The Minerva-Gentner Symposium on Burchard of Mount Sion’s Descriptio Terrae Sanctae, organized by Ingrid Baumgärtner and Jonathan Rubin, was held at Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan, Israel, from 28 November to 1 December 2022. In the workshop, German, Israeli, Italian and British scholars discussed the challenges – on the level of content, textual philology and technology – of publishing this work in print and digital form. The focus of the discussion was on questions relating to the new edition of the Descriptio , ...

Rezension von Ingrid Baumgärtner zu: Colin Dupont, Cartographie et pouvoir au XVIe siècle. L’atlas de Jacques de Deventer. (TERRARVM ORBIS. Histoire des répresentations de l’espace: textes, images, vol. 16.) Turnhout, Brepols 2019. 351 S., 89 Abb., € 120,–.

Rezension von Ingrid Baumgärtner zu: Christiane M. Thomsen, Burchards Bericht über den Orient. Reiseerfahrungen eines staufischen Gesandten im Reich Saladins 1175/1176 (Europa im Mittelalter. Abhandlungen und Beiträge zur historischen Komparatistik 29). Berlin, Boston, De Gruyter 2018. VII, 654 S. 26 Abb.

In this paper,we evaluate various medieval cartographic and diagrammatic representations of the Holy Land. The analysis focuses particularly on the religious dimensions of these representations and their potential for making pilgrimage accessible, creating religious symbolism and exciting spiritual emotions. The leading hypothesis is that medieval mapmakers introduced special technical features into maps and similar cartographic representations to deepen religious emotions and to stimulate intense sensory responses ...

Research communication has been gaining public attention in recent years. Therefore, medievalists also need to focus on the transfer of their research topics to the public both within and outside the university. Based on current political demands calling for a change in communication culture, the article first of all deals theoretically with two different concepts of research communication, by distinguishing between forms of translation and those of popularization. Numerous public events, exhibitions, and cooperative ...

Rezension von Ingrid Baumgärtner zu: Katrin Kogman-Appel, Catalan Maps and Jewish Books. The Intellectual Profile of Elisha ben Abraham Cresques (1325-1387) (Terrarum Orbis, Vol. 15), Turnhout, Brepols 2020. 358 S., 108 Abb., € 125,-.

Auf der Suche nach dem ‚richtigen‘ kartographischen Wissen prallten im 15. Jahrhundert recht gegensätzliche Vorstellungen aufeinander: Die praktischen Erfahrungen von Seeleuten standen gegen die Anschauungen der gelehrten Kosmographen, die neuen Entdeckungen des Christoph Kolumbus gegen die alten Vermessungen des Claudius Ptolemäus, mündlich vorgetragene Erklärungen gegen schriftlich tradierte Einsichten, die Erweiterungen des geographischen Weltbilds gegen allgemein bekannte Traditionen, lokale Verfahrensweisen gegen ...

Rezension von Ingrid Baumgärtner zu: Alfred Hiatt, Cartography between Christian Europe and the Arabic-Islamic World, 1100–1500. Divergent Traditions. Maps, Spaces, Cultures, Vol. 3. 2021 Brill Leiden, 978-90-04-44491-1, € 100,58

This essay concentrates on the creative potential of mapping for the subsequent processing of travels, experiences, and descriptions as well as on the associated cultural techniques, such as copying, imitating, quoting, de-contextualizing, re-contextualizing, and transplantation. It focuses on the transformation from travel to map and from the map back to the space traveled. Based on examples in which travel knowledge and cartographic skills are intertwined, the essay illuminates the wide spectrum of possibilities ...