Saxton's Maps of England and Wales: The Accuracy of Anglia and Britannia and Their Relationship to Each Other and to the County Maps

ABSTRACT

From measurements of the graticules on Saxton's two general maps of England and Wales—the atlas map Anglia and the wall map Britannia—together with other evidence, it is argued that neither map was drawn according to any specific projection, but that both were effectively produced as ‘flat-earth’ maps with the graticules superimposed afterwards. Digital versions of Saxton's maps and of a modern map, the 1:1 million Ordnance Survey transport map, are used in a number of comparisons by means of the computer program MapAnalyst. These comparisons allow the scales of the two Saxton maps to be determined. They also show that the maps are of almost the same accuracy in terms of the positioning of settlements, typically within about 4.6 kilometres, in spite of a difference in scale of a factor of about 3.6. This fact and the direct comparison of the two Saxton maps in MapAnalyst show that they are basically the same map, and it is concluded that a version of the wall map was the first to be drawn and that Anglia is a reduced copy prepared for the atlas. The lengths of Saxton's miles as used on the two maps are calculated and compared with other determinations. The relationship between the two general maps and the county maps is briefly considered, and it is provisionally concluded that the relationship is a close one.     

The Last Battle on English Soil,Preston 1715

Abstract

In July 1596 Christopher Saxton spent more than a week in Manchester with John Dee and Henry Savile working on a survey of the town. This survey has never been found, and the circumstances surrounding it have remained fairly obscure. An examination of new evidence and an analysis of both the immediate context and the links between the three men principally involved in the survey strongly suggest that it was undertaken for chorographical and historical purposes, but that it might also have served the needs of other important agents in local society such as the Collegiate Church, and the new lord of the manor.     

Stamped Signs on Manuscript Maps in the Renaissance

Abstract

The cordiform projection employed by Oronce Fine, Gerard Mercator and Abraham Ortelius may have had a hermetic meaning. The focus in this paper is on Ortelius, for recent studies have suggested connections between Ortelius, Christopher Plantin and a clandestine religious sect in Antwerp, called the Family of Love (Family of Charity), whose emblem was the heart, source of divine illumination and of Free Will. It is argued that Ortelius's contemporaries in the radical religious circles of northern Europe would have perceived the Theatrum orbis terrarum in such a light. As Guillaume Postel's evaluation of Ortelius's work demonstrates, the atlas was considered a talismanic book based on the power of the images.     

The Shroud of Turin and the singlet oxygen fallacy

Abstract

This paper is critical of certain of the claims made by Allan A. Mills in his 1995 paper in ISR (‘Image formation on the Shroud of Turin: the reactive oxygen intermediates hypothesis’). It also refutes the notion that the negative image which appears on the Shroud of Lirey–Chambéry–Turin was produced as a result of the actions of a species of reactive oxygen (specifically singlet oxygen) as described by Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas in their recent publication, ‘The second Messiah’.     

Mitchell's Influence on European Studies of Peripheral Nerve Injuries During World War I

Objective: Describe the influence of S. Weir Mitchell's (1829-1914) work, and in particular his ideas on causalgia, on European physicians who treated peripheral nerve injuries during World War I (WWI). Background: During the American Civil War (1861-1865), Mitchell studied peripheral nerve injuries with colleagues George Read Morehouse and William Williams Keen. Three monographs resulted from this work. All were important landmarks in the evolution of knowledge of peripheral nerve injuries. A subsequent occasion to improve knowledge came in WWI. Methods: The most important European monographs or series on peripheral nerve injuries from WWI were studied with special interest in references to causalgia and Mitchell's works on peripheral nerve injuries. We included works by Tinel, Athanassio-Bénisty, Purves-Stewart & Evans and Carter, Foerster and Oppenheim. Results: Tinel and Athanassio-Bénisty provided the most detailed information on peripheral nerve injuries and causalgia and often referred to Mitchell. Both mentioned a possible sympathetic origin. Athanassio-Bénisty described tremor and other movement disorders in relation to causalgia. Purves-Stewart and Evans mentioned Mitchell and causalgia in the second edition of their book. They advocated the term "thermalgia." Carter, who had access to data of many cases, concentrated his work on causalgia, referring to Mitchell. Foerster provided data of a great number of peripheral nerve injuries, but did not refer to Mitchell. However, he described the symptoms of causalgia cursorily, applying the term Reflexschmerz (reflexpain). Oppenheim was particularly interested in muscle innervation and referred to Mitchell with respect to hypertrichosis and glossy skin. Oppenheim did not use the term causalgia, although he described the syndrome in some of his patients. It wasn't until around 1920 that German physicians devoted significant attention to causalgia and began using the term. Conclusion: Knowledge of peripheral nerve injuries was greatly advanced during and after WWI. Mitchell's influence was mainly found in the French medical literature, where his findings provided the basis for further research on the origin of causalgia. In England, Mitchell and causalgia were also well-known. We found evidence to suggest that some of the English knowledge came from French physicians. German physicians described the symptoms of causalgia, but did not use the term, nor did they refer to Mitchell. This variation in Mitchell's influence by country probably reflects the fact that Mitchell's Injuries of nerves and their consequences was translated into French but not German.     

