Power of the Dispersed

Cornel Zwierlein teaches early modern history and conducts research on a Heisenberg Fellowship at the Freie Universität Berlin, Friedrich-Meinecke Institut. His latest monographs are: The Political Thought of the French League and Rome, 1585–1589 (Droz, 2016); Imperial Unknowns: The French and the British in the Mediterranean, 1650–1750 (Cambridge University Press, 2016); Politische Theorie und Herrschaft in der Frühen Neuzeit (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2020), and Prometheus Tamed (Brill, 2021).

"This book provokes a strong reflection on the work of historians. It reminds us that we tend to see stories from one point of view, and that we choose some kind of sources and not others. In this way The Power opens, or reopens, a line of investigation where the topic is not only the people of the past but also the work of historians and their way of looking at the past." - Enrica Guerra, University of Ferrara, in: Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 76, No. 4 (Winter 2023), pp. 1515–1516

• AcknowledgementsList of IllustrationsNote on the EditorNotes on the ContributorsIntroductionCornel ZwierleinPart 1: Dispersed in Ecclesiastical and Diplomatic Networks1 In Parte d’Infedeli: A Papal Informant in Istanbul (1607–1608)Edoardo Angione2 The Album Amicorum of the Athonite Monk Theoklitos Polyeidis and the Agency of Perambulating Greek Alms Collectors in the Holy Roman Empire (18th Century)Stefano Saracino3 The Great Imposture: Eastern Christian Rogues and Counterfeiters in Rome, c. 17th–19th CenturiesCesare SantusPart 2: Dispersed in the Republic of Letters4 Nomads in the Early Modern Republic of Letters: The Transient Correspondents of Henry Oldenburg and the Early Royal Society of LondonIordan Avramov5 Travelling Scholastics: The Emergence of an Empirical Normative Authority in Early Modern Spanish AmericaJosé Luis Egío6 Johann Heinrich Callenberg’s OrientSimon Mills7 Solomon Negri: The Self-Fashioning of an Arab Christian in Early Modern EuropePaula ManstettenPart 3: Dispersed by War8 From Erstwhile Captive to Cultural Erudite: The Career of Korean-Born Samurai, Wakita KyūbeiDavid Nelson9 Stories of Spanish Captivity in Istanbul: From Trauma to EmpowermentAna M. Rodríguez-Rodríguez10 Between America and the Maghrib: The Marquis of Varinas and the Weapons of the ExileAdolfo Polo y La BordaPart 4: Dispersed in Commercial and Political Networks11 In the Blind Spot of the State: Trieste in the 18th-Century Trans-Imperial Adriatic SocietyDavid Do Paço12 Religious Feeling and the Construction of a Merchant’s Identity in the Greek Trade Networks of the Late Eighteenth CenturyMaria-Tsampika Lampitsi13 From Bern with Love: The Spy with a Taste for the Exquisite in Early Modern IstanbulMarloes Cornelissen14 Dispersed Things: European Merchant Households in the LevantCornel ZwierleinIndex RerumIndex LocorumIndex Nominum