila was a groundbreaking invention by Abū Maḥmūd Ḥāmid ibn al-Khiḍr al-Khujandī in the 10th century Islamic world. Al-Khujandī described al-shāmila as an instrument that integrates the functions of the astrolabe, sundial, and armillary sphere. This presentation explores al-shāmila specifically as a sundial, addressing several key questions: What methods can be employed to use al-Shāmila as a sundial? Did it influence later instruments such as Sanduq al-Yawāqīt by Ibn al-Shāṭir or Dāʾirat al-Muʿaddil by al-Wafāʾī? Could its influence have extended to Western astronomy? The last question is particularly important because a strikingly similar instrument emerged in the 17th century, a sundial-drawing instrument by John Rowley. While the structures of al-shāmila and Rowley’s device bear remarkable resemblance, their intended uses diverge significantly. This study aims to discuss the historical and conceptual connections between these instruments, shedding light on their evolution across different civilizations.

Presenter: Feyzanur Şaşmaz Akyüz

Title of the paper: Comparative Study on Astrolabe Manuals from the 14th Century Islamic Civilisation and the West

Astrolabes are full of marvels with plenty to offer to researchers and historians of science. Many scholars provide accounts of its use with a detailed technical description and translation to specific treatises. Unfortunately, very few of them deal with the use of these instruments with a comparative approach even though more comprehensive understanding of astrolabes in historical context requires detailed examination of treatises from different regions and sometimes even from different periods. This type of study would allow the researcher to examine what is related and what is not as well as to discuss if there are any influence over each other. In this regard, this talk will deal with several treatises on the use of astrolabes both from the Islamic world and the West, all compiled in the 14th century. It aims to reveal what was the norm and research points for the use of astrolabe in different cultural basins at the same periods. For instance, treatises of 14th century Mamluk astronomers, Mizzī and Ibn al-Shāṭir and the astrolabe treatise of the English scholar Geoffrey Chaucer will be examined and compared on the basis of the topics, structure of the texts, and terminology.

Speakers: Ms Afra Akyol (Istanbul Medeniyet University (Türkiye)), Ms Beyzanur Topçuoğlu (Istanbul Medeniyet University), Mrs Feyzanur Şaşmaz Akyüz (Istanbul Medeniyet University), Dr Silke Ackermann (History of Science Museum, Oxford), Dr Taha Yasin Arslan (Istanbul Medeniyet University)

14:30 → 16:00 S.2.5. Intellectual Mobility, Commerce, and Academic Networks

Chair: Luís Campos Ribeiro

Conveners: Stefano Gulizia (Ca' Foscari University in Venice), Mai Lootah (Rice University), Nihal Özdemir (İstanbul)

14:30 Gift-Economy and the Jesuit Management of Relics in the Asian Mission

At his death, Francis Xavier held a fragment of Loyola’s handwriting and a relic. Beyond this episode, it is well-known that books, devotional objects, merchandise, and prints criss-crossed between Asia and Europe, in both directions, and despite an imperfect mailing system. Indeed, in the long seventeenth century the Jesuits became the main producers and distributors of relics, as well as authenticators of their legitimacy. However, there is still no comprehensive treatment of Jesuit relics against the background of early modern diplomacy and the global traffic of goods. This paper focuses on the classic, Maussian account of reciprocity in relationship with generosity and the Jesuit disciplines of the self, asking new questions about the status of these commodities. It makes an argument that in our over-reliance on the ‘biography of things’, invoked both by Subrahmanyam and Appadurai, we may have underestimated the relic’s capacity to recapitulate theology and anthropology as discursive forms of patronage. The paper, seeking to locate the relics as motion, instead of in motion, pays special attention to the Jesuit mission to Asia, which demonstrates a dialogue with the Reformation’s critique of the fragmentation of the holy body, its complex management, and the (dis)connected agency of empires.

Speaker: Stefano Gulizia (Ca' Foscari University in Venice)

14:50 Intellectual Mobility and the Dutch Levant Company: The Republic of Letters in the Ottoman World

Scholarly attention has largely focused on the European works transmitted, translated, adapted, and integrated into Ottoman intellectual life, such as Gerardus Mercator’s cartographic works, as published and expanded by Jodocus Hondius in Atlas Minor (1607), (1607), and Joan Bleau’s Atlas Maior (1662-1672). However, few studies have explored the pathways through which such works traveled or situated them within the broader forces driving their circulation, particularly the maritime trade networks of emerging capitalist powers.

The seventeenth century saw the Dutch Republic flourish as a capitalist state and a center for both print culture and global trade. While the Dutch Levant Company (Levantse Handel) was primarily a commercial enterprise, its trade routes carried commodities, people, and ideas. Historical evidence suggests that the Dutch Levant Company networks played a role in the circulation of ideas of the Republic of Letters—an intellectual network of correspondences among scholars of the era. This paper examines the Dutch Levant Company’s role in transmitting European knowledge to the Ottoman Empire during the reign of Mehmed IV (1648-1687). Further, it challenges the traditional framing of the Republic of Letters as a solely European phenomenon, demonstrating that Ottoman scholars were active participants in this intellectual landscape.

Speaker: Mai Lootah (Rice University)

15:10 Science, Commerce, and the Circulation of Knowledge: The James Watt and Matthew Boulton Partnership in 18th-Century Knowledge Networks

One of the most significant scientist-merchant collaborations of the 18th century, the partnership between James Watt and Matthew Boulton, provides a crucial case study for understanding how knowledge circulated through academic communities, intellectual networks, and commercial practices. This study explores how Watt and Boulton met, how their skills complemented each other, and how their collaboration contributed to early modern knowledge systems.

Watt and Boulton crossed paths in 1768 in Birmingham, when Matthew Boulton, the owner of the Soho Manufactory, sought a more reliable power source, as waterpower proved inconsistent. At the same time, James Watt was refining his separate condenser steam engine and searching for financial support. Boulton’s interest in Watt’s work laid the foundation for a productive partnership that extended beyond investment, demonstrating how scientific knowledge was integrated into industrial production.

This collaboration was not solely based on the convergence of an engineer and a merchant but was also facilitated by intellectual and social networks. Both were involved in the Lunar Society, a group of scientists, inventors, and industrialists fostering discussions merging scientific ideas with commercial applications. Their correspondence with figures such as Joseph Black, John Roebuck, Erasmus Darwin, and Joseph Priestley illustrates how knowledge flowed through laboratories, institutions, and commercial exchanges.

This study examines the circulation of knowledge, Watt and Boulton’s correspondence, their connections with the Royal Society, and the mechanisms linking scientific and commercial knowledge.

Speaker: Nihal Özdemir (Fatih Sultan Mehmet Vakıf University)

14:30 → 16:00 S.2.6. Wonder and Correction: Interrogating Knowledge Across Early Modern Geographies

Chair: Juan Acevedo

Conveners: Matthijs Jonker (Utrecht University), Feray Coskun (Ozyegin University), Djoeke van Netten (University of Amsterdam)

14:30 A Polyglot Parrot in Baroque Rome

If you were walking through the center of Rome in the 1620s, you would have heard many different languages. These languages were spoken by pilgrims, cardinals and their entourage, merchants, and diplomats, and occasionally also by parrots. One such animal with exceptional linguistic skills was owned by Balduin Breyl (n.d.), a Flemish merchant living in Rome. This parrot could hold whole conversations in Flemish with members of Breyl’s household and family. He had also taught himself some Italian words by repeating after street sellers who passed his window. And he sang songs in Flemish about love and in French about wine.
We know about this polyglot parrot from the German physician Johannes Faber’s (1574-1629) entry on a Mexican parrot in the Tesoro messicano (“Mexican Treasury”), an encyclopedia about the natural history of Mexico, published in 1651 by the Roman Accademia dei Lincei. In this talk, I focus on Faber’s discussion of Breyl’s parrot and relate it to early modern interpretations of the boundaries between human and non-human animals. Breyl’s parrot provides an interesting case study of the complexities of animal speech, and of studying exotic animals in the early modern period, between autoptic observations and interpreting ancient and modern sources.

Speaker: Matthijs Jonker (Utrecht University)

14:50 Between Wonder and Skepticism: Ottoman Engagement with Medieval Islamic Cosmographies

This study explores the transmission, reception, and reinterpretation of medieval Islamic cosmographies in the Ottoman world, with a focus on their portrayal of wonders (‘ajā’ib) and strange phenomena (gharā’ib). Rooted in Arabic and Persian traditions, these works offered a vision of the cosmos that blended scientific, religious, and imaginative elements, persisting in Ottoman intellectual circles despite increasing exposure to Western geographical knowledge. The paper examines early Turkish translations and compilations and traces the evolving attitudes toward wondrous and supernatural phenomena. Particular attention is given to Kātib Çelebi, whose critical engagement with cosmographies reflects a broader tendency toward skepticism and rationalization, yet without fully abandoning an enchanted worldview. By analyzing the balance between curiosity, faith, and critical inquiry in Ottoman cosmographical writings, this study contributes to discussions on the interplay between belief and reason, as well as the complexities of pre-modern “disenchantment.”

Speaker: Feray Coşkun (Özyeğin University)

15:10 Correcting Arctic Knowledge. Uncertain Islands and Animals in Far North

Throughout history, the Far North has been a place of myths, fables, and adventures. This sounds attractive, but we have to realize that what we think mythical creatures or ghost islands, were once accepted knowledge. But not all stories were believed by all.

In this talk I follow western-European (mostly Dutch and English) scholarly knowledge, or proclaimed knowledge, from the 15th to the 18th century. My focus will be on zoological and cartographical knowledge. Which animals allegedly lived in the North, what was known about their appearance and behaviour, and how did they relate to humans? Moreover, where did they live? What was known about the islands in the frozen (or perhaps navigable) sea?

By sorting out the instances where earlier ideas and assumptions were explicitly doubted and corrected, this talk yields new insights in the production of new knowledge. How did scholars try to refute what they thought false? From the 16th century onwards, first the English and later the Dutch started to sail the Arctic seas. What was the relationship between received, classical, bookish knowledge and traveller’s exploration and observation? And what can we learn from
these knowledge making processes?

