Latest by Florike Egmond
I disegni e i discorsi di Giovanni Antonio Nigrone «fontanaro e ingegniero de acqua» (1585-1609 ca.)
This whole volume, edited by Gaia Bruno and David Gentilcore, is in Open access and can be downlo... more This whole volume, edited by Gaia Bruno and David Gentilcore, is in Open access and can be downloaded from the website of publisher Viella, together with the first volume with text edition and images
Gesnerus, 2016
Conrad Gessner's Historia animalium is a compilation of information from a variety of sources: fr... more Conrad Gessner's Historia animalium is a compilation of information from a variety of sources: friends, correspondents, books, broadsides, drawings, as well as his own experience. The discovery in 2010-12 of a cache of drawings at Amsterdam originally belonging to Gessner has added a new dimension for research into the role of images in Gessner's study of nature. In this paper, we examine the drawings that were the basis of the images in the volume of fishes. We uncovered several cases where there were multiple copies of the same drawing of a fish (rather than multiple drawings of the samefish), which problematizes the notion of unique "original" copies and their copies. While we still know very little about the actual mechanism of, or people involved in, commissioning or generating copies of drawings, their very existence suggests that the images functioned as an important medium in the circulation of knowledge in the early modern period.
Conrad Gessner's Historia animalium is a compilation of information from a variety of sources: fr... more Conrad Gessner's Historia animalium is a compilation of information from a variety of sources: friends, correspondents, books, broadsides, drawings, as well as his own experience. The recent discovery of a cache of drawings at Amsterdam originally belonging to Gessner has added a new dimension for research into the role of images in Gessner's study of nature. In this paper, we examine the drawings that were the basis of the images in the volume of fishes. We uncovered several cases where there were multiple copies of the same drawing of a fish (rather than multiple drawings of the same fish), which problematizes the notion of unique "original" copies and their copies. While we still know very little about the actual mechanism of, or people involved in, commissioning or generating copies of drawings, their very existence suggests that the images functioned as an important medium in the circulation of knowledge in the early modern period.
in: The Invention of Humboldt. On the Geopolitics of Knowledge, eds. Mark Thurner & Jorge Canizares-Esguerra (Routledge) , 2023
THIS ESSAY IS NOT AT ALL IN AGREEMENT WITH THE INTRODUCTION TO THE VOLUME BY CAÑIZARES AND TURNER... more THIS ESSAY IS NOT AT ALL IN AGREEMENT WITH THE INTRODUCTION TO THE VOLUME BY CAÑIZARES AND TURNER - FROM WHICH I WANT TO TAKE MY DISTANCE.
This essay places the iconic ascent of Chimborazo by Humboldt, Bonpland and companions, and Humboldt’s analysis of plant geography in the long-term context of a European style of doing science (esp. in botany and geology) linked to methodologies in which autopsy, fieldwork, and site-specific expertise played key roles. The parameters of that style were set in the 16th century and especially in Italy. Humboldt travelled in Italy both before and immediately after (1805) his American journey, in part to compare American volcanoes with Italian ones. In particular his Italian journey of 1805 has been characterized as crucial to Humboldt’s own interpretation of his American experience and findings in a comparative perspective. Fieldwork and personal observation on the spot that resulted in ‘a sense of place’ were as much part of Humboldt’s style and practice as was his emphasis on measuring and the use of instruments.
Andrew Dalby & Annette Giesecke (eds.), A Cultural History of Plants in the Early Modern Period (1400-1650). Part of the Bloomsbury series: A Cultural History of Plants. , 2022
This is a survey article on early modern medicinal botany.
SCIENTIAE IN THE HISTORY OF MEDICINE, edited by Fabrizio Baldassarri and Fabio Zampieri, pp. 89-120., 2021
In the middle of the sixteenth century, a young physician from the south of Germany undertook a l... more In the middle of the sixteenth century, a young physician from the south of Germany undertook a long journey in order to improve his professional knowledge. During this medical peregrination that lasted some seven years (1548-1555), Lorenz Gryll (also Laurentius Gryllus, 1524?-1560) visited nearly the whole of Western Europe. His trip was funded by the extremely wealthy Fugger family, and one of its explicit purposes was that Gryll – after his return to Germany – would help improve the standards of medicine and medical teaching in his native region by introducing what he had learned in the core zones of medical innovation in Europe, that is Italy and France. Gryll’s journey, which we can follow thanks to his own account, triggers the main themes in this contribution about university gardens, medicine and botany in the 16th century: how medicinal were these university gardens, and in which contexts can we study their functions and uses? This excursion ultimately reveals the multifunctional organization of university gardens that went beyond mere medical teaching and ultimately shaped early modern culture.
Books by Florike Egmond
This is a pdf of the whole monograph.
