Geographical Treatise Research Articles

Resolving Gender Ambiguity: An Initial Approach to Hermaphroditism in al-Andalus: The Case of the “Bearded Woman” of Tudela

ABSTRACT In the context of al-Andalus, intersexuality is a topic that has received limited exploration, despite its significance. Within this landscape, a narration discovered in al-Bakrī’s geographical treatise, which details a forced change of gender, prompts us to question the role of undetermined gender in al-Andalus. This offers a unique opportunity to delve into the legal distinctions between men and women, the perceptions of masculinity and femininity and, particularly, an initial exploration of how khuntha was perceived in a pre-modern Islamic society like al-Andalus, comparing also with other accounts coming from Eastern sources.

Antiquarianism or Taḥqīq? Guillaume Postel’s Reading of Abu’l-Fidā’s Taqwīm al-Buldān

Abstract This paper retraces Guillaume Postel’s (1510–1581) initial acquisition of a copy of Taqwīm al-Buldān (The Arrangement of Countries), a geographical treatise of the historian and geographer Abu’l-Fidā (672/1273–732/1331) and offers an analysis of his reading of the text through a careful examination of the manuscript itself, hitherto ignored by scholarship. After the introduction and the examination of the manuscript, I will discuss the use Postel made of the Arabic geography in his cosmographical writings advancing the hypothesis that Postel’s cosmography somehow shares a similar approach to Abu’l-Fidā with respect to the concept of “tradition.” Finally, by offering an analysis of a parallel to Postel’s appropriation of Taqwīm al-Buldān, i.e., Hajji Ahmed’s cordiform map, I will propose a new way to re-contextualize the surge of cosmographical works in sixteenth-century Europe, as, at least in part, a product of post-Mongol taḥqīq.

Древнейшие греческие географы о Понте Евксинском и его окрестностях

Anaximander of Miletus, Hecataeus of Miletus and Scylax of Caryanda, representatives of the Archaic Ionian scholarship, were the earliest Greek geographers (6th century B.C.). The philosopher Anaximander drew the first map (still very schematic one); the historian Hecataeus improved this map towards more detailed elaboration and also wrote the first periegesis (“Description of the Earth”); the seafarer Scylax was the author of the first periplus (although at such an early stage of development of Greek prose literature the genres of periegesis and periplus still had little difference between each other). The article deals with extant data of these writers on the Black Sea and adjacent regions. To be true, there is no such information in Anaximander’s fragments, and rather little in Scylax’s ones (mainly on the area of the Straits); but Hecataeus’ fragments contain it in abundance. That author’s geographical treatise was a virtually exhaustive description of lands known at his time, surely including coasts of the Black Sea and the nearby Azov Sea. Hecataeus measured the size of the Black Sea (at the map rather than “in nature”). It is he who is likely to have for the first time used the famous and very popular in antiquity image of the Pontus as a Scythian bow. Of interest is the question where in the Black Sea region the scholar drew the border between Europe and Asia; the article gives arguments in favour of the opinion that for him the border was not the Don River, as later in Herodotus, but the Kuban River. Meanwhile, the territory that is now the Taman Peninsula (it was an island in antiquity) belonged to Asia according to Hecataeus. In the “Description of the Earth”, there is the first in the narrative tradition evidence on Phanagoria – one of the most significant Greek colonies at the territory of Russia, later the second in importance center of the Bosporan Kingdom. Amazons are localized by Hecataeus near the Thermodon River rather than in the Northern Black Sea Region, as Herodotus and Hellanicus later did.

Between the Islamic and Chinese Universal Empires: The Ottoman Empire, Ming Dynasty, and Global Age of Explorations

Abstract This article studies two sixteenth-century Asian texts: Khitay namah, a Persian travelogue about the Ming dynasty written by the Muslim merchant Ali Akbar and presented to the Ottoman sultan, and Xiyu, an illustrated Chinese geographical treatise with detailed travel itinerary from China to Istanbul by the Ming scholar-official Ma Li. In addition to demonstrating the breadth of Ottoman and Chinese knowledge about each other in the global Age of Exploration, these two books, written respectively for the monarchs of the self-proclaimed Islamic and Chinese universal empires, reflect the Ottoman and Chinese imperial ideologies in an era when major world powers aggressively vied for larger territories and broader international influence. Both the Ottoman and Chinese authors recast the foreign Other as the familiar Self – Ali Akbar constructed an Islamized China while Ma Li depicted a Sinicized Ottoman world – to justify their countries’ claims to universal sovereignty and plans for imperial expansion. Like many contemporary European colonial writers, Ali Akbar’s and Ma Li’s exploration of foreign societies, their literary glorification of their own culture’s supremacy, and their imposition of their own cultural thinking on foreign lands all served their countries’ colonial enterprise in the global Age of Exploration.

