2011-2012 - The Italian Academy - Columbia University

tive by placing this work in the context not only of the history
of reading but also in that of the history of encyclopedism: The
Pandechion Epistemonicon has yet to be allotted a place within the
history of humanist encyclopedism. The fact that it was never published
should not keep us from doing so. On the contrary, analyzing
Aldrovandi’s commonplace book in this vein can help us to flesh
out an oft-neglected aspect of early modern encyclopedism: the
fact that printed encyclopedias are based on very much the same
practices as are manuscript commonplace books. Many of the metaphors
used in the titles of sixteenth-century encyclopedias—such as
bibliotheca, museum, thesaurus or pandectae—hint at the practices of
collecting and taking notes that underlie these works.
I am very grateful to David Freedberg and the staff at the Italian
Academy for believing in my research, and for contributing in so
many ways to making my time at the Italian Academy exceptionally
productive and pleasant. The working conditions were truly excellent.
My fellowship also allowed me to nurture many fruitful formal
and informal exchanges with my fellow Fellows and with colleagues
both at Columbia University and at other academic institutions in
New York. At Columbia University, I profited especially from the
many discussions I had with David Freedberg, Pamela H. Smith,
and Matthew L. Jones, all of whom were remarkably generous with
their time. But I also profited very much, for instance, from meeting
Monica Calabritto (CUNY), Nancy G. Siraisi (formerly CUNY) and
Paolo Carta (Università degli Studi di Trento; former Fellow of the
Academy), amongst many others, all of whom were kind enough
to attend one of my seminars at the Italian Academy. Furthermore,
my stay at the Italian Academy gave me the opportunity to present
my research on Aldrovandi at a number of occasions, such as the
Renaissance Colloquium at Cornell University and the international
conference “Worlds of Paper: Writing Natural History from Gessner
to Darwin” at the Linnean Society in London.
Fabian Krämer takes up a Frances A. Yates Fellowship at The Warburg
Institute, University of London, School of Advanced Study, before moving
to his new position as Akademischer Rat a.Z. in the Department of History
at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München.
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