The World of Carolus Clusius. Natural History in the Makin... more This is a pdf of the whole monograph.
The World of Carolus Clusius. Natural History in the Making, 1550-1610 explores how natural history in Europe, and in particular the knowledge of plants, was transformed during the late 16th and very early 17th centuries into a field of professional expertise, a budding scientific discipline. This book presents not a history of ideas, publications or institutions, however, but a cultural and social history of people’s fascination with nature and the transformation of knowledge during this period. The formation of expertise is studied through its practical manifestations – gardening, collecting plants and animals, botanical field research, and exchanging knowledge – and the personalities involved in them.
The complete edition of the Gessner Platter albums with animal drawings in Amsterdam
Contents:
Introduction
PART I: Nature captured
1 GREEN FASHION: painted naturalia in collect... more Contents:
Introduction
PART I: Nature captured
1 GREEN FASHION: painted naturalia in collections
2 ORGANIZING NATURE: painted albums as collections
3 IN AND OUT OF ORDER
PART II: Untrue to life
4 PERSUASIVE HIGH DEFINITION
5 RENDERING FOR RECOGNITION
6 ZOOM: relevant detail in the visual study of nature
PART III: Micro before the microscope
7 MINUTE OBSERVATION
8 VISUAL DISSECTION
Conclusion
Biographical notes on collectors, naturalists, painters
Abbreviations & Appendix
References
Select bibliography
List of Illustrations
Index
Carolus Clusius (Arras 1526-Leiden 1609) was one of the most eminent botanists of the European Re... more Carolus Clusius (Arras 1526-Leiden 1609) was one of the most eminent botanists of the European Renaissance. His name is closely connected with the introduction of many exotic plants in Europe, in particular the tulip. In this volume a group of distinguished scholars explore his role in both the botanical renaissance and the genesis of botany as a field of study. Clusius’ wide-ranging correspondence provides a rich source of information and documents the formation of the European community of naturalists.
... The mammoth and the mouse: Microhistory and morphology. Post a Comment. CONTRIBUTORS: Author:... more ... The mammoth and the mouse: Microhistory and morphology. Post a Comment. CONTRIBUTORS: Author: Egmond, Florike. Author: Mason, Peter (b. 1952, d. ----. PUBLISHER: Johns Hopkins University Press (Baltimore). SERIES TITLE: YEAR: 1997. ...
Articles by Florike Egmond
History Workshop Journal, 1999
Page 1. A horse called Belisarius by Florike Egmond and Peter Mason THE HORSE AND THE MAN In addi... more Page 1. A horse called Belisarius by Florike Egmond and Peter Mason THE HORSE AND THE MAN In addition ... Belisarius was restored to honour the following year, and died in 565. Most of our knowledge about Belisarius is ...
Early Modern Zoology: The Construction of Animals in Science, Literature and the Visual Arts, 2007
History of Universities, 2008
in: Elisabeth Oy-Marra and Irina Schmiedel (eds), Zeigen – Überzeugen – Beweisen. Methoden der Wissensproduktion in Kunstliteratur, Kennerschaft und Sammlungspraxis der Frühen Neuzeit, 2020
Worlds of Natural History, edited by Helen Anne Curry, Nick Jardine, James A. Secord, and Emma Spary (Cambridge University Press), pp. 78-93, 2018
A Europe-wide disciplinary community emerged in the course of the long 16th century – well before... more A Europe-wide disciplinary community emerged in the course of the long 16th century – well before scientific societies and journals did in the course of the 17th century. This article argues that exchanges of information in text and image as well as of objects (naturalia) predicated on the many overlapping and crisscrossing personal networks of exchange (by letter, object and personal encounter) constituted not merely a means of communication but both the mode of interaction and the backbone of this natural history community. Circulation and exchanges of objects, textual and visual information also helped to circumscribe a joint research project to identify, name and inventorize nature, in which humanist philological traditions, the revived interest in classical antiquity and the medical training of many naturalists played an important part.
Journal of Early Modern Studies [edited by Oana Matei and Fabrizio Baldassarri], Volume 6, Issue 1 , 2017
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Latest by Florike Egmond
This essay places the iconic ascent of Chimborazo by Humboldt, Bonpland and companions, and Humboldt’s analysis of plant geography in the long-term context of a European style of doing science (esp. in botany and geology) linked to methodologies in which autopsy, fieldwork, and site-specific expertise played key roles. The parameters of that style were set in the 16th century and especially in Italy. Humboldt travelled in Italy both before and immediately after (1805) his American journey, in part to compare American volcanoes with Italian ones. In particular his Italian journey of 1805 has been characterized as crucial to Humboldt’s own interpretation of his American experience and findings in a comparative perspective. Fieldwork and personal observation on the spot that resulted in ‘a sense of place’ were as much part of Humboldt’s style and practice as was his emphasis on measuring and the use of instruments.
