Tina Asmussen
Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Historisches Institut, Faculty Member
- Deutsches Bergbau-Museum, Bochum, Forschungsbereich Bergbaugeschichte, Faculty Memberadd
- Material Culture Studies, History of Science and Technology, Cultural History, Renaissance Studies, Early Modern Intellectual History, History of alchemy, and 9 moreHistory of Science, Mining History, Cultural Economy, Economic History, Underground Imagination, Aboveground-belowground linkages, History of Early Modern Science, Environmental History, and History of Geologyedit
This special issue is dedicated to the cultural values and impacts of the early modern mining industry and some of the enterprises and practices that surrounded them. The contributions enquire into how mining and metallurgy became a key... more
This special issue is dedicated to the cultural values and impacts of the early modern mining industry and some of the enterprises and practices that surrounded them. The contributions enquire into how mining and metallurgy became a key sector in early modern European society, not only in terms of economic prosperity with its utilitarian connotations, but as a sociocultural phenomenon, whose materials and products affected, or even enabled, many areas of life and rulership. The authors' contributions focus on places, materials, and processes, and assess how historical actors engaged with metallic materials, both under and above the ground. They analyse human engagement with mined materials not simply from an economic perspective, but also as an administrative and legal praxis, a technological challenge, an environmental problem, a spiritual engagement, and an affective experience. This approach affords a broader perspective which expands the history of mining beyond the narrow sense of a history of material extraction, one that crosses the borders of the European mining regions and takes activities in urban hubs and on the sea into consideration as well.
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Wer oder was verbarg sich hinter dem Namen Athanasius Kircher S. J.? Anhand der Analyse des gedruckten Œuvre Kirchers, seiner Korrespondenz sowie seiner zahlreichen Wissenspräsentationen nördlich und südlich der Alpen untersucht der Band... more
Wer oder was verbarg sich hinter dem Namen Athanasius Kircher S. J.? Anhand der Analyse des gedruckten Œuvre Kirchers, seiner Korrespondenz sowie seiner zahlreichen Wissenspräsentationen nördlich und südlich der Alpen untersucht der Band die Fabrikationsmechanismen der Kircher-Figur und seiner Wissenschaft. Die Studie zeigt, dass es sich bei Kircher nicht nur um einen jesuitischen Gelehrten und Autor zahlreicher Publikationen handelte, sondern um ein mehrhändig betriebenes Unternehmen. Kircher war ein Produkt des Buchmarktes, sein Name fungierte als Markenzeichen für exklusives und spektakuläres Wissen sowie für großformatige und reich illustrierte Bücher. Diese Perspektive ermöglicht eine neue Sicht auf die hinter dem Gelehrten im Verborgenen liegenden Mechanismen der Wissensgenese ‒ und ebenso auf die kollektiv betriebenen Prozesse der Produktion, Zirkulation und Distribution von Wissen. Die räumlichen Bedingungen, die Kirchers Wissen konstituierten, die Netzwerke, in denen es zirkulierte, und die zahlreichen Akteure, die an der Produktion und Vermarktung beteiligt waren, zeigen nicht den strategischen Unternehmer Kircher, sondern eine äußerst dynamische Werkstatt Kircher.
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This article examines the perception and valuation of mineral resources in sixteenth and seventeenth-century European mining regions. It aims to critically review the utilitarian and anthropocentric view of mining and mineral resource... more
This article examines the perception and valuation of mineral resources in sixteenth and seventeenth-century European mining regions. It aims to critically review the utilitarian and anthropocentric view of mining and mineral resource production, circulation and consumption that is shaped by a long tradition of economic history and history of technology. To understand human relation to the underground and its resources only in terms of innovation and rationalization means to ignore the many different layers by which resource landscapes affected the miner's perception of nature and mineral matter. The literary, material and visual culture of sixteenth-and early seventeenth-century central European mining sites proves to be fruitful ground for historicizing the interplay between manual labor, mechanical arts, natural resources and religion in mining landscapes. This paper aims to connect the material and immaterial or the physical and symbolic dimensions of human-nature entanglement in early modern mining and suggests a way to locate human and geological agency within the context of a divine oeconomy.
