Agenda

14 Jan 2025 16:00

From Ice to Ink: Interpreting Frozen Waters, Life and Climate in Early Modern Greenland

Aula Mazzarol

From Ice to Ink: Interpreting Frozen Waters, Life and Climate in Early Modern Greenland

14 January 2025, 4PM CET
Aula Mazzarol and online

Ingar Stene
(OSEH)

Abstract:

How did early modern Europeans perceive ice, icescapes, and cold climates? And how did these perceptions influence their ideas about life and habitation in the far North? To what extent could climatic and environmental theories shape interactions between people and regions within different climates? In this talk, Ingar Stene will explore the cultural and scientific history of ice and cold climates in early modern Europe, as seen through the case of the 15th-century abandonment of Norse Greenland. Stene will also discuss how the long history of inquiries into the Greenland case helped spark the rise of diachronic theories of glaciation and climate history, while critically assessing ongoing debates on the concept of "the Little Ice Age."

Image:
Winter scene, from Tacuinum Sanitatis, 1390-1400.
BnF, NAL 1673, fol. 96v

 

Language

The event will be held in English

Organized by

NICHE, UNESCO

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