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Definitions of cosmography and geography in the wake of Ptolemy's Geography

Tessicini, Dario

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Authors

Dario Tessicini



Contributors

Z. Shalev
Editor

C. Burnett
Editor

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to examine the ways in which the terminological and disciplinary distinction between cosmography and geography was understood by Renaissance and early modern editors, translators, and commentators of Ptolemy’s Geography. Throughout the period under examination (roughly, 1400 – 1600), cosmography was often connected to practical enterprises such as navigation, or cartographical surveys, as well as being variously intertwined with, or linked to traditional disciplines such as geography and astronomy1. Yet, it was not intended as a united body of knowledge: its content varied from navigation to mining surveys, mathematics, astronomy, geography, even including practical travel guides, such as a 1637 survey of the inns and lodgings of London.2 Notable items comprise the historical and geographical account by Enea Silvio Piccolomini, the biblical interpretations of Guillaume Postel, the geographical descriptions of Thomas Munster, the mathematical and geometrical problems of Francesco Maurolico, and, last but not least, the astronomical speculations of Johannes Kepler’s Mysterium cosmographicum.3 In fact, Kepler was involved in a curious incident regarding the status and boundaries of cosmography when his work was included in the book dealers’ catalogues alongside Sebastian Münster’s geography. In the second edition (1621) of the Mysterium, Kepler complained: ‘Thus the word cosmography is commonly used to mean geography; and that title, though it is drawn from the universe, has induced bookshops and those who compose book catalogues, to include my little book under geography. Nevertheless I have taken the mystery as a secret, and marketed this discovery as such’. This example suggests that at least up until 1600 different notions of cosmography coexisted, interacted and eventually collided.

Citation

Tessicini, D. (2011). Definitions of cosmography and geography in the wake of Ptolemy's Geography. In Z. Shalev, & C. Burnett (Eds.), Ptolemy's geography in the Renaissance (51-69). Warburg Institute

Publication Date Jan 1, 2011
Deposit Date Apr 14, 2016
Publicly Available Date Mar 29, 2024
Publisher Warburg Institute
Pages 51-69
Series Title Warburg Institute Colloquia
Book Title Ptolemy's geography in the Renaissance.
Chapter Number 3
Publisher URL http://warburg.sas.ac.uk/?id=620

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