Speaker: Djoeke van Netten (University of Amsterdam)

16:00 → 16:15 Coffee Break

16:15 → 17:15 Keynote Lecture: Is It Time to Abandon 'Islamic Science'? Genres, Languages, Centers and the Problem of Periodization in Light of Recent Scholarship

Convener: Harun Küçük (University of Pennsylvania)

16:15 Is It Time to Abandon 'Islamic Science'? Genres, Languages, Centers and the Problem of Periodization in Light of Recent Scholarship

A monolithic notion of Islamic science overlooks the shifting influence of intellectual centers, the true breadth of practices and motivations and, the diverse political and political-economic trajectories of Islamic empires. It also fails to capture the dynamics between Western and Islamic geographies. Although a sense of the Islamic world existed long before the nineteenth century, the notion of “Islamic science” is a product of the 19th and 20th centuries. It is inextricably linked to the imbalance of resources – including symbolic resources-, stemming from Western domination of the modern capitalist world system. Islamic science is a category fundamentally born of violence—a reflection of the profound asymmetries and injustices blanketing Islamic countries, rather than a perennial intellectual designation. While much contemporary scholarship on Islamic science serves the struggle to recuperate recognition at the symbolic level, this moral focus risks obscuring the long-standing patterns of domination, which lie not in science itself, but in the global economic shifts from the 17th century onward. Indeed, many of the observations on as well as frustrations with Western science that we find in nineteenth- or twentieth-century Muslim authors have much earlier precedents. Most importantly, while tensions between utilitarian and intellectualist interpretations of knowledge existed long before Western hegemony, Western dominance recalibrated their significance and outcomes. Thus, for many Muslim actors who confronted encroaching Western powers, science played an ambivalent role. For some, it was something to adopt as a pragmatic tool for advancement in areas like arms, public health, and industry. For others, science attached to moral ends rooted in older Aristotelian and Islamic legacies and in different economic conditions. This inherent duality—science as both the perceived fruit of wealth and the perceived locomotive of development—lies at the heart of modern debates surrounding Islamic science. Thus, I contend that the more profound historical divide isn't between Islamic science and Western science, but between utilitarian and intellectual interpretations of science as they were transformed by the pressures of the capitalist world system. I will follow medieval, early modern and modern examples of this rift to suggest that instead of talking about Islamic science, we may be better served by focusing on the shifting ends and means of science.

Speaker: Harun Küçük (University of Pennsylvania)

17:15 → 17:30 Participants gather in Hall of Honor (Şeref Holü) prior to Yenikapı Shipwrecks visit

17:30 → 19:00 Optional visit to the Yenikapı Shipwrecks (Limited to 30 people; Registration required)

Thursday 18 September

09:15 → 10:45 P.3.1. Together, with, against: Building and Reassembling Astronomical Traditions in Three Different Contexts

Chair: Matthieu Husson

Conveners: Florence Somer (Observatoire de Paris), Sophie Serra (Lund University - Department of philosophy), Divna Manolova (Department of Literary Studies – Greek Section, Ghent University)

09:15 Together, with, against: Building and Reassembling Astronomical Traditions in Three Different Contexts

All written astronomical cultures attest to the great creativity of astronomers in producing different sorts of manuscripts, printed books and instruments. Embodying the very tools of their practices, these records simultaneously housed and organized the memory that underpinned those practices. These canons and curricula consist of various types of texts, tables and diagrams and they are organized as much around technical astronomical aspects, such as eclipses, planetary motions or daily motion. Historiographical aspects are also part of the process, including the works of a given astronomer or school with their subsequent respective commentaries, the tables concerning a certain date, place, ruler, or even in some cases calendars and astronomical systems attached to ethnic, linguistic or geographical collectives. The formation and continuous negotiation of these astronomical canons and curricula offer invaluable insights into how astronomers curated and managed the intellectual memory of their discipline. This panel brings together three specialists to explore astronomical curricula within three distinct yet deeply interconnected contexts, as evidenced in the Byzantine manuscript tradition of Cleomedes’ The Heavens, Latin astronomer, master of arts and physician Ludolfus Borchtorp, and Azerbaijani-Ottoman taqvim dealing with geomancy. By adopting a comparative approach, the panel seeks to advance research into this relatively understudied but crucial aspect of the history of astronomy.

Presenter: Florence Somer, Observatoire de Paris-CNRS –EIDA project

Title of the paper: The Taqvim B-1441 of the Fuzuli Institute of Manuscript (Əlyazmalar İnstitutu) held in Baku

The origins of Taqvim date back to around 400 BC, following the Babylonian invention of the zodiac and the various arrangements of ephemerides for the sun, moon and planets, as well as astrological remarks for the days of the month.
In addition to the possible influence of the Babylonians and Hellenists, the impact of Indian and Sassanian astrological knowledge on the formation of Islamic astrology, particularly in the courts of the early Abbasid caliphs, must also be taken into account.
Thābit b. Qurra, in the second half of the 9th century, made the first known mention of a taqwīm he called daftar al-sana.Two centuries later, al-Bīrūnī also used these concepts in his astrological compendium, Kitāb al-tafhīm li-awāʾil ṣināʿat al-tanjīm. The main aims of these annual compositions were to list planetary positions and the exact time at which the sun enters the different signs of the zodiac, to provide calendar information for different chronological systems, and to communicate astrological prognostications.
While it forms part of the continuing tradition of the production of these documents, manuscript B-1441 contains geomancy diagrams (ilm al raml) inherited from another tradition adopted and developed in Azerbaijan mainly during the Ottoman period. My contribution will focus on understanding the continuity of an Arab-Iranian model for understanding astronomical data, superimposed on a tradition specific to Central Asia.

Presenter: Sophie Serra, Lund University, Department of Philosophy - Wallenberg Foundation Project “Reassessing Aristotelian Science” (P.I. Ana Maria Mora Marquez)

Title of the paper: Authorities and Controversies in Latin 15th c. astronomy: The case of manuscript Berlin, Staatsbibliothek, Lat. Fol. 246.

It is challenging to gain an overview of 15th-century Western European astronomy, as it exists within a complex network: taught for itself in some universities but not others, caught between authoritative texts and innovations, and of interest to theologians, philosophers, physicians, and mathematicians. The manuscript Berlin, SB, Lat. Fol. 246 serves as an ideal entry point. It was copied throughout his life by Ludolfus Borchtorp, who was a master in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Erfurt (1445), later became a master in medicine in Padua, and eventually returned to Brunswick as a physician. The manuscript contains over 50 astronomical works, reflecting the teachings he received and gave, his medical uses of astronomy, as well as contemporary debates on calendar reform, astrological interpretations, and errors in astronomical tables. On fol. 263r, it includes a polemical text titled “Invectiva contra astronugos et specialiter contra quondam rudem et presumptuosum,” followed by an example of an astrological judgment “by the said idiot” (“Judicium cuiusdam ydeote de quo supra”). I am currently working on an edition and commentary of these works, and I will present it, alongside the manuscript prepared by Ludolfus, as a testimony of both the traditional curriculum of astronomy in Western universities and the raging polemics in this field.

Presenter: Divna Manolova, Department of Literary Studies – Greek Section, Ghent University

Title of the paper: John Nathaniel’s Cosmological Dossier in Vaticanus graecus 1908 and Its Place in the Manuscript Tradition of Cleomedes’ The Heavens

Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, ms. gr. 1908 is a composite manuscript consisting of codicological units dating to the fourteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Its sixth quire puts together cosmological and medical astrological material copied by two professional scribes originating and active in Venetian Crete, namely the teacher, scribe, and theologian John Nathaniel (d. before 1577) and the professional scribe Thomas Bitzimanos (active in the second half of the 15th C). John composed the short text on medical astrology preserved on fols. 32r - 33r, placed it before the Pseudo-Aristotelian De Mundo copied earlier by Thomas and brought it to Venice probably in 1559. He also drafted fol. 33r which includes a diagram of the universe that appeared for the first time in a copy of Cleomedes’ The Heavens prepared in 1450 in Sparta. The large-scale diagram is accompanied by a poem on the zodiac, as well as by smaller diagrams of a solar and a lunar eclipse. It also features short texts providing further information about the sun and the moon. This paper positions the diagram in the tradition of Cleomedean diagrams and analyses John Nathanael’s spatial organisation of diverse cosmological material as well as the ways in which he departs from his models and sources.

Speakers: Ms Divna Manolova (Department of Literary Studies – Greek Section, Ghent University), Florence Somer (Observatoire de Paris), Ms Sophie Serra (Lund University - Department of philosophy)

10:45 → 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 → 12:30 P.3.2. Prognostication, Fortune, and Risk: How Early Modern People Navigated Material Fortunes through Almanacs and Astrological Consultations

Chair: Florence Somer

Conveners: Jakub Ochocinski (European University Institute), Tunahan Durmaz (European University Institute), Luís Campos Ribeiro (University of Lisbon)

11:00 Prognostication, Fortune, and Risk: How Early Modern People Navigated Material Fortunes Through Almanacs and Astrological Consultations

This panel challenges conventional approaches to risk studies by examining how early modern communities and individuals navigated uncertainty in their daily lives. Moving beyond the quantitative methods often deployed in assessing historical risk, we investigate how early modern people used astrological knowledge and almanacs to make critical decisions about health, commerce, travel, and agriculture. This panel places centre stage the activities of the astrologer and almanac writer, as well as the consulted individual and almanac reader, to try to understand the qualitative and lived ways early modern people navigated risk and fortune. We will explore the available predictive marketplace in early modern Europe and Ottoman world. In doing so, we will focus on what techniques astrologers used to answer the questions of clients and the contents and use of the almanac writing tradition. In this way, we turn away from traditional economic frameworks often synonymous with risk studies and offer a fresh perspective that reshapes our understanding of how early modern societies conceptualised and responded to fortune and misfortune.

Chair: A. Tunç Şen

Presenter: Jakub Ochocinski

Title of the paper: Celestial Science and Practical Knowledge: Everyday Uses of Calendars in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

This paper examines how readers in eighteenth-century Poland-Lithuania interacted with astrological predictions found in printed calendars. Throughout the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569-1795), university professors of geometry, astronomy, and astrology produced calendars containing weather forecasts, political predictions, agricultural guidance, and health advice based on astrological principles. However, when we examine how people used these texts—evidenced by annotations written in the interleaved blank pages—we find a different story: owners recorded practical information including household accounts, weather observations, travel records, recipes, and social events. Taking this contrast into account, this paper has two objectives. First, to systematically analyse the astrological content that appeared in these widely circulated calendars. Second, to investigate how readers engaged with these predictions through a close examination of their handwritten annotations. By comparing astrological forecasts produced in universities with readers' writings and marginalia, this paper aims to reveal the complex relationship between institutional knowledge and everyday practice in early modern Poland–Lithuania, offering new insights into how diverse communities navigated between university-produced predictions and their lived experiences.

Presenter: Tunahan Durmaz

Title of the paper: A ‘Pathology’ of Prognostications: Courtly Politics of Medical Astrology in Ottoman Istanbul in the Late 17th Century

This paper is an exercise on the little-known domain of medical astrology in the early modern Ottoman world, particularly in late-seventeenth-century Istanbul. The circumstantial evidence, particularly from medical sources, indicates that a form of medical astrology must have been practiced in the city. Nevertheless, the scope and marketplace of this practice is barely known since such evidence permits only limited contextualization. As a preliminary attempt to approach it, I propose to turn to sources in which medical knowledge intersects with that of the planets. One such genre is the rûz-nâmes ('book of days') that served as almanacs providing prognostications depending on possible changes in weather, seasons, and so on. Using health-related themes such as humors, diseases, and outbreaks as analytical tools, this paper examines several rûz-nâmes from the late seventeenth century. It particularly focuses on one commissioned by Prince Ahmed, later Sultan Ahmed II, in the year 1095/1684, following the unsuccessful siege of Vienna in 1683 by the latter’s brother Sultan Mehmed IV. Through a case study, the paper discusses (a) the role of prognostication in a post-crisis imperial context and (b) some possible historical trajectories of medical astrology in the Ottoman realm.