The World-Revealing Goblet: Reading Farhād Mīrzā’s Geographical Treatise Jām-i Jam as a Lithograph

Abstract This article examines a copy of Farhād Mīrzā’s Jām-i Jam (the World-Revealing Goblet) published in 1856 in Tehran and kept at Columbia University Library offsite storage. It demonstrates the dual importance of this book in geographic knowledge production and as part of the library of Saʿīd Nafīsī, one of the most prominent Iranian scholars of Persian literature. Methodologically, the paper offers various ways to study a single lithograph to decipher larger historical processes in histories of education, translation, and print. First, it analyzes the paratext to expose scholarly and political networks in order to examine the genealogy of geographic knowledge production in mid-nineteenth century Qajar Iran. Second, it studies the content and translation practices employed by Farhād Mīrzā to offer novel strategies for analyzing dissemination and reception of new ways of production and categorization of geographic knowledge as well as methods utilized in composition of pedagogical geography books. Finally, it discusses how cataloging practices affect current scholarship and lead to rendering certain texts “hidden.” It therefore illustrates how the study of Farhād Mīrzā’s Jām-i Jam, a book aspiring to reveal the world, can expose much about scholarly practices not only in the past but also the present.

External Relations of Old Rus’ in the 12th Century

The paper is devoted to the analysis of information about the external relations of Old Rus’ in the geographical treatise of the 12th century Arab scholar al-Idrisi. Unlike other sources, information of which, as a rule, is fragmentary and describes only particular direction of external relations of Old Rus’, in the world geography of al-Idrisi these relations are characterized in almost all directions at once, which allows us to imagine them as a system. Due to the fact that al-Idrisi’s text is built primarily as a “route description”, all his messages about Old Rus’ (with the exception of archaic, borrowed from the authors of the tenth century) are a story about the ways by which Old Rus’ was associated with the outside world. The paper considers information about the relations of Old Rus’ with Poland, the Baltic countries, Cumania (the Polovtsian steppe), as well as its presence in the Black Sea area.

Quand une édition imprimée redevient manuscrit: le Kitāb al-Masālik d’Ibn Ḥawqal (Rabat, Fondation ʿAllāl al-Fāsī, ʿayn 608)

Summary: A new discovery of a late manuscript of Ibn Ḥawqal in the library of the ʿAllāl al-Fāsī Foundation, in Rabat, sheds light on the manuscript culture of the late 19th century in Morocco, on the dualism of manuscripts and prints of the same text at the same time. Indeed until now, Ibn Ḥawqal’s geographical treatise is known through eight medieval manuscripts that seem to give four versions of the text, although their relations are not clear. However, an unpublished manuscript is kept in Rabat, but it is a recent copy (early 20th century) of Michael De Goeje’s edition of 1873. Surprisingly this copy bears several charateristics of manuscript writing although the copist had a printed text as model.

Koreans’ Perception of the Liaodong Region During the Chosŏn Dynasty - Focus on <i>Sejong sillok chiriji</i> (Geographical Treatise in the Annals of King Sejong) and <i>Tongguk yŏji sŭnglam</i> (Augmented survey of the geography of Korea) -

