RomanIslam Guest LectureCarthography and Empire - The World on View

21 May 2025, 5:00 pm

Photo: © Creative Commons CC-Y

The Roman Empire and the Islamic Empire conquered and ruled large areas of land. What did emperors, caliphs, and governors know about the lands they actually ruled? What cities and tax-rich regions, what mountains, valleys, river systems did they have to oversee? Where were they located? While land surveying for purposes of land distribution, cultivation, and taxation was well developed, and astronomical observation and mathematics were at such a high level that they could measure the spherical shape of the planet, knowledge of the geological and civilizational features of the earth was still in its infancy, but necessary. Maps, however, seem to have a different origin than fiscal or astronomical concerns. Itineraries and road maps were not only verbalized, but put on a graphic. The best known map of late Roman antiquity was the map copied around 1200 CE and kept for a long time in the family of the humanist Konrad Peutinger. In the Islamic Empire, cartography had similar roots, beginning with itinaries and their visualization, and in some cases linked to astronomical measurements. In our back-to-back lecture the outstanding speakers offer a discourse between the efforts of the two empires.

We cordially invite you to our guest lecture “Carthography and Empire - The World on View" on Wed. May 21, 2025, 5 -7 pm (German time) on Zoom. 

The format comprises the lectures "Roman Cartography and the Empire" by Prof. em. Dr. Richard Talbert (The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) and "The Islamicate World in Pieces. Envisioning the Abbasid Realm through the Book of Routes and Realms (10th c.)" by Dr. Nadja Danileko (Freie Universität Berlin). 

For registration please contact romanislam"AT"uni-hamburg.de by May 17, 2025.

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