Readers familiar with my dissertation will know that the Spanish antiquarian Benito Arias Montano (1527‚Äì1598) and his theory that Spain was settled by Nebuchadnezzar’s Jewish captives play an important role. Now you, too, can read Arias Montano from the comfort of home, as the Spanish Culture Ministry’s Biblioteca Virtual del Patrimonio Bibliogr?°fico (BVPB) has put [...]
Last weekend I fortunate to attend a ‘Scholars’ Day’ at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, focused on their new exhibition “El Greco to Velazquez: Art during the Reign of Philip III.” The morning consisted of a guided tour of the exhibition led by William B. Jordan and Richard Kagan, and both the tour and [...]
Antonio Agust??n (1517-1586), bishop of Tarragona, was one of sixteeenth-century Spain’s most famous antiquarian scholars. Like his contemporaries Ambrosio de Morales (1513-1591), Benito Arias Montano (1527-1598), and Juan Fern?°ndez Franco (ca. 1520-1601), Agust??n was skilled in epigraphy and numismatics, and profoundly interested in applying the information that could be had from material remains to writing [...]
I was recently forwarded a link to the blog written by Mar??a Amelia L??pez of Mux??a, near A Coru?±a, in Galicia, Spain. In many ways, it’s a perfectly ordinary blog–do?±a Mar??a writes about her daily life, including (by her own admission) “anything that comes to mind” (todo lo que se le pasa por la cabeza). [...]
As the lone Hispanist in my history department, I’m often asked for references to Spanish history texts. I frequently answer these queries by turning to one of the most valuable resources for early modern Spanish history on the web: Jim Amelang‘s copious and au courant bibliographies, hosted on his website at the Universidad Aut??noma de [...]
My friend and Fulbright colleague Matt Crawford (see his website here) has just published his first article, on the basis of research he’s done in Madrid and Seville for his dissertation on the production of quinine in the Spanish empire in the eighteenth century: Matthew James Crawford, “‘Para desterrar las dudas y adulteraciones’: Scientific Expertise [...]
My wife has posted an assortment of her favorite photos from our Fulbright year in Spain (2005-2006); feel free to go have a look! We’ll probably post a few more as we get around to it. Though we lived in the center of Madrid, one or both of us also made it to: London, Segovia, [...]
It’s just come to my attention that my friend Mar??a Tausiet will be presenting her latest book, Abracadabra Omnipotens: Magia urbana en Zaragoza en la Edad Moderna (Siglo XXI de Espa?±a Editores, 2007) on 8 June in Zaragoza. Mar??a is one of the finest Spanish historians of religion, magic, and witchcraft around, and I’m sure [...]
In 1848, while on a grand tour of the Iberian Peninsula, the French traveler Antoine de Latour passed through Seville. Among the many sites that caught his attention was the so-called “Casa de Pilatos,” or “Pilate’s House,” a rambling, whitewashed palace near the center of town long associated with the noble Enr??quez de Ribera family, [...]