Technical Knowledge in Europe, 1200-1500 AD

This volume brings together works on the development of scientific and technical knowledge in Europe between the 13th and 16th centuries, with a special focus on the Iberian Peninsula. These works, which rely heavily on the evidence provided by the written record, pay particular attention to the content of recipe books and technical treatises from the 15th and 16th centuries. The volume addresses issues such as manuscript and technical recipe book analysis, archaeological investigation of production areas and archaeometric analysis, presenting a holistic and comprehensive perspective of technical knowledge during the Middle Ages. It highlights different approaches and perspectives in the analysis of medieval technical and technological knowledge, in order to arrive at equally broad and complementary conclusions.

Ricardo Córdoba de la Llave is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Cordoba, Spain. He is Director of the Meridies Research Group (HUM128) of the Andalusian Research Plan, and his research focus is medieval technology and crafts, Medieval material culture and archaeological heritage. He is the author of 14 books and around 150 other publications.

Javier López Rider is Lecturer of Medieval History at the University of Cordoba, Spain, and member of the Meridies Research Group (HUM 128). His research interests include the exploitation of the rural landscape, study of the settlement and its interaction with the environment, the science, technique and technology of the Middle Ages and archaeological experimentation. He has published two books and over 25 articles.

"The essays provide a range of perspectives and research on late medieval craft and industrial techniques. A key virtue of the volume is the attention paid to methodology and the wide range of sources and disciplines drawn on by the authors, emphasizing the interdisciplinary nature of studying the history of technology. Several of the essays, for example, draw our attention to the importance of collaborative research, including the capabilities of the Colour ConText Database, a searchable database that provides access to digital images of recipe collections and individual recipes across Europe and relevant bibliographic data (Maria João Melo, Paula Nabais, and Tati¬ana Vitorino), and the Exploitation of Mediterranean Alums in Europe, an important international research coordination network (David Igual Luis and Didier Boisseuil). Overall, this volume will be useful to medieval social and economic historians, as well as historians of technology. It is particularly valuable for providing a guide to European scholarship on these specialized topics to an English-speaking audience."

Elspeth Whitney Professor Emerita at the University of Nevada, USA, in Technology and Culture 64, no. 4 (2023): 1294–96

Philippe Bernardi

Didier Boisseuil

Ricardo Córdoba de la Llave

Danielle Arribet Deroin

Philippe Dillmann

Chloë N. Duckworth

David Govantes Edwards

Rafael Javier Díaz Hidalgo

Stefanos Kroustallis

David Igual Luis

Maria João Melo