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The material and the immaterial or the cognitive and affective are not in opposition to each other, however, but are inextricably linked. At the same time, they produce their own materiality, which becomes manifest in the practice of... more
The material and the immaterial or the cognitive and affective are not in opposition to each other, however, but are inextricably linked. At the same time, they produce their own materiality, which becomes manifest in the practice of affective projecting. Affective projecting is consequently something we can explore while analysing its strategies and its impact. This chapter explores by research on the constitution of markets as a specific form of social interaction for the exchange and circulation of goods and knowledge, commercial and scientific exchange, and the distribution, marketing and consumption of knowledge and knowledge products. The case studies presented zoom in on two areas essential to Duke Julius’s economic and political practice: mining and inland navigation. For concerns such as how to improve the productivity of industry, trade and infrastructure in Braunschweig-Luneburg, Julius regularly drew on the expertise of artisans, craftsmen and merchants from the Netherlands.
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This article investigates the myth of the Wild Man and the figure's symbolic and emotional significance for the Harz mining industry. From about the sixteenth century onward, the Wild Man became a point of identity in the montane region... more
This article investigates the myth of the Wild Man and the figure's symbolic and emotional significance for the Harz mining industry. From about the sixteenth century onward, the Wild Man became a point of identity in the montane region of the Harz Mountains. By analysing the appropriation and meanings of the Wild Man and his connection to mining in different media, especially on coins, this article stresses the importance of investigating not only material and empirical evidence, but also considering the imaginary and affective implications of mining. The changing perceptions of mythical figures such as the Wild Man reflected the desires, hopes, and anxieties of historical persons. They reflected the circumstance that mines represented sources of great wealth, but also delivered terror, injury, and death.
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This special issue is dedicated to the cultural values and impacts of the early modern mining industry and some of the enterprises and practices that surrounded them. The contributions enquire into how mining and metallurgy became a key... more
This special issue is dedicated to the cultural values and impacts of the early modern mining industry and some of the enterprises and practices that surrounded them. The contributions enquire into how mining and metallurgy became a key sector in early modern European society, not only in terms of economic prosperity with its utilitarian connotations, but as a sociocultural phenomenon, whose materials and products affected, or even enabled, many areas of life and rulership. The authors' contributions focus on places, materials, and processes, and assess how historical actors engaged with metallic materials, both under and above the ground. They analyse human engagement with mined materials not simply from an economic perspective, but also as an administrative and legal praxis, a technological challenge, an environmental problem, a spiritual engagement, and an affective experience. This approach affords a broader perspective which expands the history of mining beyond the narrow sense of a history of material extraction, one that crosses the borders of the European mining regions and takes activities in urban hubs and on the sea into consideration as well.
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As mining became more popular as a form of investment in the 16th century, the number of representations of mining scenes depicting the goddess Fortuna increased. She became a popular emblem of the promises, risks, and uncertainties of... more
As mining became more popular as a form of investment in the 16th century, the number of representations of mining scenes depicting the goddess Fortuna increased. She became a popular emblem of the promises, risks, and uncertainties of mining. The discursive and iconographical traditions of chance in the context of mining are borrowed from the fortuna di mare. The popularity of the maritime Fortuna stood in a close context with the emergence of the term risk in the late Middle Ages, which is closely connected to the sea trade and the social group of merchants and sailors. In the context of mining this image of fragile stability seems to have captured the imagination of those who, like the goddess, had to make quick moves to keep on top in the new world of 16th-century business with mineral resources. In this article I show how the concepts of hope, risk and chance were mediated through the figure of Fortuna between the sea and the mountains. In current research, however, a modernist perspective often connects the emergence of risk with the processes of secularization and growing self-awareness of tradesmen and merchants. My investigation instead concentrates on discourses about successful and failed mining investments, both in textual and visual sources, in order to investigate the vast semantic field of risk, hope and chances. This analysis reveals that the notion of Fortune in mining was inextricably tied up with Christian discourses on moral values and hope.
