Mapping the medieval world

This course offers an object-led, comparative introduction to medieval cartography, focusing on Christian and Islamic traditions. As joint inheritors of ancient Greek texts that had established mapping as a fundamental spiritual and scientific exercise, medieval Islamic and Christian cultures both leave behind an astonishing range of attempts to picture the world, long before it could be seen from space. From the enigmatic bird-shaped maps of the 10th-century Persian geographer Al-Istakhri, to the combination of myth and biblical narrative that characterises the English Hereford world map (c1300), and the pilgrim itineraries of Matthew Paris (c1250), we’ll explore pre-modern mapping, and reflect critically on modern representations of the globe.