Project description
Exploring the intellectual boom in the Mediterranean after the Middle Ages
From 1400 to 1700, Venice assigned physicians, surgeons and apothecaries to its colonies and outposts in the Mamluk Sultanate and Ottoman Empire to safeguard its overseas commercial and political interests. While keeping diplomats and merchants healthy, they used their positions as medical servants for intellectual exploration through contact with local populations and traditions. The Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions FONDACO project will perform the first systematic examination of the origins of this knowledge exchange network that connected Christian and Islamicate states throughout the Mediterranean and Levant. It will study how the network helped to advance major fields of scholarship in early modern Europe, especially natural history and antiquarianism.
Objective
This two-year Fellowship will produce the first systematic study of an uncharted network of knowledge exchange connecting Christian and Islamicate states across the Mediterranean and Levant 1400-1700. This network had its humble origin in a public health initiative of the Republic of Venice, first uncovered by Pugliano thanks to a Wellcome Trust Fellowship in Medical History. Keen on protecting its commercial and political interests overseas, for three centuries Venice appointed physicians, surgeons and apothecaries to its colonies and outposts in the Mamluk Sultanate and the Ottoman Empire. Tasked with guarding the health of Venice’s diplomats and merchants, in fact these medical servants used their positions as springboards for rich intellectual explorations that brought them in contact with local populations and traditions. The proposed project aims to investigate how these diplomatic doctors turned into savants and, more ambitiously, how this network facilitated the development of key fields of scholarship in early modern Europe, notably natural history and antiquarianism, and how these were informed by the intellectual world of the Near East. In so doing, the project will overturn the image of intellectual stagnation traditionally attributed to the post-medieval Mediterranean world, and reshape our understanding of the connected history of the region. The project will significantly contribute to the development of the field of History of Science and Medicine in the host institution and European higher education. It will also considerably advance the career of Valentina Pugliano, an experienced researcher educated internationally in the UK, Germany and the US. The training provided by Ca’ Foscari and a secondment at Koç University, Istanbul, the international networks of these two institutions, and the project’s output, will cement Pugliano’s reputation as emerging scholar and increase her chances of securing an ERC grant and a position at a European university.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
You need to log in or register to use this function
Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
-
HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
MAIN PROGRAMME
See all projects funded under this programme
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
See all projects funded under this funding scheme
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2021-PF-01
See all projects funded under this callCoordinator
Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
30123 Venezia
Italy
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.