AGENTSEGET · Itinerant Cultural Agents in Early Modern Europe and the Scotsman Thomas Seget: A Case-Study
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2016-09-01 → 2018-09-07
- EU contribution
- €183,455
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Itinerant Cultural Agents in Early Modern Europe and the Scotsman Thomas Seget: A Case-Study
AGENTSEGET is a project that aimed at challenging the idea that Scotland played virtually no role in the Scientific Revolution. In order to bring to light the role of Scotland, the project focused on the concept of mobility within early modern scientific communities, asking what qualities made these cultural agents suitable to transmitting knowledge, how did this materially happened, how did political and religious factors influence the process, and what impact did these cultural agents have on the way science developed in the sixteenth and seventeenth century. These questions were primarily to be addressed through the case study of Thomas Seget, a rather neglected figure in the history of science and yet, as the MSCA fellow and the sponsor argued, a key actor in the transfer and production of early modern scientific knowledge in early modern Europe. The project aimed to provide important insight into how knowledge travels and what are the key factors that may hinder its transmission. The ultimate objective of the project was to demonstrate how mobility has always been a crucial element in the production of knowledge, and how the study of early modern dynamics can illuminate the importance of cultural, political and geographic factors in hindering or facilitating knowledge production within Europe.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
AGENTSEGET is an interdisciplinary project that will explore a neglected type of intellectual who grew to prominence in Europe at the end of the sixteenth century, a time of significant social and cultural upheaval. The religious conflicts, political tensions, and profound intellectual transformations of the decades around 1600 called for new styles of communication often involving subterfuge, middle-men, and disguise. A different type of intellectual was required to connect scholars in different and often troubled areas of Europe. Their task was to deliver scientific instruments, precious books and manuscripts crucial to the production of new knowledge and theories. To support themselves, they also traded information about princes, governments, religious factions and political machinations. The project will focus on the Scotsman Thomas Seget (1569/70-1627), one of the most interesting and less studied examples of this type of intellectual. By using Seget as a case study, AGENTSEGET aims to unlock the rich and vibrant personal and professional network of intellectual brokers and cultural middlemen in which prominent scientists such as Kepler and Galileo operated and thrived, exchanging ideas and receiving informal feedback on their work. The findings of AGENTSEGET are expected to demonstrate that cultural and scientific mobility has always been an essential component of the circulation and development of cutting-edge scientific research. The results will be disseminated through a monograph, Open Access publications, an interactive website, an edited volume, an exhibition, and a series of educational activities.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH · EdinburghCoordinatorUnited Kingdom
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union