요동은 지금의 遼寧省 동남부 일대를 말한다. 이 곳은 삼국시대 ê³ êµ¬ë ¤ ì˜ì—­ì´ì—ˆê³ ê³ êµ¬ë ¤ê°€ 멸망한 이후에는 발해의 영역이었다. 그러나 발해가 거란에 의해 멸망되면서, 요동은 중국에 넘어가게 되었다. 이후 원나라가 ë“¤ì–´ì„œê³ ì¶©ì„ ì™•ì´ 심왕으로 ìž„ëª ë˜ë©´ì„œ 요동을 íšŒë³µí•˜ë ¤ëŠ” 움직임이 일어나기 시작했다. ê³ ë ¤ì™•ì¡°ë¥¼ 이어 ë“¤ì–´ì„ ì¡°ì„ ì˜ 태조 역시 요동확보 의지를 드러내었다.ì¡°ì„ ì€ 여진을 ì œì••í•˜ë‹¤ë©´ ëª ì˜ 다음 단계는 바로 êµ­ê²½ì„ ì„ ì ‘í•˜ê²Œ ë ì¡°ì„ ìž„ì„ ìš°ë ¤í•˜ì§€ 않을 수 없었다. 이를 방지하기 위해서는 여진을 ì¡°ì„ íŽ¸ìœ¼ë¡œ ëŒì–´ë“¤ì´ê³ ì„ ì œê³µê²©í•˜ì—¬ 요동지역을 ì¡°ì„ ì´ 차지하는 것이었다. 만약 ê·¸ë ‡ê²Œ 된다면 서북쪽에는 몽골이 ìžˆê³ ê·¸ 아래 남쪽에는 ëª ì´, ê·¸ë¦¬ê³ ì¡°ì„ ì´ë¼ëŠ” 삼각구도가 í˜•ì„±ë ìˆ˜ 있을 것이다. 이같은 생각에서 ì •ë„ì „ì€ 태조 이성계와 손을 ìž¡ê³ ìš”ë™ì •ë²Œì„ 계획하였으나 이방원의 ì¿ ë°íƒ€ë¡œ 실패하였다.íƒœì¢ ëŒ€ì— 이르러서 ëª ì€ ì—¬ì§„ì„¸ë ¥ì„ í†µì œí•˜ê¸° 위해 건주위를 설치했다. 이에 ì„¸ì¢ ì€ 여진족의 분란을 틈타 6진과 4군을 설치하여 압록강과 두만강 이남의 영역은 ì¡°ì„ ì˜ 것으로 ê³ ì°©í™” 시켰다. 또한 ì´ì „ 시대의 역사지리 기록을 모두 압록강 이남에 존재했던 것으로 기재하여 압록강 이남만은 ëª ì˜ 침략으로부터 ì§€í‚¤ê³ ìž 했다. 이같은 사실이 기록된 것이 ã€Žì„¸ì¢ ì‹¤ë¡ì§€ë¦¬ì§€ã€ì™€ 『동국여지승람』 ê·¸ë¦¬ê³ ã€Žê³ ë ¤ì‚¬ã€ì´ë‹¤. 史書에서 우리 역사를 압록강 이내로 ê³ ì°©í™”ì‹œí‚´ìœ¼ë¡œì„œ 요동에 대한 ì¡°ì„ ì¸ì˜ 생각이나 ì •ë²Œì˜ì§€ëŠ” ì ì  ì•½í™”ë ìˆ˜ 밖에 없었다. ì£¼ì œì–´: ã€Žì„¸ì¢ ì‹¤ë¡ì§€ë¦¬ì§€ã€, 『동국여지승람』, 요동, 건주위, ì •ë„ì „, 양성지

SU ALCUNE CINQUECENTINE SCIENTIFICHE DELLA BIBLIOTECA DELL’ISTITUTO LOMBARDO

We introduce some of the 96 books of scientific content, published in the 16th century and belonging to the Istituto Lombardo library. We chose some books in the field of the “natural sciences” both for iconographic peculiarities and for the original content. The library owns the first edition of the anatomy treatise of Andrea Vesalio. The medical books of Jean Francois Fernel, Antonio Fracanzani, Girolamo Fracastoro, the botanical treatise of Pier Andrea Mattioli and the geographical treatise of Giovan Battista Ramusio although in further edition are of great interest in order to evaluate the state of the art and the evolutionary steps of the science. Some books are rather rare and precious and deserve to be accurately exploited. Also the texts should be worthy of a critical investigation, overcoming the linguistic difficulties, both for the latin and for italian texts.

Resilience Theory and Thomas Vale's Plants and People: A Partial Consilience of Ecological and Geographic Concepts of Succession

Geography has discovered resilience theory, a body of thought about ecological change that initiated with C.S. Holling in the 1970s. We describe the similarities and differences between resilience theory and a geographical treatise, Thomas Vale's (1982) book Plants and People. Vale's work draws more from the tradition of field botany and plant succession than from the theoretical and mathematical ecology that prompted Holling's ideas. Yet like resilience theory, Vale's model of ecological change emphasized multiple states, the threshold transitions between them, and their irreversibility. Each described how forests and rangelands can flip between stability domains in response to altered fire regimes, modified grazing pressures, and climate change. Plants and People also recognized the dual nature of stability encapsulated in Holling's formalization of engineering and ecological resilience. Although resilience theory predates Vale's work and retains primacy through its citation record, we show how their partial consilience promotes a more critical understanding of resilience theory and the ways in which models, scale, and human values influence our comprehension of ecological change.