Presenter: Luís Campos Ribeiro

Title of the paper: How it shall speed? Astrological practices in early modern nautical culture

This paper discusses the role of astrological practice in the long overseas journeys of the early modern period. While sea travel was known to Europeans prior to this time, large oceanic voyages presented new levels of unpredictability. In practical nautical knowledge, astrology was primarily used for weather forecasting to prepare for natural conditions during the voyage. At a personal level astrological concerns varied: merchants wanted to know about the safety of their ships or cargo; ship captains and sailors sought information on the likelihood of a successful journey; and families enquired about the safe return of their loved ones. Taking as an example the practice of English astrologers, this paper examines these astrological consultations as a significant yet lesser-known aspect of early modern maritime journeys. It will show how astrology played a significant part in the decision-making processes of early modern seafarers and those related to them.

Speakers: Jakub Ochocinski (European University Institute), Dr Luís Campos Ribeiro (University of Lisbon), Mr Tunahan Durmaz (European University Institute)

11:00 → 12:30 S.3.1. Sacred Authority and the Politics of Faith in Early Modern Cultural Landscapes

Chair: Monika Frazer-Imregh

Conveners: Lisa Klotz, Zachary Schwarze (Department of Religion, Rice University), Erin Bell (University of Lincoln)

11:00 Kepler, Witchcraft, and the Law

In 1620-1621, Johannes Kepler wrote a detailed argument defending his mother, Katharina, against witchcraft charges. Witches were also being tried in England during this period. Lacking eyewitnesses and direct physical evidence, factfinders had to rely on circumstantial evidence. Circumstantial evidence is not direct proof of the elements of a crime, but an inference of one fact from another—suspicious circumstances that bolster the impression of culpability. Reputation and character were also crucial in witchcraft trials, which were about the individual as well as the act. This paper will compare the Roman-canon law followed at the Kepler trial and the English common law; for one thing, English procedure barred torture in witchcraft cases, while Continental cases depended on it to elicit confessions. But English juries could and did convict on indirect evidence which on the Continent merely sufficed to continue investigation by resorting to torture. The two systems constitute different ways of knowing, defining knowledge, and understanding the past. This paper will also discuss Kepler’s attack on the evidence in his mother’s case and will ask: Did Kepler’s experience with the courts likely make him appreciate the law’s handling of evidence? Or did it have the opposite effect?

Speaker: Lisa Klotz

11:20 Light-Dark and Death Divine: "Bad Mariology" in Colonial Mexico

In 1531, the Virgin Mary appeared to a Nahua peasant on the outskirts of Mexico City, leaving on his garment a miraculous image of herself. In 1648, the priest Miguel Sánchez published the Image of the Virgin Mary, the first known systematization of the Guadalupe event. Therein, Sánchez echoes the fifth-century Christian Patriarch Cyril of Alexandria in praise of the image, wherein the Virgin inverts the story of the biblical fall and inaugurates a new paradise under which Christians will flourish.
In spirit of the Conference's focus on emergent global relations, this paper will argue that the opening of a geo-exegetical relationship between early modern Mexico and the received late ancient Mediterranean directly contributes to the emergence of exegetical inversion as a key feature of Mexican religiosity. To this end, the paper will also argue that this exegetical inversion constitutes one of the conditions of historical possibility for the emergence of the devotional tradition around the Holy Death, i.e., death venerated in the style of a Catholic Saint. It will be shown that an examination of the aforementioned geo-exegetical relationship fills in persistent gaps in scholarship on the historical origins of devotion to the Holy Death.

Speaker: Zachary Schwarze (Department of Religion, Rice University)

11:40 From Prophets to Martyrs in the First Two Generations of Quakerism, 1650s-1690s

In January 1691, George Fox, one of the first Quaker leaders, died after a lifetime preaching and proselytising. In Fox’s final years, English Quakers experienced legal acceptance as a Protestant denomination, with the 1689 Toleration Act enabling freedom of worship. It became crucial for Fox’s Journal to be published promptly, to share his insights and – by curating the 3 extant journal manuscripts – shape Quaker history to best fit Quaker needs.

By focussing on prophecy and mysticism, this selectivity is apparent - few Quaker prophets are acknowledged in the 1694 work, other than Fox; all are male other than citations of Acts 2:17, that sons and daughters shall prophesy. Second-generation limitations are also apparent in the physical removal, after publication, of an account of radical female Friends. One, Ellen Fretwell of Stainsby, died a tithe martyr in prison 8 months before the Journal’s publication; the other, Susannah Frith of Chesterfield, had in the early 1660s engaged in epistolary warfare with self-declared prophet Lodowick Muggleton, and several of his responses to letters, including Frith’s, were reprinted in Muggletonian works, preserving Friends’ prophetical, controversial and combatant past in contrast to their later efforts to represent themselves in print as quiet sufferers for faith.

Speaker: Erin Bell (University of Lincoln)

11:00 → 12:30 S.3.2. Intellectual Lineages and Methodological Innovations in Early Modern Studies

Chair: Feray Çoşkun

Conveners: Gerhard Wiesenfeldt (University of Melbourne), Karine Durin (University of Nantes), Thijs Ossenkoppele (University of Amsterdam)

11:00 Dynasties and Networks: Knowledge in Academic Families

While the role of family networks at early modern universities has often been studied, the transmission of knowledge within these networks tends to receive less attention. This talk will present an attempt of a typology of family universities using the examples of Tübingen and Jena from the late 16th to the 18th centuries. Tübingen was characterised by the emergence of professorial dynasties - most notably those of the families Osiander, Bardili, Camerarius, and Gmelin - that had a strong presence at the university over many generations. Comparable dynasties did not exist at Jena, instead professorial families frequently married into each other, a practice that lasted well into the 19th century and created a network of family relations at the university. While such networks had an obvious function in providing protection for the individual professors, they tended to have less impact in establishing academic family traditions. The talk aims at highlighting how such traditions could shape knowledge as well as academic culture at early modern universities.

Speaker: Gerhard Wiesenfeldt (University of Melbourne)

11:20 Opinions and Experiments in Antonio Gómez Pereira’s Antoniana Margarita (1554): Digression and History in Natural Philosophy

Antonio Gómez Pereira (1500-1558) was a philosopher and physician who played a significant role in the intellectual renaissance in Spain during the second half of the 16th century. His major opus, Antoniana Margarita (Medina del Campo, 1554) ensured his European reputation beyond the 16th century to the point of being considered a precedent for the Cartesian theory of the animal machine. The Antoniana Margarita addresses various issues, based on a philosophical investigation of the immortality of the soul. However, the consideration about matter emerges as a major theme. Generation and corruption are linked to the description of pure material elements in the experience of sensitivity and sensations. The aim of this paper is to study the movement of Gómez Pereira's thought from the anatomy of the physical perception and the power of the intellect as an act of understanding in sensation to the rhetoric employed in order to question doctrines and to resolve paradoxes. The text reflects important digressions that connect natural philosophy to the political events of the time such as the condition of the Indians, the repercussions of irreligion on civil peace. Political reflections and personal opinions are intertwined in a new way to expand the limits of philosophical doctrine.

Speaker: Karine Durin (University of Nantes)

11:40 Counting the Bees: A Data-Driven Investigation into Early Modern British Thought (1605-1776)

Histories of science frequently suggest that the advent of British experimentalism marked a fundamental shift away from the traditional axiomatic ideal of science (Shapin & Schaffer 1985; Dear 1995; Pasnau 2019). While partially accurate, such narratives remain incomplete due to their reliance on a limited evidence base and their emphasis on discontinuity over potential continuity.

This study addresses both issues using a data-driven approach to systematically retrieve and analyze evidence on the axiomatic ideal from a newly constructed corpus. Its starting point is BOOKSHELPhS, a digital bibliographical knowledge graph of logic, philosophy, and science books published in Britain (1605–1776). BOOKSHELPhS, currently containing metadata on 2,123 editions of 1,272 works, serves as the foundation for a structured, machine-readable text corpus.

The corpus enables large-scale retrieval of passages discussing the axiomatic ideal, using an extensive mapping of concepts from the Classical Model of Science (CMS) (de Jong & Betti 2010) to historical actor’s terms. Retrieved passages are close-read, annotated, and linked to bibliographic metadata, allowing unprecedented analysis of concept drift, geospatial, temporal, and publishing trends. While the project’s resources were built to investigate axiomatic science in Britain, the paper demonstrates its wide reuse potential in the historiography of Early Modern British science.

Speaker: Thijs Ossenkoppele (University of Amsterdam)

12:30 → 14:30 Lunch & Optional visit to the IU Turkish Hamam Culture Museum or Rıdvan Çelikel Archaeology Museum (Registration Required)

14:30 → 16:00 P.3.3. Cultures of Trust and Global Connections in Early Modernity. Remarks on Pacts and Agreements in Western and Central-Eastern European Texts

Chair: Matthias Roick

Conveners: Lorenzo Fancello (Università di Pisa), Filippo Marchetti (Università di Pisa), Luisa Brotto (Università di Pisa)

14:30 Cultures of Trust and Global Connections in Early Modernity. Remarks on Pacts and Agreements in Western and Central-Eastern European Texts

Description of the panel:
The panel examines theories of conflict management in early modern Europe as strategies for establishing forms of fruitful connection. To this end, works addressing pacts and agreements are regarded as the expression of different ‘cultures of trust’ which result from the interplay of cultural, religious, social and political factors. In the 16th and 17th centuries, early modern authors could easily perceive themselves as part of rapidly changing social contexts: even within European states, the impact of foreign cultures and forces was undeniable. While reinterpreting ancient and medieval sources, early modern texts addressing the topic of agreements tried to respond to concerns of the present regarding contacts with diverse individuals and groups.
By examining texts written in different areas of Europe, the papers analyze considerations about agreements, their definitions, the types of individuals involved in them, and the circumstances under which they can be broken. They focus on contacts between cultures, religions, and conflicting interests addressed through the concept of trust – often resulting in complex combinations of forms of inclusion and exclusion. The panel aims to encourage debate on the impact of global connections on European theories of social interaction, and on the features and shortcomings of European perspectives.

Chair: Matthias Roick, Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences

Presenter: Lorenzo Fancello, University of Pisa

Title of the paper: Pierre Gassendi and Baruch Spinoza: The Advantages of Cooperation

The paper aims to explore how the structure of pacts described by Epicurus is reflected in some modern solutions to the problem of peaceful cooperation. Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655) was the first to pave the way for those who followed. He worked to rescue Epicureanism from its historical accusations of impiety and atheism. In doing so, he formulated a theory of the origins of society based on the concept of utility and the advantages discovered through cooperation. Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677) pursued a similar line of thought. Observing that forms of cooperation could be found even among those he calls “savages”, he deduced the primacy of social elements over political ones. To guarantee the benefits of cooperation, both Gassendi and Spinoza relied on explicit pacts and positive laws that bind individuals to publicly beneficial behaviours. Rather than seeking a shared moral or religious foundation, they focused on what is common for all human beings: the strain to improve their condition and the ability to calculate what is advantageous. What is now crucial for peace is not what is just, but what is useful, enabling people – from different geographical and cultural areas – to freely and peacefully cooperate despite their religious and cultural differences.