This article appeared in: Eva Brugger, Maike Christadler (ed.): Riskante Versprechen: Erfolg und Scheitern in der Vormoderne (FKW, 60), 2016, pp. 30-41. https://www.fkw-journal.de/index.php/fkw/issue/view/72/showToc
This article appeared in: Eva Brugger, Maike Christadler (ed.): Riskante Versprechen: Erfolg und Scheitern in der Vormoderne (FKW, 60), 2016, pp. 30-41. https://www.fkw-journal.de/index.php/fkw/issue/view/72/showToc
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Primary Materials is a newly launched collaborative project on conversations surrounding materiality and material culture. It is an online platform featuring established voices and emergent interests surrounding these themes through... more
Primary Materials is a newly launched collaborative project on conversations surrounding materiality and material culture. It is an online platform featuring established voices and emergent interests surrounding these themes through interviews with an interdisciplinary group of scholars and practitioners. Our first volume of Primary Materials features Lorraine Daston, Jacob Gaboury, Timothy Mitchell, and Keith M. Murphy discussing glass flowers, digital teapots, carbon resources, and design offices. We’re very excited to be sharing these conversations and are looking forward to more to come. Please take a look and share any suggestions you might have for themes and individuals you’d like to see featured here.
www.primarymaterials.org
www.primarymaterials.org
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Workshop (online) on the 29th of April 2021. This workshop will focus on two resource groups: Water in urban and planetary contexts and mineral and metallic resources in mining contexts. Presentations will address the use of resources... more
Workshop (online) on the 29th of April 2021.
This workshop will focus on two resource groups: Water in urban and planetary
contexts and mineral and metallic resources in mining contexts. Presentations
will address the use of resources as well as their conceptualization as parts
of a “nature” redefined from the perspective of resource exploitation in the
early modern period. In terms of knowledge history, the workshop aims to
understand the assimilation process in relation to the respective contexts
and the respective resources. At the same time, this resource-related
knowledge will be placed in tension with a (post-)Copernican understanding
of planetary contexts and a planetary unity in the consideration of an early
modern construction of nature. Thus, human agency with respect to natural
processes and conditions is also included in a comprehensive dimension of the
workshop’s considerations. Water management and mining are forms of early
modern “geoengineering” and link resource management to planetary theories
of nature. Thus, these areas are early, effective and irreversible interventions
in nature, as described by the Anthropocene in the twentieth century with the
help of large-scale technology. Therefore, the workshop seeks to also trace the
idea of a Protoanthropocene that comprises aspects of practice, domination,
and epistemology in socio-natural environments
This workshop will focus on two resource groups: Water in urban and planetary
contexts and mineral and metallic resources in mining contexts. Presentations
will address the use of resources as well as their conceptualization as parts
of a “nature” redefined from the perspective of resource exploitation in the
early modern period. In terms of knowledge history, the workshop aims to
understand the assimilation process in relation to the respective contexts
and the respective resources. At the same time, this resource-related
knowledge will be placed in tension with a (post-)Copernican understanding
of planetary contexts and a planetary unity in the consideration of an early
modern construction of nature. Thus, human agency with respect to natural
processes and conditions is also included in a comprehensive dimension of the
workshop’s considerations. Water management and mining are forms of early
modern “geoengineering” and link resource management to planetary theories
of nature. Thus, these areas are early, effective and irreversible interventions
in nature, as described by the Anthropocene in the twentieth century with the
help of large-scale technology. Therefore, the workshop seeks to also trace the
idea of a Protoanthropocene that comprises aspects of practice, domination,
and epistemology in socio-natural environments
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A 'split' study day held on Teams over three consecutive afternoons (30th March-1st April 2021, 3-6pm GMT), exploring how early modern developments in arts and techniques conceptualised, confronted, and attempted to manipulate nature as... more
A 'split' study day held on Teams over three consecutive afternoons (30th March-1st April 2021, 3-6pm GMT), exploring how early modern developments in arts and techniques conceptualised, confronted, and attempted to manipulate nature as understood in the form of the four 'classical' elements: earth, water, air, and fire. Participants will discuss literary, technical, and artistic material, reflecting on the interrelated experimental and cultural significances of the four elements, and the relationships between them. These classic categories, though challenged and evolving, as we will see, throughout the early modern period, present a fruitful framework for the 'Writing Technologies' Network's ongoing conversations on representation, analogy, imagination, inventions, and narratives.