Delw y Byd : la traduction médiévale en gallois d’une encyclopédie latine et la création d’un traité géographique

Delw y Byd : the Welsh medieval translation of a Latin encyclopaedia and the creation of a geographical tract. The present article is an investigation into the origins of the Welsh geographical treatise Delw y Byd and its relation with its Latin original, Imago Mundi. It presents an overview of the manuscript tradition of the Welsh text, and identifies the branch of the Latin tradition from which Delw y Byd is derived. It establishes the existence of two independent Welsh translations of the first, geographical, book of Imago Mundi and demonstrates that one of these translations is based on the Latin text represented in the fragment of Imago Mundi preserved in Oxford, Bodleian Library MS Rawlinson B 484. A date and approximate provenance are provided for Rawlinson B 484, and new light is thrown on the potential Welsh contacts of another manuscript of Imago Mundi, Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS 66.

EVSItalia Database of Broadleaved Temperate Deciduous Forests

A database of phytosociological releves of Broadleaved Temperate Deciduous Forests of peninsular Italy (Apennines, from Liguria to Calabria regional districts) is presented (EVSItalia Database of Broadleaved Temperate Deciduous Forests, GIVD ID EUIT-011). The data-set aims to store information from published certified phytosociological sources, in order to support ongoing reviews based on larger data-sets for comparative classification of Italian vegetation types. The database stores 1,092 releves, mostly from beech forests, along an altitudinal gradient. Three beech forest types are identified: between 800 and 1,000/1,100 m.a.s.l., a mixed forest with the presence of Q. cerris, Ilex aquifolium, Tilia sp. and Taxus baccata; above 1,100 m a.s.l. until the treeline, a beechdominated forest; below 800 m a.s.l., relic Fagus forests, in very restricted areas of the Apennines. All the releves are uploaded to the TURBOVEG software for plot databases. An ArcGis Database related to the TURBOVEG units reports localization information in GPS coordinates, toponym or quadrats (grid of Operational Geographic Units -OGU of the Italian floristic grid). Descriptive records of locations extracted from geographical information systems are also stored. The data model structure allows producing presenceabsence or quantitative matrices for classification of communities and their parametrisation over larger areas by geostatistical analysis. The aims are to explore patterns of similarity among the distribution of different associations (chorological groups of associations, provincialism), patterns of geographic changes in community distribution along topographical gradients and to test changes in the physical scenario of selected individual communities along geographical gradients. A different insight into the patterns of synonymy and reassessment among syntaxa on the basis of a geographical treatise is expected as well.

EVSItalia Database of Broadleaved Deciduous Submediterranean Forests

A database of phytosociological releves of Broadleaved Deciduous Submediterranean Forests of peninsular Italy (the Thyrrenian sea basin, from Liguria to Calabria including Sicilia and Sardegna) is presented (EVSItalia Database of Broadleaved Deciduous Submediterranean Forests, GIVD ID EU-IT-009). The data-set aims to store information from published phytosociological sources, in order to support ongoing reviews based on larger data-sets for comparative classification of Italian vegetation types. The database stores 733 releves, mostly in oak forest areas dominated by Quercus pubescens and Q. cerris, from the subcoastal to the limit of beech forests in the mountain range of the Apennines and in the forests related to the syntaxa Quercion-pubescentis petreae in Sardegna. Releves were uploaded to TURBOVEG and store information about localization (ArcGis Database) in the square of the grid of Operational Geographic Units (OGU, i.e. quadrates of the Italian floristic grid), precise GPS or toponym localization and descriptive records of locations extracted from geographical information systems. Presence-absence or quantitative matrices are produced as well. The database aims to produce data for coenological classification and parametrisation over larger areas by geostatistical analysis. This will allow to explore patterns of similarity among the distribution of different associations (chorological groups of associations, provincialism), patterns of geographic changes in community distribution along topographical gradients and to test changes in the physical scenario of selected individual communities along geographical gradients. A different insight in to the patterns of synonymy and reassessment among syntaxa on the basis of a geographical treatise is expected.

EVSItalia Database of Dry Grasslands

A database of phytosociological releves of dry Grasslands of Central Italy (regional districts: Marche, Abruzzo, Molise, Lazio and southern Toscana) is presented (EVSItalia Database of Dry Grasslands, GIVD ID EU-IT-008). The data-set aims to store information from published phytosociological sources, in order to support ongoing reviews based on larger data-sets for comparative classification of Italian vegetation types. The database stores 963 releves in 4 syntaxa: Festuco-Brometea (708 releves), TuberarieteaGuttatae (156 releves), Thero-Brachypodietea (92 releves), and Lygeo-Stipetea (7 releves). All the releves were uploaded in the TURBOVEG software for plot databases. Each releve contains geographical information (ArcGis Database) in the square of the grid of Operational Geographic Units (OGU), corresponding to the quadrates of the Italian floristic grid, precise GPS or toponym localization as well as descriptive records of locations extracted from geographical information systems. The structure of the data-model is used to produce presence-absence or quantitative matrices for classification of communities and their parameterisation over larger areas by geostatistical analysis. Applications of the database will enable to explore patterns of similarity among the distribution of different associations (chorological groups of associations, provincialism), patterns of geographic changes in community distribution along topographical gradients and to test changes in the physical scenario of selected individual communities along geographical gradients. A different insight into the patterns of synonymy and reassessment among syntaxa on the basis of a geographical treatise is expected.