Presenter: Filippo Marchetti, University of Pisa

Title of the paper: Defending Utopia, or Which Political Theology Best Suits the Polis

The paper focuses on Nicholas Hill's Philosophia Epicurea (1601), a multifaceted work that includes reflections on the failed Catholic conspiracy that forced its author to leave England. The failure of the plot due to an informer led Hill to explore the reasons why his political theology wasn't enough to keep his fellow conspirators loyal. Philosophising about the conspiracy led him to believe that a human pact cannot be binding if it is not supported by an adequate political theology - thus placing fides among the most important theological and social virtues that should sustain the life of a community. As an atomist, Hill sees diversity as an essential feature of nature. For him, however, the commitment to the spread of good political theologies becomes a guiding principle in the sphere of social relations. A critical analysis of Hill's remarks on English colonialism will highlight key aspects and shortcomings of his approach, which is often characterised by suspicion and an emphasis on cultural homogeneity. Hill's thoughts on the possibility of global connections will also be considered in the light of the connection he draws between human forms of loyalty or betrayal, the consideration of geographical spaces, and the construction of powerful ideologies.

Presenter: Luisa Brotto, University of Pisa

Title of the paper: Reaching Agreements in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Early Modern Trust-Based Strategies for Conflict Management

The paper aims to address trust-based theories of conflict management in 16thand 17th-century Polish-Lithuanian texts. Due to its political features (an elective form of government; laws granting forms of religious tolerance) and its borders (including the Habsburg Empire, Muscovy, and the Ottoman Empire), Poland-Lithuania faced challenges of multiculturalism. I argue that focusing on different ways of dealing with social trust may enable a better understanding of how conflicts with diverse interlocutors were addressed within the Polish-Lithuanian political discourse, with a focus on how potential conflicts could be transformed into other kinds of connection. To this end, I will analyze some passages from works on social and political theories, ranging from De optimo senatore by Wawrzyniec Goslicki (1568) to Monita politico-moralia by Andrzej Maksymilian Fredro (1664). I will especially focus on Scholia on Aristotle’s Rhetoric by Andrzej Abrek (professor of eloquence at the Academy of Zamosc 1629-1656), where the illustration of classical rhetoric is accompanied by some exercises concerning present issues of foreign politics. Special attention will be given to the entanglement of local and international sources, and to the interplay of rules of rhetoric, legal concepts, and moral and political ideas when facing diverse individuals, groups, or states.

Speakers: Filippo Marchetti (University of Pisa), Lorenzo Fancello (University of Pisa), Luisa Brotto (University of Pisa), Matthias Roick (Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences)

14:30 → 16:00 P.3.4. Ways of Knowing Water in Early Modern Europe

Chair: Andre Araujo

Conveners: Samuel Barney Blanco (Ca' Foscari University of Venice), Oscar Schiavone (Ca' Foscari University of Venice), David Gentilcore (Ca' Foscari University of Venice)

14:30 Ways of Knowing Water in Early Modern Europe

This panel seeks to shed light on the ways in which early modern Europeans acquired, interpreted and applied knowledge about water – in particular fresh water – in a range of different contexts. In the process, we shall examine some of the tensions that played out between established authority and empirical observation, received wisdom and practical expertise. To do this we look at three very different case studies from Italy and Spain.
The first compares expertise in the measuring of water in the application of water justice in the Republic of Venice and the Kingdom of Valencia. Officials walked the length of irrigation and drainage canals, interrogating and engaging with local authorities and stakeholders; they measured water depth and speed, evaluated the state of the insfrastructure and assessed climatological circumstances – all in order to adjudicate water-related disputes. The second takes us to the Tuscan Grand Duchy and the figure of Francesco Redi – author, expertimenter and court physician – to analyse his previously unstudied notes on the ‘chemical experiences on water’. These shifted from medical inquiries to a broader scientific investigation into water’s fundamental nature, ultimately concluding that all water was essentially the same. The final case study takes us back to Venice, here in its urban guise, to examine evolving early modern ideas concerning water quality and purity, and how this was evaluated. This shifting knowledge is compared to actual practice, how Venice monitored and managed its fresh water supply, including its routine testing of water.

Presenter: Samuel Barney Blanco

Title of the paper: Professional Expertise and Measuring Water Justice in Early Modern Rural Communities: the Venetian Terraferma and the Kingdom of Valencia (1500-1600)

The alluvial plains of the Iberian Mediterranean coast that made up the Kingdom of Valencia, and those contained in the arc between the rivers Po and Piave in the mainland of the Republic of Venice, the Terraferma, were the theatre of quotidian irrigation and drainage activities, which involved arbitration between the different communitarian water uses. In the mid-16th century, the practice of water justice was gradually appropriated by new professionals brought in from the centres of power. Officials such as procurator fiscals sent by the Valencian vice-royal courts of justice, together with the periti and avvocati, sent by the Venetian senate’s magistracies, walked the length of irrigation and drainage canals, interrogating and engaging with local authorities and stakeholders. These expeditions are recorded in modern sources with an unprecedented degree of detail, focusing on measuring water, (depth and speed of current), as well as its infrastructural aspects (state of embankments and weirs), and assessing climatological circumstances, such as droughts or floods, that conditioned the human actions that were to be judged. This paper examines how local conceptions of water justice and their subsequent investigation were a vector of technical and juridical specialisation in 16th century courts.

Presenter: Oscar Schiavone

Title of the paper: Experimenting with Water at the Spa: Francesco Redi as a Chemist in Bagni di Lucca (1669)

This paper explores the pivotal role of water in early modern science through an analysis of Francesco Redi’s previously unknown notes on ‘chemical experiences on water’ (Biblioteca Marucelliana, Florence: MS Redi 27, fols 1–110). Compiled during Grand Duchess of Tuscany Vittoria della Rovere’s thermal treatments at Bagni di Lucca (1669) and continued over two years, these notes document Redi’s evolving interest in water science.
Initially focused on the medical properties of spring water, Redi’s experiments aimed to assess purity through colour-based chemical reactions. Over time, they shifted from medical inquiries to a broader scientific investigation into water’s fundamental nature – hether it was a principle, an element or a compound. Through studies on the specificity and interchangeability of different waters, he ultimately concluded that all water was essentially the same. Conducted in response to the Accademia del Cimento’s findings, his experiments sought to align Florentine science with European standards. By fostering a culture of sceptical inquiry and empirical research, Redi helped shape the principles of free inquiry and intellectual freedom. His work not only advanced water chemistry but also contributed to the broader transformations of the scientific revolution.

Presenter: David Gentilcore

Title of the paper: The Knowledge and Practice of Water Quality in Early Modern Europe

When it came to water intended for human consumption, what was meant by water quality in the early modern period involved a language, conceptualisation and implementation quite different from our own. In order to understand this, my paper has two aims. On the one hand, we examine evolving early modern ideas concerning water quality and purity, and how this was determined and essayed – including continued reliance on the senses and the increasing role of quantitative chemical analysis – as well as what this meant for the perceived relationship between the ‘qualities of waters’ and particular diseases.
On the other hand, we look at what this shifting knowledge looked like in actual practice, taking as our test case the hydraulic infrastructure of Venice. The lagoon city was uniquely dependent on rainwater capture for all of its freshwater needs, which fed several thousand ‘well-cisterns’ located throughout the city. But these faced the twin threats of drought and extraordinarily high tides (acqua alta). We consider how the authorities monitored and managed the city’s fresh water supply, including its routine testing of water from the 1730s, long before this became common in European cities, and, closely linked to this, the programme of repair and reconstruction of its public well-cisterns.

Speakers: Prof. David Gentilcore (Ca' Foscari University of Venice), Dr Oscar Schiavone (Ca' Foscari University of Venice), Mr Samuel Barney Blanco (Ca' Foscari University of Venice)

14:30 → 16:00 W.3.1. Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence: Methodological Developments in the Study of Astronomical Sources

Conveners: Matthieu Husson (LTE-Observatoire de Paris, CNRS), Somkeo Norindr (LTE-Observatoire de Paris)

14:30 Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence: Methodological Developments in the Study of Astronomical Sources

Relevance and Objectives
Since antiquity, astral sciences have been cultivated in diverse historical contexts, often involving complex processes of knowledge transmission and cross-cultural interaction. Consequently, studying their development requires a broad and comprehensive corpus of sources, as well as advanced analytical methodologies capable of addressing the diversity of materials.

The rise of Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence is reshaping the accessibility of historical sources, as well as the methods used for their analysis, editing, and interpretation. These technological transformations present both opportunities and challenges for research communities in the history of science. In recent years, scholars have launched collective initiatives to explore these issues, leading to the emergence of new tools, methodologies, and research avenues in the history of astral sciences.

This workshop aims to:

1. Present and discuss recent advancements in the application of DH and
   AI to the study of astronomical sources.
2. Share knowledge and technical expertise regarding new digital tools.
3. Critically assess the strengths and limitations of these approaches.
4. Explore potential directions for future methodological development.

Methodology
The session will begin with a brief overview of the opportunities and challenges associated with the integration of DH and AI methodologies into the study of the history of astral sciences. A survey of key ongoing projects in the field will be presented, followed by a focused examination of two specific projects led by the History of Astral Sciences team at LTE–Paris Observatory.

Both projects are centered on the analysis of non-discursive elements in historical sources related to the astral sciences, encompassing a broad range of documents from the 8th to the 18th centuries in multiple languages, including Chinese, Sanskrit, Persian, Arabic, Turkish, Hebrew, Latin, and Greek.

Project 1: DISHAS (dishas.obspm.fr)
The DISHAS project is dedicated to the digital study and critical edition of astronomical tables, with the aim of reconstructing the computation scenario employed by historical actors. By providing tools for analyzing the structure and transmission of these tables, DISHAS enables scholars to better understand the mathematical practices embedded within them.

Project 2: EIDA (eida.hypotheses.org)
The EIDA project focuses on the study and digital edition of diagrams used in the astral sciences. It examines both the material aspects of astronomical diagrams—such as their modes of production, visual conventions, and circulation patterns—and their epistemic dimensions, including their relationships with accompanying texts and their roles in reasoning and argumentation. EIDA aims to develop a critical framework for understanding diagrammatic transmission while also creating digital representations that support these analyses by providing new scholarly tools for visualizing, editing and publishing astronomical diagrams.

Throughout the workshop, we will demonstrate these tools in an interactive and informal manner, engaging participants in hands-on exploration. Additionally, we will discuss the forthcoming developments of these projects and their broader relevance not only to historians of mathematical astronomy but also to researchers in adjacent fields, including contemporary astronomy.

At least one-third of the session will be dedicated to open discussion, allowing participants to engage in dialogue about the opportunities and challenges presented by these methodologies and to explore potential future directions for research.