Christopher Saxton’s Last Maps: Nichol Forest and the Debatable Land, 1607

Although it has been generally held that Saxton in his later life did not work far from home, two previously unrecognized maps in The National Archives show him surveying in 1607 for the Earl of Cumberland in the dangerous Border country. These maps throw new light onto the working methods of Saxton and his son, suggesting that by this date Robert was doing most of the work. The original map appears to have been commissioned as an estate map but was then copied to be re-used as evidence in a law suit, thus separating the maps from their context.     

Drawing,Etching, and Experiment in Christopher Wren’s Figure of the Brain

Abstract

Christopher Wren’s figure of the brain ‘viewed from below’ in Thomas Willis’s Cerebri anatome (1664) set a precedent, not only for subsequent images of the brain, but for scientific illustration. The image is the visual proof of a Baconian experiment conducted by the Oxford dissection team, in which dye was pumped into the carotid arteries of animal and human specimens in order to imitate the natural flow of blood, thereby applying William Harvey’s theory of circulation to the brain. Usually described as engravings, Wren’s images are in fact etchings (produced by the acid process), significant because etching for book illustration was then in its infancy in England. In addition to considering Wren as an experimental etcher, this article frames our understanding of Wren’s contributions to Willis’s project in terms of his virtuosic talents as amateur draughtsman, natural historian, anatomist, and his use of optical and draughting instruments.     

Nature now and then

Science Incarnate: Historical Embodiments of Natural Knowledge. Edited by Christopher Lawrence and Steven Shapin (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1998) vii + 342 pp. $55.00 cloth, $15.25 paper.

Modern Environmentalism: An Introduction. By David Pepper (London: Routledge, 1996) viii +376 pp. £40 cloth, £13.99 paper.     

Michael Drayton’s Poly-Olbion: maritime England and the free seas debates

ABSTRACT

Attending to Poly-Olbion’s river dynamics, I argue that, implicitly opposing natural, inevitable unionization, Drayton demonstrates through visual and poetic means that any viable empire is forged by deliberate local choices about conjunction and affiliation. Further, I show that by reconfiguring Saxton’s maps, rejecting politically defined boundaries and perceptions, and situating three major rivers as the organizing features of the landscape and the empire, Drayton ultimately defines Britain as inherently and universally maritime. Moreover, linking Poly-Olbion to mare clausum and mare liberum debates, I reveal that Drayton situates the flow of self-aware rivers into the sea as an extension of Britain beyond its land boundaries. He thereby suggests that the eventual mixing of British waters with the larger oceans establishes the basis of Britain’s local and global maritime rights, linking regional autonomy and conjunction by choice with claims to both local offshore dominion and global freedom of navigation and trade.     

Übersicht der Tätigkeit internationaler Geographenkongresse auf dem Gebiete der Geschichte der Kartographie

Abstract

This paper surveys the career of Benedetto Bordon as a miniaturist, designer of woodcuts, and cartographer. Although from Padua, Bordon worked primarily in Venice where he illuminated religious and classical texts and official ducal documents destined for Venetian noblemen. The writer argues that Bordon designed woodcut illustrations for books printed by Aldus Manutius and others, in addition to the woodcut maps in his 1528 book on islands in the MediteiTanean, Atlantic, and Caribbean. Bordon's lost world map of 1508 is discussed in relation to the map‐making activities of Francesco Rosselli, the Florentine miniaturist and engraver who was in Venice in 1504 and 1508, and in relation to a circle of Venetian scholars and patricians interested in Ptolemy's Cosmographia and in the mapping of the New World.     

WHITHER “WHAT IF” HISTORY?

Richard Evans's new book, Altered Pasts, offers a perceptive but flawed critique of the field of counterfactual history. The author provides a useful historical survey of the field's recent rise to prominence and intelligently analyzes its respective strengths and weaknesses. His overall assessment of the field is quite skeptical, however. Evans cites many reasons for his skepticism, but his overall critique can be summarized in three words: plausibility, politicization, and popularity. Evans faults works of counterfactual history for their frequently implausible narratives, their promotion of political agendas, and their distressing degree of popularity. In advancing his critique, Evans makes many valid observations that call attention to important deficiencies in the field. But his view is a partial one that neglects countervailing evidence and never penetrates to the heart of why the field has left the margins for the mainstream. Evans's study provides a useful introduction to an understudied topic, but further research—ideally of a less partisan nature—is required for us to better understand counterfactual history's increasing appeal.     

