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To complete research for and write a monograph entitled 'The Indies and the Medieval West: Thought, Report, Imagination' (Turnhout: Brepols, due 2012)

完成研究并撰写题为“印度群岛和中世纪西方：思想、报告、想象力”的专着（Turnhout：Brepols，2012 年到期）

基本信息

批准号：
AH/I001409/1
负责人：
Marianne O'Doherty
金额：
$ 3.68万
依托单位：
University of Southampton
依托单位国家：
英国
项目类别：
Fellowship
财政年份：
2011
资助国家：
英国
起止时间：
2011 至无数据
项目状态：
已结题

来源：
https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FI001409%2F1
关键词：
complete research write monograph entitled

项目摘要

When Vasco da Gama's ships, the first to take the sea route from Portugal to India, arrived in 1497 in Calicut on the South-West coast of India, a member of his crew is famously said to have explained the mission as a quest for 'Christians and Spices'. Scholars have often interpreted this as a moment of extraordinary intersection between literary history and the history of discovery. Portuguese expectations of what they would find in mainland India and the Indian Ocean World were formed, the story goes, by legends of Christians, spices and glorious wealth retold down the centuries. Seduced by stories of St Thomas's mission in India, the legendary Priest-King Prester John of the Three Indies, and of the fabulous wealth and spices of India, the Portuguese misread myth and imaginative literature for truth, with serendipitous (for Europeans) results.The seductive myth of serendipitous discovery brought about by myth and legend has until now proven stubbornly resistant to investigation. Yet some facts within the narrative strike discordant notes. Portuguese vessels used in Vasco da Gama's expedition were specially-designed hybrids, reinforced to enable them to carry cannon. Vasco's da Gama's maritime mission to Calicut was also not the first by the Portuguese; it followed a secret overland one by Pêro da Covilhã, disguised as a Muslim - a disguise which in itself suggests some prior knowledge of the political configuration of the Indian Ocean World trading region. Whereas Portuguese self-representations paint Western Europeans as innocent seekers after myth and legend, their actions show them as canny manipulators, informed by careful research, and better prepared for hostilities than for diplomacy. This anecdote should warn us that there is a gap between what, in this period leading up to European political ascendancy in the Indian Ocean world, western Europeans wrote about the region, about their intentions and desires towards it, and the kinds of activities that they undertook there. This monograph investigates that gap. It will show that fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Western Europeans had access to detailed and recent accounts of India, the Indian Ocean World and the Far East, and that these accounts were widely copied, read and used across Europe, but for different reasons among different audiences. The book will describe what was done with Medieval Western European accounts of the Indian Ocean World, setting out how and why knowledge of the Indian Ocean World was circulated, manipulated, deployed, concealed, and made strategically useful within Medieval Europe. As part of its investigation, the book will look in detail at the kinds of writing and other forms of representation of the Indian Ocean World that circulated in late-Medieval Europe. Textual representations influenced literature, art, and cartography, and were read by clerics, laypeople, merchants, nobles, administrators, missionaries and scholars. But reading is something that happens in real places and circumstances in the world: in monastic libraries; at court; in a shop; alone; in a group; in periods of militant Christian or aggressive mercantile expansion; in periods of fear of political or religious 'others'. This book will show how these circumstances and situations affected the way texts were read and used. What did real medieval readers know and believe about the Indian Ocean world? How did they use their knowledge? How did political and social changes shape these representations and uses? How did these representations shape their political, social, cultural and economic environments? In short, this book will examine the role of geographical knowledge in the making of self and community, in ratifying or shaking up one's own religious and cultural assumptions, and in preparing for, inspiring and justifying action.

1497年，当瓦斯科·达·伽马的船队，第一批从葡萄牙到印度的海上航线，抵达印度西南海岸的卡利卡特时，据说他的一名船员把这次任务解释为寻找“基督徒和香料”。学者们经常把这解释为文学史和发现史之间的一个非凡的交叉点。葡萄牙人对他们将在印度大陆和印度洋世界找到的东西的期望，据说是由基督徒的传说、香料和辉煌的财富形成的，这些传说在几个世纪以来被反复讲述。受圣托马斯在印度传教的故事、传说中的三印度祭司兼国王普雷斯特·约翰、以及印度神话般的财富和香料的诱惑，葡萄牙人误读了神话和富有想象力的文学作品，把它们当成了真理，并带来了（对欧洲人来说）意外的结果。神话和传说带来的偶然发现的诱人神话至今仍顽固地抵制调查。然而，故事中的一些事实却不和谐。达伽马远征中使用的葡萄牙船只是经过特殊设计的混合体，经过加固后可以携带大炮。瓦斯科的达伽马前往卡利卡特的海上任务也不是葡萄牙人的第一次；它跟随了一个秘密的陆路旅行，由Pêro da Covilhã伪装成一个穆斯林——这个伪装本身就表明对印度洋世界贸易区的政治格局有一些事先的了解。葡萄牙人的自我描述把西欧人描绘成追求神话和传说的无辜的人，而他们的行为则表明他们是精明的操纵者，经过仔细的研究，对敌对行动的准备比外交手段更充分。这则轶事应该提醒我们，在欧洲在印度洋世界占据政治优势的时期，西欧人对该地区的描述，他们对该地区的意图和愿望，以及他们在那里进行的各种活动之间存在着差距。这本专著调查了这一差距。它将展示14和15世纪的西欧人可以接触到有关印度、印度洋世界和远东的详细和最新的描述，这些描述在整个欧洲被广泛复制、阅读和使用，但不同的受众有不同的原因。这本书将描述中世纪西欧对印度洋世界的描述，阐述印度洋世界的知识是如何以及为什么在中世纪欧洲传播、操纵、部署、隐藏和具有战略意义。作为调查的一部分，这本书将详细研究中世纪晚期欧洲流传的印度洋世界的文字种类和其他形式的代表。文本表现影响了文学、艺术和制图，被神职人员、俗人、商人、贵族、行政人员、传教士和学者阅读。但阅读是发生在世界上真实的地方和环境中：在修道院的图书馆；在法院;在商店里；独自一人;在一群中；在激进的基督教或激进的商业扩张时期；在对政治或宗教“他人”的恐惧时期。这本书将展示这些环境和情况如何影响文本的阅读和使用方式。真正的中世纪读者对印度洋世界的了解和信仰是什么？他们如何运用他们的知识？政治和社会变化是如何塑造这些表征和用途的？这些表现如何塑造了他们的政治、社会、文化和经济环境？简而言之，这本书将考察地理知识在自我和社区的形成，在批准或动摇自己的宗教和文化假设，以及在准备，激励和证明行动中的作用。