Target Audience
This workshop is primarily designed for early-career researchers, but all scholars interested in the application of Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence to historical research are welcome to participate.
Maximum number of participants: 20

Speakers: Matthieu Husson (LTE-Observatoire de Paris, CNRS), Somkeo Norindr (LTE-Observatoire de Paris)

16:00 → 16:15 Coffee Break

16:15 → 17:45 Round Table - On a Personal Note: Handwritten Knowledge Transfer in Ego-Documents

Chair: Matthias Roick

Conveners: Alicja Bielak (Polish Academy of Sciences), Gábor Förköli (Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of Philosophy and Sociology), Sooyong Kim (Koç University, Department of Comparative Literature)

16:15 On a Personal Note: Handwritten Knowledge Transfer in Ego-Documents

In recent decades, historians have increasingly recognised that the creation and dissemination of knowledge extends beyond the works of published authors and the production and circulation of books. Early modern knowledge was recorded, transmitted and stored in a variety of media, including letters, travelogues, working papers, lists, notebooks, diaries and drawings. Moreover, knowledge was not the preserve of particular groups, nor was it geographically limited. Early modern travellers, such as itinerant students, merchants and diplomats, significantly contributed to the continuous exchange of information and the transfer of knowledge across cultural boundaries. Finally, the creation and dissemination of knowledge did not exclude individual experience, but was embedded in the personal accounts of ego-documents.
Our roundtable brings together four scholars to discuss their own research in the light of these questions. They all work on manuscript sources from a comparative and global perspective, involving travel and knowledge transfer between European regions as well as between European and non-European countries. The aim of the roundtable is to bring together concrete cases of research that test, validate and modify the general assumptions described above for specific textual forms and materials, and to facilitate a conversation about the state of the art, with its problematic aspects and possibilities for further development.
• Alicja Bielak’s research centers on the notebooks of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth students at Western European universities. Taking into account their social status, religion and future professions, she will argue that in the notebooks even short, seemingly isolated sentences, out of context, proved to be effective conduits, leading the researcher to specific themes or concerns that occupied the students’ minds – impossible to find in the official curricula.
• Gábor Förköli examines to what extent the prescriptive and collective aspects of early modern notetaking methods enabled students to construct a self-image via excerpts from their readings and personal notes. He will contend that their concern about identity can be grasped through their rising awareness for confessional issues as well as their increasing curiosity for the historia litteraria of their homeland as part of a broader Republic of Letters.
• Sooyong Kim focuses on Ottoman literati practices in the 17th century, examining issues of canon and its legacies and the role of multilingualism in that regard, with a focus on prose genres, including the autobiographical. He will discuss how health and illness are represented in early modern ego-documents, particularly from an Ottoman Muslim male perspective. The focus of his discussion will be on how Evliya Çelebi in his Book of Travels (ca. 1683) records his recovery from long-term impotence and the uniqueness of that.

The roundtable discussion will be organized in three phases.
First, the panellists will briefly present the materials they are working with in 5-7 minutes. Their description may cover one or more of the following points:
• What materials do you work with? What made you interested in them?
• What skills are needed to study your materials? Did you have these skills or did you have to learn them?
• What has your research contributed to the field and how do you think it has changed it?
Second, the panellists will discuss among each other for 25-30 minutes.
• How do you think your studies compare with each other? Where do you see differences, where do you see similarities? Is there any continuity between the materials studied, such as commonplace books or lecture notes, and the travel-related ego-documents?
• How would you describe the “status” of handwritten ego-documents compared to printed sources? How would you describe the role of “material” aspects in your studies?
• To what extent can we say that these documents are personal? Were they designed for personal or collective use? Are they based on individual experiences and observations or on other textual sources? To what extent are their compilers able to overwrite inherited stereotypes?
• What are the main systems used to organise knowledge in manuscripts? Should we emphasise cultural differences or transcultural universals in methods of knowledge management? For example, can we assume the existence of ars apodemica outside Europe?

Third, in the remainder of the time, the chair will open up the discussion to audience participation.

Speakers: Dr Alicja Bielak (Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of Philosophy and Sociology (Poland)), Dr Gábor Förköli (Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of Philosophy and Sociology (Poland)), Matthias Roick (Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences (Poland)), Prof. Sooyong Kim (Koç University, Department of Comparative Literature (Türkiye))

17:45 → 18:00 Participants gather in Hall of Honor (Şeref Holü) prior to Yenikapı Shipwrecks visit

18:00 → 19:30 Optional visit to the Yenikapı Shipwrecks (Limited to 30 people; Registration required)

Friday 19 September

09:15 → 10:45 S.4.1. Medical and Natural Knowledge Networks in the Early Modern Ottoman and European Worlds

Chair: Stefano Gulizia

Conveners: Jessica Hogbin (Syracuse University), Zongbei Huang (Department of the History of Science, Tsinghua University), Nazıme Özgür Tamdoğan

09:15 Recording Melancholic Deaths: Necrologies and Healthcare in Early Modern Venice and Padua

On January 8, 1580, sixty-three-year-old jeweler Antonio Bondi, who had suffered from melancholy, threw himself down a well and died, as reported by the Provveditori e Sopraprovveditori alla Sanità (Superintendents and Supervisors of Health) of the Republic of Venice. Necrologies produced in the Veneto demonstrate that melancholic deaths took many forms, from cases such as Biondi’s to more mundane “melancholic humors” combined with fever to reports of melancholic pains following childbirth. By engaging with the narratives about people’s lives from records of their deaths, this paper investigates the treatment of patients suffering from the capacious category of melancholy through these medical mortality records, allowing for better understanding of the interrelationship between bodily and mental function in the early modern period. This study engages with melancholy, a disease which might impact a patient’s life for decades or as little as a few days, and the deadly disorders that sprung from it, such as cancer and rabies. Through the examination of necrologies created in the Veneto from 1550 to 1650, this paper studies how deaths related to melancholy demonstrate the tension between local conceptions of illness and responses to larger, pan-European developments in the implications of early modern humoral theory.

Speaker: Jessica Hogbin (Syracuse University)

09:35 Rembert Dodoens’s Construction of an Epistemology of Observational Experience: A Case in Sixteenth-Century Medical Empiricism

Many studies have demonstrated the emergence of “observation” as a new epistemic category in sixteenth-century Europe, as well as an increasingly “empiricist” stance taken by European physicians in their knowledge-making. This study aims to offer a more nuanced perspective on this grand shift through an analysis of the works of Flemish physician and botanist Rembert Dodoens (1517–1585). The all-too-natural modern association of “observation” and “experience” breaks down if we notice how Dodoens only worked out a framework that neatly contained both after almost thirty years of medical-botanical study, coalesced into the Stirpium historiae pemptades sex (1583). In fact, as revealed in his progressive works starting from 1548, the ideas of “observatio” and “experientia” as ways of knowing came down to him from different intellectual and disciplinary sources, one from cosmography and the other from Galenic medicine. For Dodoens, ultimately, “observatio” obtains the apparent, phenomenal characteristics of natural things (heavens, plants, or patient bodies), while “experientia” provides insight into the “facultas” or “properties of essence” which are actually not manifest as opposed to “sensory qualities”. This version of “empiricism” is unique, rooted in the world of sixteenth-century medical learning, and calls for reflection on some traditional narratives about early modern empiricism(s).

Speaker: Zongbei Huang (Department of the History of Science, Tsinghua University)

09:55 An Evaluation for the Understanding of Rational Sciences in the Context of Natural Sciences Works in the Classical Period Ottoman

When the 'Classical Period' is mentioned in the Ottoman Empire, it is the period from 14th century, when the state became an empire; to the 17th century, when the first modernization movements began. Educational activities in the Classical Period; It was carried out both in formal education institutions such as schools and madrasahs; and also in non-formal education institutions such as mosques, libraries, and houses of scholars and statesmen. In these institutions, where education was provided at different levels, the works used as textbooks and the educational methods differed on an institutional and periodic basis. Moreover, the education in these institutions during Ottoman Empire was progressed not through curricula as it is today, but through the book-teacher-student relationship, as in the education system inherited from the Islamic tradition. Thus, the books and their contents became the only resources that determined the educational system. In this paper, inspired by the fact that studies on the Ottoman scientific tradition are mostly on religious sciences and there are very few studies on rational sciences (positive sciences), the works on natural sciences published in the Ottoman Empire during the Classical Period (XIV.-XVII. centuries) have been examined from primary sources using the document analysis method. Due to the large sample pool, the scope of this study in Natural Sciences works is limited to the fields of Physics, Chemistry, Geology and Mineralogy, which deal with inanimate objects on earth. In this context, an evaluation will be made regarding the understanding of rational sciences in the Ottoman Classical Period. In addition to contributing to the studies on the 'History of Natural Sciences of Ottoman Civilization', it is also aimed to be a guiding source for Ottoman Science research as it is the first study in which the natural science works taught in educational institutions will be examined in the form of an annotated bibliography.

Speaker: Nazime Özgür Tamdoğan (Ankara University)

09:15 → 10:45 S.4.2. The Movement of Science: Optical, Astronomical, and Horological Knowledge Across Cultures

Chair: Gaye Danışan

Conveners: Sena Aydın, Víctor Pérez-Álvarez, S. Ceren Özdemir

09:15 Light-Colour Relationship in Taqi al-Din and His Primary Source Ibn al-Haytham

The 16th-century polymath Taqi al-Dīn Muḥammad ibn Maʻrūf wrote a work in the science of optics that would enable him to be recognised as one of the peak figures of the Ottoman classical period. This work, entitled ‘Nawr ḥadīqat al-abṣar wa-nūr ḥaqīqat al-Anẓar’, cites Ibn al-Haytham's Kitāb al-Menāzir as one of its main sources in its introduction. Taqi al-Dīn's work uses numerous experimental setups to present the theoretical content under the headings of direct vision, vision through reflection, and vision through refraction. In these experiments, especially the effort to understand the relationship between light and colour is frequently encountered. This study aims to examine Taqi al-Dīn's understanding of the relationship between light and colour in comparison with his primary source, Ibn al-Haytham. Taqi al-Din's and his source Ibn al-Haytham's frequent study of the problem of the colour of light being carried by reflection and refraction in dark room setups, their efforts to understand the nature of colour, and the importance of their works in the history of science in terms of colour theory are issues that need to be examined.

Speaker: Sena Aydın

09:35 The Armillary Sphere in Molla Ali's Risâle-i Meyyâl: A 17th-Century Latin-to-Ottoman Turkish Translation and Its Structural-Functional Analysis

Abstract

The study of astronomical instruments has been central to the development of Ottoman astronomy, a tradition shaped by both theoretical writings and practical applications. Among the various works in this literature, studies on the Zâtü’l-Halak (the Spherical Armillary) stand out as significant contributions. Our literature review reveals that authors predominantly drew on Turkish and Arabic sources from the sixteenth century onward when writing about this instrument. In contrast, the work Risâle-i Meyyâl (The Treatise on the Inclined [Instrument]), translated by the 17th-century Ottoman astronomer Molla Ali (fl. 1687) in 1093/1682 from Latin into Ottoman Turkish, stands as an exception to this trend. This short treatise, one of the early scientific translations in the Ottoman Empire, provides detailed information on the structure and function of the Zâtü’l-Halak (the Spherical Armillary), and four distinct copies of it have survived to the present day.

This study will examine the physical properties, components, and methods of use of the Zâtü’l-Halak as discussed in Risâle-i Meyyâl. Additionally, the study will assess whether there are any differences between the four known copies of Risâle-i Meyyâl (which were transcribed between 1682-1782) and will explore the circulation of the text in this context. Finally, the paper will analyze the position of the work within Ottoman astronomical literature and examine how it connects with other Ottoman texts related to Zâtü’l-Halak.

The author gratefully acknowledges that this paper is part of an ongoing project entitled 'Delineating the Journey of European Astronomical Instruments in Ottoman Education and Beyond (1773-1923)," led by S. Ceren Özdemir and funded by the Scientific Instrument Society, as well as the project 'Portable Astronomical Instruments: The Processes of Adaptation and Diffusion of Medieval Islamic and Early Modern European Examples in the Ottoman Geography (1500-1700),' led by Gaye Danışan within the scope of the TUBA-Outstanding Young Scientists Awards (GEBIP) Program, in which S. Ceren Özdemir is a researcher.