Faith,Pluralism, and Public Engagement

Abstract

This essay is Miroslav Volf’s reply to the respondents to his book A Public Faith (2011). In the process of engaging his his respondents, the author articulates the main thesis and thrust of the book as well as the motivation behind writing it.     

“Religious Violence as Modern Myth”

Abstract

In this essay the author summarizes the argument of his book entitled The Myth of Religious Violence, whose main contention is that there is no reason to suppose that people are more likely to kill for a god than for a whole other host of “secular” ideologies and practices that behave in the way that “religions” do. The author then goes on to respond to various critiques that have been made of the book since its appearance in 2009.     

Some Thoughts about Standardized Teaching Evaluations

Abstract

Mark Blitz begins his book Plato’s Political Philosophy by making a strong case for Plato’s continuing relevance to us. The book’s three parts are centered on three dialogues of special importance to Blitz’s topic: the Laws, the Republic, and the Statesman. Blitz also pulls into his discussion other dialogues that illuminate the teachings of these three central ones. Blitz’s analyses of the dialogues are illuminating. He lays out the dialogues’ intellectual pathways and gives us an important sense of their meaning. In addition to his examination of particular dialogues, Blitz also gives us rich discussions of four key concepts that underlie and are found throughout Plato’s works: nature, wonder, perplexity, and laughter. The book lacks a deeper discussion of the view that we should be guided by nature in determining our ends. Also missing is a better appreciation of both the challenge posed to philosophy by piety, and the attraction of institutions of modern republics. And we could have a better understanding of the limits of a rational politics in the Statesman. Plato has difficulty finding a place for the philosopher in the city, and this could come through more clearly in Blitz’s account. But these shortcomings are minor when set against the book’s strengths. Its synoptic analyses can help guide those new to Plato. But there is also much here for mature scholars in Blitz’s detailed and careful exploration of Plato’s more important concepts and arguments.     

A Review of “Cultures of the Erotic in Spain, 1898–1939, and A Virtual Wunderkammer: Early Twentieth Century Erotica in Spain”

Abstract

Christopher Rivers. Face Value: Physiognomical Thought and the Legible Body in Marivaux, Lavater, Balzac, Gautier, and Zola. The University of Wisconsin Press, 1994. xii + 275 pp.

Brian T. Fitch. The Fall: A Matter of Guilt. (Twayne's Masterwork Studies.) New York: Twayne Publishers, 1995. xii + 136 pp.     

Esoteric Tangles

Abstract

I attempt here a very general reply to the preceding sixteen essays by addressing the broad, structural constraints of my book, from which many of the particular problems raised in the essays flow. Philosophy Between the Lines is an effort to give a very sweeping account—theoretically and historically—of a phenomenon that is, in many respects, highly particularized and situation specific. The characteristic sin of the book is overgeneralization or simplification. In the present essay I attempt a brief and partial clarification, primarily by selecting one main theme of the book—defensive esotericism—and redescribing it from a more localized and fine-grained perspective.     

The Book of Job – The Cyclical Progression of the Aporia

ABSTRACT

This article explores the relation between aesthetics and theology in the Book of Job. The overall aim of the article is to explain the relationship between centre and periphery (poetry and prose) and its significance for the theology of the book. The article claims that Job's problem is not the attainment of wisdom but how to reconcile wisdom with suffering—how to relate to suffering. And this theological theme is propagated through aesthetics—including stylistic, narrative, compositional and structural features.

It is impossible to point out a preferential reading in the Book of Job because of the fundamental and structural dissonance of the text. This destabilized, ambiguous, paradoxical, ironical and dissonance-producing text is the hermeneutical starting point. Qua dissonance-producing text this feature is used as foundation for the interpretative task. And to get a comprehensive grip on the book two instruments are used: the literary and compositional means are analyzed, and the structural elements are evaluated in their relation between frame and centre. Following this line of interpretation reveals that the stylistic differences of the work manifest crucial theological distinctions. In the book of Job, shape and aesthetics are meaning and theology.     

Symbolism and Irony in Three Novels by Kosmas Politis

Abstract

In a recent book, Mario Vitti has described Kosmas Politis as ‘emotionally the most highly charged novelist’ of the Generation of 1930. Vitti also points out that Eroica is ‘compositely organized down to the minutest detail’, despite the author's assertion that he wrote each instalment ‘on the presses’. In an attempt to account for the ‘magical’, ‘Poetic' quality of Politis’ writing as pointed out by Greek critics, Vitti investigates Politis' use of irony and of the interior monologue. My purpose in this article is to examine further Politis' ironical approach and to make some preliminary remarks about his use of symbols and imagery (a subject on which far more work has to be done), in the hope that, in so doing, I shall shed some light on the ‘emotionally charged’ and ‘highly organized’ nature of Politis' writing. For reasons of space and time I must confine myself to his first three novels, Lemonodasos (1930), Hekate (1933) and Eroica (1937).