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Wer oder was verbarg sich hinter dem Namen Athanasius Kircher S. J.? Anhand der Analyse des gedruckten Œuvre Kirchers, seiner Korrespondenz sowie seiner zahlreichen Wissenspräsentationen nördlich und südlich der Alpen untersucht der Band... more
Wer oder was verbarg sich hinter dem Namen Athanasius Kircher S. J.? Anhand der Analyse des gedruckten Œuvre Kirchers, seiner Korrespondenz sowie seiner zahlreichen Wissenspräsentationen nördlich und südlich der Alpen untersucht der Band die Fabrikationsmechanismen der Kircher-Figur und seiner Wissenschaft. Die Studie zeigt, dass es sich bei Kircher nicht nur um einen jesuitischen Gelehrten und Autor zahlreicher Publikationen handelte, sondern um ein mehrhändig betriebenes Unternehmen. Kircher war ein Produkt des Buchmarktes, sein Name fungierte als Markenzeichen für exklusives und spektakuläres Wissen sowie für großformatige und reich illustrierte Bücher. Diese Perspektive ermöglicht eine neue Sicht auf die hinter dem Gelehrten im Verborgenen liegenden Mechanismen der Wissensgenese ‒ und ebenso auf die kollektiv betriebenen Prozesse der Produktion, Zirkulation und Distribution von Wissen. Die räumlichen Bedingungen, die Kirchers Wissen konstituierten, die Netzwerke, in denen es zir...
Die Flugblattsammlung der Wickiana gehort zu den bedeutendsten Sammlungen illustrierter Einblattdrucke des 16. Jahrhunderts uberhaupt und ist daher eine mediengeschichtliche Quelle ersten Ranges. Der reformierte Chorherr des Zurcher... more
Die Flugblattsammlung der Wickiana gehort zu den bedeutendsten Sammlungen illustrierter Einblattdrucke des 16. Jahrhunderts uberhaupt und ist daher eine mediengeschichtliche Quelle ersten Ranges. Der reformierte Chorherr des Zurcher Grossmunsters, Johann Jacob Wick, sammelte Flugschriften, Flugblatter, Briefe und sonstige Berichte aus allen Teilen des europaischen Raumes. Die 24 zumeist jahrlich gefuhrten Chronik-Bande von 1560-1588 stellen eine einzigartige Sammlung von Nachrichten zur Geschichte des 16. Jahrhunderts dar und ermoglichen einen Blick in das reformierte „Elite“-Netzwerk der Zeit. Die Lizentiatsarbeit uber die „Wunderbucher“ Johann Jacob Wicks legt den Fokus auf die Reprasentation von Grausamkeit in den Wickiana-Flugblattern sowie auf die Funktionen des Flugblatts mit grausamem Inhalt im Sammlungskontext. Die Medialisierung von Grausamkeit, als eine extreme Form physischer Gewalt, steht im Zentrum dieser Arbeit. Die illustrierten Einblattdrucke eignen sich dank ihres d...