Speaker: S. Ceren Özdemir

09:55 Islamic Clepsydrae in the Christian Spain During the Late Middle Ages

The technology behind the hydraulic clocks dates back to the Antiquity and was transmitted to the Christendom and the Islamic world. From Siria to Morocco and Al-Andalus, Islamic engineers developed further that technology mastering the construction of complicated water driven time pieces and automata. Surviving Arabic treatises are testaments of that refined technological tradition.
Knowledge and objects produced by the Muslims circulated among the Europeans, specially across the borders between neighbouring states. The paradigmatic case is the Iberian Peninsula, which was divided into Christian kingdoms in the North and Islamic kingdoms in the South. The Christians progressively advanced southwards taking territories from their Islamic counterparts until the end of the 15th Century, when the last Muslim state felt into the Christians rule. The conquest boosted the transmission of knowledge and skills with the incorporation of Muslim populations, libraries and different types of infrastructure.
This paper will aim to shed some light on the reception of Islamic clepsydras by the Christians of the Iberian Peninsula. Were they properly understood by them? Were they any useful in the new society? A recently discovered document from the 13th Century mentioning an hydraulic clock in the cathedral of Toledo will be discussed.

Speaker: Víctor Pérez-Álvarez

09:15 → 10:45 S.4.3. Embodied Knowledge: Applied Sciences and Material Practices in Ottoman and Arabic Traditions

Chair: Nazan Karakaş Özür

Conveners: Sarah Sabban (Lebanese American University), Deren Ertas (Harvard University), Alper Atasoy

09:15 Ways of Knowing: Exploring Science and Practice in the Early Modern Arabic Notion of al-Ṣināʿa

This paper explores the Arabic notion of al-ṣināʿa, which can be translated as knowledge in practice or applied science, that developed between the 14th and the 18th centuries. It documents the polyvalence of the concept in different contexts and registers of ʿilm (science or knowledge at large) and traces the long and collective process of meaning making around al-sinaʿa that spanned traditions of knowledge and imperial geographies alike. Following a particular chain of texts, including glosses on works of rhetorical sciences, lexicons, and technical or specialized dictionaries produced within Arab-Islamic cultures in different regions, my analysis shows that al-ṣināʿa was defined as the practical application of science, as embodied knowledge, and as a disposition that enabled a modality of action. In encompassing both the Greek technê and praxis, the Arabic notion retained a more comprehensive and less divisive system of knowledge in comparison to the original Aristotelian concepts, from which the modern Western organization of knowledge derived and devised its new classifications. This study on al-ṣināʿa, which came to mean modern industry in the late 19th century, offers a reconsideration of ways of knowing and revisits the notion of science and its relation to practice.

Speaker: Sarah Sabban (Lebanese American University)

09:35 From the Mine to the Market: A History of Silver in the Eighteenth-Century Ottoman Empire

At the turn of the eighteenth century, the Ottoman Empire undertook a concerted effort to revive its domestic mining industry, which involved reopening closed mines and excavating in new sites. As part of this state-led initiative, the Keban and Ergani mines were opened in the 1720s. Located in the Upper Euphrates and Tigris River Valley, in present-day Elazığ, they became key suppliers of silver and gold for the imperial treasury and mint, while also providing copper and lead essential for the military. This presentation follows silver’s journey from extraction to refinement, transportation to Istanbul, and its eventual minting into coinage. By examining the interplay of human and non-human labor, technology, and state control in this process, I highlight how Ottoman mining policies reshaped the empire’s monetary and military infrastructure. Additionally, I explain the scientific knowledge, technical expertise, and resource networks necessary to extract and refine this precious metal. By centering this historical narrative on the journey of silver, I also aim to provide a new materialist approach to Ottoman historiography wherein the matter and its transformations have an agentive role in how history is shaped.

Speaker: Deren Ertas (Harvard University)

09:55 Cross-Cultural Knowledge Transfer in Military Reform: The Impact of Rochefort’s 1717 Proposal on the Ottoman Empire

In 1717, the French officer Rochefort presented a proposal to the Ottoman authorities aimed at establishing a specialized engineering corps composed of foreign experts. His plan included military aspects such as fortifications, artillery calculations, technical training and economic recommendations to reduce the Ottoman Empire's dependence on foreign trade. Although Rochefort's proposal was not accepted at the time, it resurfaced years later through Comte de Bonneval, who arrived in the Ottoman Empire in 1731, converted to Islam as Ahmet Pasha, and played a significant role in founding the Humbaracı Ocağı (Bombardier Corps) and a Hendesehāne (Engineering School). The reappearance of these ideas highlights the complex processes of cross-cultural knowledge transfer and the adaptation of foreign expertise within the Ottoman context. This study explores how Rochefort's proposals contributed to early Ottoman military modernization and their long-term influence on military education. By examining the transmission and transformation of European military knowledge in the Ottoman Empire, this research seeks to shed light on the broader global connections that shaped early modern statecraft, engineering practices, and educational reforms.

Speaker: Alper Atasoy (Independent Researcher (Türkiye))

10:45 → 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 → 12:30 S.4.4. Medicine, Morality, and the Supernatural: Cultural Narratives of Health in Premodern Societies

Chair: Vladimír Urbánek

Conveners: Dávid Molnár (University of Tokaj), Salome Gviniashvili (Tusheti Protected Landscape), Elisa Ramazzina (University of Insubria)

11:00 The Divine and Demonic Beverage: Antonio Gazio’s Medical Treatise on Wine and Beer

In 1538, Simone Gazio dedicated a short treatise on beer and wine to Franciscus Thurzo, a work that survives in an Augsburg edition from 1546. According to Gazio, he discovered the manuscript among the papers of his late father, Antonio Gazio (1461-1528). The main text resembles a medical indictment, establishing health-related "facts" about wine and beer. It evokes a courtroom trial - or rather, a show trial - where witnesses are called one after another. It seems like a piece of medical propaganda. Wine is a divine elixir, whereas beer is the invention of an evil demon meant to sicken people. The utter misery of human life can be tasted in its flavor. Thus, wine was bestowed upon humanity by heaven, while beer originates from the depths of the underworld; one comes from heaven, the other from hell. This paper examines Gazio’s work in detail, situating it within the context of ancient medical and ideological topoi related to beer and wine.

Speaker: Dávid Molnár (University of Tokaj)

11:20 Sacred Healing: The Interplay of Magic and Religion in Georgian Folk Medicine

Georgian folk medicine, deeply rooted in both Christian traditions and pre-Christian beliefs, preserved healing practices that combined herbal remedies with magical rituals, protective spells, and sacred objects. This paper examines the role of religious invocations, amulets, and symbolic actions in healing, as documented in medieval Georgian carabadinis (medical books) and ethnographic sources. By analyzing healing prayers, ritualistic treatments for ailments like eye diseases and wounds, and the use of sanctified substances (such as holy water and blessed oils), the study explores how spiritual and medical practices overlapped. It also draws comparisons with Byzantine and Islamic healing traditions, highlighting the shared belief in divine intervention as part of medical care. Ultimately, this paper argues that the fusion of magic and religion in Georgian folk medicine reflects a broader Eurasian healing tradition, where faith and medicine were not separate, but complementary forces in the pursuit of health.

Speaker: Salome Gviniashvili (Tusheti Protected Landscape)

11:40 The Science of Aging: Metaphors, Medicine and the Quest for Vitality in Early Modern England

This paper examines the linguistic and rhetorical strategies in early modern English medical texts to conceptualise old age, vitality, and life prolongation. Focusing on 16th- to 18th-century works, including reprints of Bacon's The Cure of Old Age, Quersitanus's Practise of Chymicall Physicke, Sennert's Nine Books of Physick, and Salmon's Ars Chirurgica, it explores how aging was metaphorically framed and scientifically rationalised. Central to these texts is the humoral concept of "radical moisture" or the "balsam of life," equating vitality with the gradual depletion of a finite, life-sustaining essence.
Old age is constructed as a phase of depletion and imbalance, contrasted with youthful vigour. Metaphors like the "lamp of life" or "water of life" depict aging's progression, while remedies—dietary regimens, alchemical preparations like potable gold—are presented as restorative or preservative through persuasive rhetoric, reflecting the interplay of science and moralising language.
By situating aging within socio-political and theological discourses, the paper highlights enduring metaphors and shifting paradigms in the cultural understanding of old age. It contributes to the medical humanities, history of science, and sociolinguistics by revealing how early modern English texts framed aging as both a physiological process and a cultural construct.

Speaker: Elisa Ramazzina (University of Insubria)

11:00 → 12:30 S.4.5. Reframing Knowledge: Critical Approaches to Historiography, Evidence, and Representation

Chair: Kaan Üçsu

Conveners: Utku Can Akın (University of Toronto), Andre Araujo (University of Brasilia), Gül Kale (Carleton University)

11:00 How Not to Contextualise Materialism in Ottoman Historiography

This paper provides an in-depth examination of the narrative surrounding “Ottoman materialism” in late Ottoman historiography, focusing particularly on the common assumptions clustered around the Ṭıbbiyye (Medical School) students. While mainstream accounts often conceptualise the so-called “Ottoman modernisation” by contending that institutions such as the Ḥarbiyye (Military Academy), the Mülkiyye (Civil Service School), and the Ṭıbbiyye merely imported “Western thought” and its outputs, this study uncovers far more complex networks of relations and subjectivities. Drawing on European and North American travel accounts (e.g., Charles MacFarlane), along with Ottoman medical curricula, scholarly production, teşrīḥ (dissection) practices, and detailed student profiles, the paper assesses how securely grounded the claims of materialist inclinations at the Ṭıbbiyye truly are. In addition, it considers whether this alleged “Ottoman materialism” developed into a broader intellectual current—intersecting with philosophical, intellectual, and economic domains—rather than simply constituting a transient trend. By moving beyond the notion of the Ṭıbbiyye as a monolithic, transformative institution, the study highlights the diverse subjectivities and strands of thought that shaped it. Admittedly, one can follow standard historiographical perspectives on “modernity” or nation-formation by tracing the medicalisation of life, populations, and bodies. However, the very bodies of these medical students, steeped in centuries of cultural and historical experience, lead us to question overly neat “modernity” theses. Indeed, on closer inspection, nineteenth-century Ottoman debates concentrated predominantly on concepts such as the nefs (self or psyche), consciousness, and the life of the soul—categories that anticipated, or even fused with, emerging notions of psychology.emphasized text

Speaker: Utku Can Akın

11:20 The Graphic (Re)Configuration of Historical Evidence: The Collective Construction of Diplomatics in Eighteenth-Century Germany

This paper explores the collective and material construction of historical knowledge in the Early Modern period, a dimension often neglected in historiography. While traditional studies emphasize epistemological foundations and the uses of history, this research highlights the collaborative processes underlying the production of printed artifacts. It argues that historical knowledge emerged through intricate academic, artistic, and editorial negotiations, involving questions of intellectual and graphic authorship, as well as the creation of reliable editions. These negotiations were especially significant in illustrated publications on eighteenth-century diplomatics, a historical auxiliary science, where the accuracy of graphic representations of authentic documents was essential to the credibility of printed arguments. Drawing on an analysis of nearly thirty printed works from late eighteenth-century Germany, alongside manuscript drafts, correspondences, drawings, engravings, and the original documents depicted, this study demonstrates how the reproduction of authentic documents was shaped by the media through which it was conveyed. By examining these materials from both intellectual and material perspectives, the paper shifts the focus from traditional historiographical concerns to the broader field of the history of knowledge. It reveals how the interplay between media, collective work, and audience expectations fundamentally shaped the (re)configuration of historical evidence in the Early Modern period.

