Welt-Wissen und kartografische Repräsentation

Overview & Synopsis

This interdisciplinary study explores the controversially discussed question of whether and how geographical and cultural knowledge from the Arab-Islamic world was utilised by European mapmakers. The contextual analysis of cartographic representations – from diagrammatic maps of the three known continents and the seven climes to detailed world maps and Portolan charts – as well as accompanying source texts from the 10th to the beginning of the 15th century demonstrates the complex dynamics of the transmission of knowledge, which was neither linear nor continuous. Following the spatial turn, maps are understood as hybrid, socio-cultural cultural sources that conceptualise space and transmit cultural world views, which were used to pursue a variety of interests.