Houari Touati . Islam and Travel in the Middle Ages . Translated by Lydia G. Cochrane . Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 2010. Pp. ix, 305. $55.00.

In this eye-opening study of medieval Islamic travel (translated from the French original, Islam et voyage au Moyen Âge [2000]), Houari Touati argues that the scope and intent of this travel created the conceptual boundaries of the Muslim world, or Dār al-Islām. Through their movements, travelers defined “a political, religious, and cultural space” (p. 38), and thus travel was “one of Islam's major intellectual acts” (p. 265). Early Muslim travelers ventured forth in search of knowledge, journeying widely to gather information about Islamic traditions and other religious data from far-flung scholars. Touati tracks the development of the travel genre, from its beginnings in the eighth and ninth centuries as inventories listing the scholars consulted along the way, through the tenth-century forms of letter, journal, and geographical treatise, to the full-fledged rihla narrative of the twelfth century. Touati focuses on travelers whose voyages had religious motives and intellectual consequences. His survey of travel literature is selective, though extensive, illuminating the voyages of men who journeyed far afield to listen to the words of religious scholars, who ventured into the desert to study the pure forms of Bedouin Arabic, who enhanced geographical knowledge, and who spent time on the Islamic frontiers. Because the origins of Muslim travel were rooted in collecting knowledge about Islam, these travelers rarely ventured beyond the boundaries of Muslim lands. Nevertheless, they had an extensive geographical range, as their voyages took them from Spain to India, and there was plenty of opportunity for adventure, hardship, intellectual experience, and religious growth. Touati's focus on travel within the confines of the Muslim world excludes certain other types of traveler, such as diplomats, merchants, and captives, who moved beyond the borders of the Dār al-Islām. Likewise, Touati's prioritization of travelers with an intellectual rationale avoids discussion of the best-known form of Muslim travel, the pilgrimage to Mecca.

Oldtidsforfattere under arkæologisk kontrol – Om skriftlige kilder og materiel kultur i Sydskandinavien

Oldtidsforfattere under arkæologisk kontrol – Om skriftlige kilder og materiel kultur i Sydskandinavien

Hug ha-’aresby Rabbi Solomon of Chelm: An Early Modern Geographical Treatise and its Sources

The sanctity of the Land of Israel and its borders are fundamental concepts in Jewish texts, from the Bible and throughout the rabbinic literature. Nevertheless, Jewish graphical representations of this territory, whether as maps or other geographical illustrations, are both rare and late.

Legal Spaces of Empire: Piracy and the Origins of Ocean Regionalism

In his geographical treatise of 1537, the Portuguese chronicler D. João de Castra explained that it would be possible to correlate all newly discovered lands with astronomical markers to produce an accurate map of the world. The result would be, he wrote, a “true and perfect geography.” The movement toward this vision, from the cartographic revolution of thirteenth-century Portolan charts to the use of surveying to map colonial territories in the nineteenth century, is a compelling narrative of the rationalization of space, and of the reinforcement of this trend by the pursuit of European imperial interests.

An Anonymous Byzantine Geographical Treatise

Le manuscrit Vladimir 415 contient un traité géographique, qui est ici édité, traduit et commenté. Il ressort de cette étude que le texte a été rédigé entre 1360 et 1390.

Dating the Arrival of the Bedouin Tribes in Sinai and the Negev

In any desert region for which few if any governmental or other documents exist, trying to date the events that transpired there among the inhabitants themselves is difficult. Accordingly, historians attempting to reconstruct the history of the bedouin in Sinai and the Negev have had little success in determining when the ancestors of the present bedouin population arrived there'). While a list of tribes compiled by the German explorer, Ulrich Jasper Seetzen, in 1807, instructs us that all the major groups presently there were already there by the early nineteenth century2), the only older documents known to scholars until recently made mention of but a few. The first such document was the tenth century geographical treatise, Sifat Jazirat al-CArab, written by al-Hasan ibn Ahmad alHamdanT (d. 945). It mentions the Bill and Bayyadhlyin tribes still found in northern Sinai3), and presumed to have been there at least