Speaker: Andre Araujo (University of Brasilia (Brazil))

11:40 A Critical Historiography of the Intersection Between History of Architecture and Science in the Islamic World

This paper will look at the intersection between architecture and the history of science in the Islamic world, focusing on the early modern Ottoman empire. It will particularly discuss the role of mathematical sciences in relation to architectural practices. Whereas geometry and arithmetic were important in various artistic practices, their use constantly changed, altering architectural practice and knowledge. Architects relied on specific forms of practical knowledge rather than applying theories. Yet scholarship in the history of science frequently relies on a fixed notion of Islamic architecture, leading to anachronistic reading of this interaction. Through a few case studies based on the sciences of surveying, geometry, and arithmetic, I will argue how it is crucial to critically engage with the transformations in art and architectural histories to understand this evolving relationship better. This reevaluation will also place history of science within its social and cultural context in specific periods while considering its link to the practical realm.

Speaker: Gul Kale (Carleton University)

11:00 → 12:30 S.4.6. Sparks of Knowledge: Early Electrical Science and Mathematical Perspectives

Chair: Meltem Kocaman

Conveners: Lorenzo Voltolina (Università di Padova), Tuğçe Esenduran (Istanbul Technical University), Alessia Salierno (Università degli Studi di Milano)

11:00 Giovanni Poleni and the Early Development of Electrical Science in Northern Italy

The mechanism of diffusion of electrical knowledge in Italy during the first half of the eighteenth century remains an open issue. To what extent did Italian scholars’ original research drive it, and how much did it rely on foreign itinerary demonstrators, called “the Saxons” at the time, who allegedly introduced rotational electrical machines south of the Alps?
This paper explores Giovanni Poleni’s (1683-1761) engagement with electricity from 1742 to 1748, when the interest in this emerging field rapidly diffused through Northern Italy. First Experimental Philosophy professor at the University of Padua and primarily known for his contributions to hydraulics and civil engineering, his role as an active researcher in electrical science remains largely understudied.
By examining Poleni’s national and international correspondence with key figures such as Scipione Maffei, George M. Bose, and Pieter van Musschenbroek, and his unpublished compendium Physices Elementa Mathematica, this study sheds light on the complex network of intellectual exchanges that shaped scientific inquiry across Enlightenment Europe, exploring the dissemination of theoretical knowledge and experimental practices, and highlighting the crucial yet often overlooked role of itinerant demonstrators and instrument makers. Additionally, it provides new evidence concerning the authorship of Dell’Elettricismo (1746), the first Italian book on electricity.

Speaker: Lorenzo Voltolina (Università di Padova)

11:20 Scientific Instruments of the 18th-Century Electrical Phenomena from a Philosophical Perspective: An Analysis in the Light of Sturgeon’s Lectures on Electricity

The emergence of electromagnetism as a distinct phenomenon in the early 19th century marked a significant milestone in the study of electricity and magnetism. However, despite considerable experimental developments, the parental nature of electrical and magnetic forces remained inadequately understood. To have a more comprehensive understanding of the scientific problems of the 19th century, it is essential to examine the main ideas that persisted throughout the 18th century, because these earlier developments formed a basis for later discoveries in electromagnetism. The evolution of natural sciences from philosophical inquiry began in the 17th century and progressed throughout the 18th century, prepared the way for basic principles that influence the modern scientific thought.
The outline of this research is based on Lectures on Electricity, delivered by William Sturgeon at the Royal Victoria Gallery in Manchester during the 1841–1842 session. In those lectures, various philosophical instruments relevant to the study of electrical phenomena from the early 17th to the early 18th century were examined, with a particular focus on their structural composition and the underlying principles governing their function.
These lectures, attended by both public audiences and academic participants, serve as a bridge between philosophical inquiry and the practical applications of early electrical technologies in Victorian England.
Sturgeon’s role as a lecturer positioned him between experimental philosophers and an engaged public eager to explore this emerging scientific field. His work reflects a concerted effort to elucidate the theoretical principles underlying electrical experiments, particularly the fundamental physical laws governing this branch of science. In his lectures, Sturgeon not only contributed to scientific discourse but also facilitated a deeper public understanding of electricity and its implications.
This work aims to contribute to the understanding of 18th century philosophical instruments by offering understanding into the instrumental developments of electrical phenomena, not only from a practical perspective but also in a wider philosophical meaning.

Speaker: Tuğçe Esenduran (Istanbul Technical University)

11:40 Leibniz on the Representation of Geometrical Objects: The Role of Algebra

My talk will be aimed to analyse Leibniz’s position in relation to the use of algebra as a means to represent curves and diagrams in geometry. The reference sources (partially not yet edited) will be the ones concerning the geometric symbolism invented by Leibniz, i.e. the characteristica geometrica. The analysis will begin with the presentation by Leibniz of the difference between a ‘true’ geometric symbolism, i.e. able to convey the construction of the solution of a geometric problem without the cumbersomeness of cartesian algebra, and a speciosa for quantities, a ‘revised’ algebra devoid of the problems implied by the method of Descartes. I will try to situate such a distinction within the context of Leibniz’s discoveries during his Parisian stay (1672-1676), and I will show its developments in the following texts on characteristica geometrica. Eventually, I will try to draw a connection between the representation of geometrical objects in algebra and characteristica geometrica with the expression of other mathematical entities (such as numbers) by other representational devices.

Speaker: Alessia Salierno (Università degli Studi di Milano (Italy))

11:00 → 12:30 W.4.1. How Can We Use the Astrolabe in Education to Inspire a New Generation?

Convener: Willem de Graaf (Utrecht University)

11:00 How Can We Use the Astrolabe in Education to Inspire A New Generation?

The astrolabe is one of the most prominent examples of mathematical ingenuity and craftsmanship in the Islamic scientific tradition. The astrolabe is a portable instrument with which the (apparent) movements of the sun and stars around the Earth can be represented. The main application of the astrolabe is the determination of time. Other applications include finding the position of the sun and stars, with respect to both the horizon and the meridian, and determining the prayer times and qibla. Ottoman astronomers used the astrolabe until the beginning of the 20th century. The instrument can be found in the inventory lists of military engineering academies even in the period of modernisation.

In this workshop we primarily focus on the astrolabe in the early modern Ottoman scientific tradition and explore together how the astrolabe can be made accessible to a non-expert audience, especially to school pupils and university students, in Turkey, and elsewhere.

In the first part of this workshop (15 minutes) we discuss the astrolabe in the early modern Ottoman scientific tradition and list the extant astrolabes.

In the second part of this workshop (45 minutes) we expose the participants to the astrolabe workshop. In the astrolabe workshop the participants receive a plastic and paper model of the astrolabe of Abū Maḥmūd Khujandī made in 985 CE, together with a handout with exercises. The model has been recomputed for the latitude of Istanbul, that is for 41 degrees North. We chose the astrolabe of Khujandī to base the model on, since it is not only one of the oldest extant astrolabes, but also the first one that was designed in an artistic way. The astrolabe is currently displayed at the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar.

After an introduction, the participants will work on the handout exercises, preferably in groups of up to 4 participants, and under supervision of the workshop instructors, to determine the length of the day and the local time, and find the direction of the sun and the qibla. In doing these exercises, the participants will realise the depth of the astrolabe from their own experience. The participants may also learn some mathematics and astronomy on the way. The astrolabe workshop does not require previous knowledge of mathematics and astronomy.

In the third part of this workshop (30 minutes) the participants reflect on the astrolabe workshop in groups. As a workshop instructor, I will share my own experiences with performing astrolabe workshops for a variety of audiences, most notably for university students and high school students in Turkey, but also for a variety of groups in other countries, such as Algeria, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan, over the years 2006-2025. I will discuss how in my view to best perform these workshops and tailor the materials, i.e., the astrolabe model and the handout exercises, to specific audiences. These audiences can be a general public without any background in mathematics, school pupils, university students, astronomy enthusiasts, an expert audience of mathematicians, people from different cultural backgrounds, and more. I would like to hear from the participants how in their view the astrolabe can be used as an educational tool and source of inspiration for pupils and students in history of science, mathematics and astronomy. Together with the participants, we may also discuss potential other and new ways to perform workshops with the astrolabe. And ultimately, what astrolabe from the early modern Ottoman scientific tradition would be the best choice to base an astrolabe model on.

Time permitting, I will also explain how the astrolabe workshop can be a first element of a multi-day programme about the astrolabe. Other workshops in this programme could deal with the Arabic alphabetic numeral system called abjad and involve reading and interpreting the abjad numbers on an astrolabe. The workshop series could culminate in having the participants draw their own astrolabe on a sheet of paper.

I can also explain how the teaching philosophy of the astrolabe workshop can be extented to similar workshops about other instruments from the Islamic scientific tradition.

Speaker: Willem de Graaf (Utrecht University)

12:30 → 14:30 Lunch & Optional visit to the IU Turkish Hamam Culture Museum, Rıdvan Çelikel Archaeology Museum or IU Rare Books Library Collections (Registration Required)

14:30 → 15:30 P.4.1. Medicine and Slavery in the Early Modern Mediterranean World

Chair: Mustafa Yavuz

Conveners: Valentina Pugliano (Ca' Foscari University of Venice), Ana Struillou (Institute of Historical Research, London)

14:30 Medicine and Slavery in the Early Modern Mediterranean World

Part of the panel organized by Valentina Pugliano (Ca' Foscari), and including as speakers Valentina Pugliano, Ana Struillou (IHR, London).

Rationale: Throughout the early modern period the Mediterranean was a major stage for practices of enslavement, affecting millions of individuals across ethnic groups, religious communities, and social ranks. While the medicalization of race and, more recently, slave medicine have become key entry points for the study of Atlantic slavery, the same cannot be said for the Mediterranean context, where enslavement has been traditionally examined from the viewpoint of religious and economic history. Yet, we know, for instance, that the role of physicians was crucial in the selection process of convict and slave galley rowers, and in defining the monetary value of captives. We are beginning to appreciate that bagnos (the slave enclosures dotting the Mediterranean coast, both Christian and Muslim) served economic interests but were also key structures through which early modern states conceived the management of public health. We are also beginning to uncover how captives were crucial for the transfer of medical and pharmaceutical knowledge, and material culture, from one side of the Mediterranean to the other, and beyond. This panel tries to provide a first corrective, aware that the heterogeneity of contexts, perspectives and lived experiences across the wider Mediterranean world cannot be easily reduced to generalities.