Books by Florike Egmond
The World of Carolus Clusius. Natural History in the Making, 1550-1610 explores how natural history in Europe, and in particular the knowledge of plants, was transformed during the late 16th and very early 17th centuries into a field of professional expertise, a budding scientific discipline. This book presents not a history of ideas, publications or institutions, however, but a cultural and social history of people’s fascination with nature and the transformation of knowledge during this period. The formation of expertise is studied through its practical manifestations – gardening, collecting plants and animals, botanical field research, and exchanging knowledge – and the personalities involved in them.
Introduction
PART I: Nature captured
1 GREEN FASHION: painted naturalia in collections
2 ORGANIZING NATURE: painted albums as collections
3 IN AND OUT OF ORDER
PART II: Untrue to life
4 PERSUASIVE HIGH DEFINITION
5 RENDERING FOR RECOGNITION
6 ZOOM: relevant detail in the visual study of nature
PART III: Micro before the microscope
7 MINUTE OBSERVATION
8 VISUAL DISSECTION
Conclusion
Biographical notes on collectors, naturalists, painters
Abbreviations & Appendix
References
Select bibliography
List of Illustrations
Index
Articles by Florike Egmond
This essay places the iconic ascent of Chimborazo by Humboldt, Bonpland and companions, and Humboldt’s analysis of plant geography in the long-term context of a European style of doing science (esp. in botany and geology) linked to methodologies in which autopsy, fieldwork, and site-specific expertise played key roles. The parameters of that style were set in the 16th century and especially in Italy. Humboldt travelled in Italy both before and immediately after (1805) his American journey, in part to compare American volcanoes with Italian ones. In particular his Italian journey of 1805 has been characterized as crucial to Humboldt’s own interpretation of his American experience and findings in a comparative perspective. Fieldwork and personal observation on the spot that resulted in ‘a sense of place’ were as much part of Humboldt’s style and practice as was his emphasis on measuring and the use of instruments.
The World of Carolus Clusius. Natural History in the Making, 1550-1610 explores how natural history in Europe, and in particular the knowledge of plants, was transformed during the late 16th and very early 17th centuries into a field of professional expertise, a budding scientific discipline. This book presents not a history of ideas, publications or institutions, however, but a cultural and social history of people’s fascination with nature and the transformation of knowledge during this period. The formation of expertise is studied through its practical manifestations – gardening, collecting plants and animals, botanical field research, and exchanging knowledge – and the personalities involved in them.
Introduction
PART I: Nature captured
1 GREEN FASHION: painted naturalia in collections
2 ORGANIZING NATURE: painted albums as collections
3 IN AND OUT OF ORDER
PART II: Untrue to life
4 PERSUASIVE HIGH DEFINITION
5 RENDERING FOR RECOGNITION
6 ZOOM: relevant detail in the visual study of nature
PART III: Micro before the microscope
7 MINUTE OBSERVATION
8 VISUAL DISSECTION
Conclusion
Biographical notes on collectors, naturalists, painters
Abbreviations & Appendix
References
Select bibliography
List of Illustrations
Index
With a Foreword by Sir David Attenborough
Contributors are: Marie Addyman, Peter Barnard, Paul D. Brinkman, Ian Convery, Peter Davis, Felix Driver, Florike Egmond, Annemarie Jordan Gschwend, Geoff Hancock, Stephen Harris, Hanna Hodacs, Stuart Houston, Dominik Huenniger, Rob Huxley, Charlie Jarvis, Malgosia Nowak-Kemp, Shepard Krech III, Mark Lawley, Arthur Lucas, Marco Masseti, Geoff Moore, Pat Morris, Charles Nelson, Robert Peck, Helen Scales, Han F. Vermeulen, and Glyn Williams.
In this panel, we aim to discuss the study of plants in different contexts, periods, and areas from Late Middle Ages to the Early Modern world. The recent scholarship has highlighted the importance of the study of vegetation in diverse areas of human activity, thereby suggesting that the claim that botany was just a secondary branch of knowledge
throughout the ages is not supported by documentation. In contrast, this field of knowledge stands as a complex assmeblage of inputs, aims, case studies, and methodologies, and reveals a broader confrontation with nature as a whole. In this panel, we would like to approach this through different case studies. These cases involve a wide range of practices and practitioners (botanists, alchemists, physicians, natural scholars, philosophers and collectors) and concerns as, for example, (a) the exchanges of specimens, seeds, or parts of plants, (b) the study of herbs in pharmaco-therapeutics, (c) the naturalphilosophical
attempts to explain vegetal bodies, and (d) the natural-historical work of representing and cataloguing specimens’ diversities. Ultimately, the aim of the panel is to explore the complexity and the intersections in the knowledge of the second realm of nature.