Presenter: Valentina Pugliano

Title of the paper: Alessandro Pini (1653-1717), medico condotto: galley slavery, medical practice and Venetian public health

In a dramatic reversal of fortunes typical of Mediterranean slavery, the Florentine physician Alessandro Pini (1653-1717) ended his life in Istanbul’s slave bagno. For the previous twenty-five years, after a stint in the 1680s exploring Egyptian flora for the Granduke of Florence and a summer corsairing with the military Order of St. Stephen, Pini’s job had been to ensure the health of convicts and slaves, alongside Christian merchants and soldiers, first as galley physician in the Venetian fleet engaged in the Peloponnese wars against the Ottomans, and then as personal doctor to the Venetian ambassador in Istanbul. In contact with Italian scholars including his patron Francesco Redi and the apothecary Diacinto Cestoni, he had expressly chosen such positions to cultivate his interests in cartography, archaeology and natural history. Pini’s case is instructive not only of the variety of contradictory roles which early modern physicians played in the Mediterranean slave trade; but also, because he was one cog in a much larger public health initiative established by the Venetian Republic in the eastern Mediterranean and Levant to guard its representatives, manage the threats of plague epidemics, and also – a facet still in need of study – preserve its convict and captive population.

Presenter: Ana Struillou

Title of the paper: Captivity, Slavery and Circulation of Medical Knowledge between Early Modern Spain and North Africa

From the sixteenth century onwards, the expansion of North African privateering in the Western Mediterranean led to the captivity of a growing number of medical practitioners from the Spanish littoral, including surgeons and barbers serving aboard Iberian vessels. At the same time, Spanish military incursions along the North African coast resulted in the forced migration of enslaved Maghribi practitioners to the Iberian Peninsula. This paper examines these reciprocal movements of captive and enslaved medical practitioners across the Strait of Gibraltar during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. By focusing on the material environment of these male and female healers, and how they continued to practice medicine on the other side of the Mediterranean, this paper explores the dynamics of the circulation of practical knowledge across the Western Mediterranean and the role of various forms of forced mobility in shaping its diffusion. At a time when practices associated with Islam faced increasing repression in the Iberian Peninsula, this paper also interrogates the nature and the shape of the archives that allow us to unearth the itineraries of medical knowledge and expertise across the region.

Speakers: Valentina Pugliano (Ca' Foscari University of Venice (Italy)), Ana Struillou (Institute of Historical Research, London (England))

14:30 → 15:30 P.4.2. Inside/Outside the ‘Box’: Boundaries, Materiality and Affect in the Early Modern Home

Chair: Matthijs Jonker

Conveners: Christine Quach (University of Maryland), Nur'ain Taha (Utrecht University)

14:30 Inside/Outside the ‘Box’: Boundaries, Materiality and Affect in the Early Modern Home

Panel Description:

Boxes are often thought of as containers to enclose, conceal or protect items. This panel brings together three case studies of objects located within the interior spaces, found in the early modern Dutch Republic, across the Indian Ocean, and in Sri Lanka, all of which constitute personal objects with which their owners and makers maintain an intimate connection.

Objects located within these private spaces have often been analysed through the lens of fashion, decorative types, time period, or their users. With the advent of sensory history and the history of emotions, we can adopt new approaches to reconstruct how individuals, from makers to owners, would have physically encountered and interacted with objects and their materiality.

In this panel, we seek points of commonality in affective engagement with personal objects, even though our objects are found in distinct cultural contexts. By taking a closer look at the qualities that make up a ‘box’, these case studies demonstrate how boundary-making and materiality became significant in the eye of the beholder. In this way, we propose to reassess the ‘box’ as a concept and as an effective form in early modern interior spaces.

References:

Appadurai, Arjun. The Social Life of Things : Commodities in Cultural Perspective. Cambridge University Press, 1986.

Bachelard, Gaston. The Poetics of Space. Beacon Press, 1969.

Brittenham, Claudia. Vessels: The Object As Container. Oxford University Press, 2019.

Broomhall, Susan. Spaces for Feeling : Emotions and Sociabilities in Britain, 1650-1850. Routledge, 2015.

Gerritsen, Anne, and Giorgio Riello. The Global Lives of Things : The Material Culture of Connections in the Early Modern World. Routledge, 2016.

Musillo, Marco. “Exchanging Something Between Europe and Asia: Valuable Gifts or Empty Boxes?” European History Quarterly 50, no. 3 (2020): 524–34.

Razzall, Lucy. Boxes and Books in Early Modern England. Cambridge University Press, 2021.

Um, Nancy. “Nested Containers for Maritime Journeys: Tools of Aromatic Diplomacy around the Late Seventeenth- and Early Eighteenth-Century Indian Ocean.” West 86th 25, no. 2 (2018): 199–223.

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Presenter: Christine Quach, Doctoral Candidate, University of Maryland

Title of the paper: Capturing Time: Temporal Shifts in Boxed Enclosures

Beds have a notably box-like character and appearance in the seventeenth century which raises questions about the relationship between the inside of the “box” and the exterior world. If a person is sleeping inside the box-like confines of a bed, how does their temporality differ from the one on the outside? Is there any form of interaction between the interior of the bed and the room on the exterior? And by extension, could temporality be implicated in boxes in general, as their contents are contained at one moment and sealed off from the business of the world? This paper explores the temporal interactions between the objects inside boxes and their exterior environment. I examine how items kept in boxes play a key role in the ways in which temporality manifests inside the confined space. As temporalities may shift based on a box’s content, the boundaries between the interior of the box and its exterior become blurred. Using phenomenological concepts, I explore how the enclosed space becomes permeable depending on the state of the object contained and the box’s wall material. As the border between interior and exterior dissolves, temporality takes on a more complex meaning for the enclosed object.

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Presenter: Nur'Ain Taha, Doctoral Researcher, Utrecht University

Title of the paper: Whalebone Wonders: Materiality, Craft and Knowledge of Baleen Boxes in Early Modern Netherlands

At the start of the Dutch whaling industry in the early seventeenth century, the lack of knowledge in hunting and processing whales led to various attempts to find ways in maximising profits from this dangerous and high risk trade. From the covered whale oil to the utilisation of whalebone, the Noordse Compagnie undertook extensive efforts, collaborating with merchants and craft makers to maximise the commercial potential of various whale by-products. This paper examines the seemingly simple baleen boxes not merely as functional containers but as objects that are embedded with knowledge. How has the expansion of the Dutch whaling industry affected the knowledge and understanding of these marine mammals? How has encounters with whale byproducts affected the Dutch craft making industry? The shaping of the baleen into bodies of objects required craft makers to understand not only its material properties, and develop new techniques to fully exploit its potential. It also entailed various processes of administration such as regulation of patents. Through the materiality of the baleen boxes, I explore not only the knowledge of craft making, but also the long history of the Dutch whale industry in the early modern period as reflected in these objects.

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Appendix: List of Images

Speakers: Christine Quach (University of Maryland), Nur'ain Taha (Utrecht University)

14:30 → 15:30 S.4.7. Astronomy in Practice: Instruments, Texts, and Cross-Cultural Dialogues

Chair: Florence Somer

Conveners: Mostafa Yavari (University of Tehran, Institute for the History of Science), Kaveh Niazi (Stanford Online High School)

14:30 The Unsanctified Space: Observatories in Islamic Lands

The two major observatories built in Samarkand and Istanbul during the 15th and 16th centuries, as the last significant observatories in the Islamic world, shared a common fate: both were destroyed. However, the circumstances of their destruction and the historical narratives surrounding their demise differ. The reasons behind their destruction appear to remain shrouded in ambiguity and popular stories, but perhaps local historical texts can provide more information about these destructions.

The Samarkand Observatory was built by Ulugh Beg in 1420. During his rule over Samarkand, this observatory was able to carry out an observational program, and its results led to the writing of astronomical tables. However, with the death of Ulugh Beg, the observatory lost its momentum, was forgotten, and eventually fell into ruin. In less reliable stories, there is always talk of the observatory's destruction after Ulugh Beg's death, as if the narrators of these stories believe that the observatory only survived with Ulugh Beg's power and had to be destroyed after that. Similar popular folklore can be seen about the end of the Maragheh Observatory as well. Interestingly, these stories do not mention Ulugh Beg's madrasa, where the same astronomical studies were taught, and the madrasa still stands today.

The Istanbul Observatory was also built by order of Sultan Murad III in 1575 and was destroyed by his order only five years later. The main reasons given for the destruction of this observatory are religious objections and political rivalries. The appearance of the 1577 comet and the outbreak of plague are mentioned as factors that intensified these objections and the final cause.

In Istanbul, too, after the destruction of the observatory, astronomical studies continued to be taught in madrasas, and no madrasas were destroyed. However, the observatory, as an unsanctified space, was easily removed. What distinguishes the observatory from other places of this era is the view that exists about it. The experience of all three observatories of Maragheh, Samarkand, and Istanbul shows that these observatories did not have social, religious, or popular acceptance and were able to survive only as long as they had the support of powerful patrons. The funding for these institutions, similar to the Maragheh Observatory, came from endowments. Does this lack of acceptance stem from the nature of their scientific pursuits, or was curiosity about divine secrets and the heavens not very acceptable at all? Were these institutions, in fact, considered unsanctified places in the minds of the people?

To answer these questions, we have tried to find an answer not from the astronomical texts of scholars, but from local histories and secondary reports that, in addition to reporting historical events, have combined popular analyses, stories, and folklore.

Speaker: Mostafa Yavari (University of Tehran, Institute for the History of Science)

14:50 An Astronomical Summa of the Safavid Era: Tashrīḥ al-Aflāk by Bahāʾ al-Dīn al-ʿĀmilī

The Lebanese born scholar Bahāʾ al-Dīn al-ʿĀmilī (953/1547-1030/1621), known as Shaikh Bahāʾī, was a key cultural figure of the Safavid court of Shah ʿAbbās I (995/1587-1038/1629). Among his most popular scientific works was Tashrīḥ al-aflāk (“Explanation of the Celestial Spheres”), which has survived in numerous copies to the present day. The author identifies this short work as a “summary” at several points, while excusing himself from presenting a full explication of the subject matter at hand. Indeed, the highly condensed presentation of the discussions in Tashrīḥ al-aflāk, the absence of many standard topics, such as the planetary anomalies, and many missing astronomical parameters (such as the angular motions for the various orbs) were likely what led the author to subsequently compose a commentary for the work. Bahāʾī’s preoccupation with astronomy is reflected in the fact that he wrote commentaries, as well, on other works, including al-Mulakhkhaṣ fī al-hayʾa al-basīṭa (“The Summary of plain hayʾa,”) by Maḥmūd Jaghmīnī (fl. early 13th century CE) and al-Tadhkira fī ʿilm al- hayʾa (“Memoir on the Science of hayʾa,”), by Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274). The present study examines Tashrīḥ al-aflāk in view of the influence of his predecessors, particularly Jaghmīnī and ʿAlī Qūshjī (d. 879/1474), while highlighting some of the unexpected features of the Tashrīḥ al-aflāk, as well.

Speaker: Kaveh Niazi (Stanford Online High School)

15:30 → 15:45 Coffee Break

15:45 → 16:45 Conference Closing and Annual General Meeting

16:45 → 17:30 Conference Photoshoot & Gathering in Hall of Honor (Şeref Holü) before proceeding to the Istanbul University Observatory for Closing Reception

17:30 → 19:00 Tour of the Historical Telescope, Gleissberg Astronomical Collection, Planetarium Show

19:00 → 21:30 Evening Reception – Istanbul University Observatory Garden