Tanja Pommerening – författare

Medicine, astronomy, dealing with numbers ‑ even the cultures of the “pre-modern” world offer a rich spectrum of scientific texts. But how are they best translated? Is it sufficient to translate the sources into modern scientific language, and thereby, above all, to identify their deficits? Or would it be better to adopt the perspective of the sources themselves, strange as they are, only for them not to be properly understood by modern readers? Renowned representatives of various disciplines and traditions present a controversial and constructive discussion of these problems.

Ancient cultures have left written evidence of a variety of scientific texts. But how can/should they be translated? Is it possible to use modern concepts (and terminology) in their translation and which consequences result from this practice? Scholars of various disciplines discuss the practice of translating ancient scientific texts and present examples of these texts and their translations.

The volume presents phenomena of classification and categorisation in ancient and modern cultures and provides an overview of how cultural practices and cognitive systems interact when individuals or larger groups conceptually organize their world. Scientists of antiquity studies, anthropologists, linguists etc. will find methods to reconstruct early concepts of men and nature from a synchronic and diachronic comparative perspective.

Dieser Sammelband vereint Beiträge aus verschiedenen Disziplinen (von den Altertumswissenschaften bis zur Psychologie), die sich mit kulturübergreifend wiederkehrenden Vorstellungen vom menschlichen Körper und universalen Aspekten von Weltbildern auseinandersetzen. Im Zentrum der Fallstudien stehen Wissenstraditionen verschiedener Kontinente und Epochen von der Antike bis in die Gegenwart, die sich um den lebenden und toten Körper sowie um den Kosmos ranken. Die Beiträge des Bandes machen evident, wie eng verflochten Vorstellungen von Mensch und Kosmos sind, wie körperbasierte Erfahrungen diese Konzepte prägen, und wie verschiedene Faktoren zur Universalität als auch Vielfalt solcher Konzepte beitragen.

Since the dawn of humanity, people have developed concepts about themselves and the natural world in which they live. This volume aims at investigating the construction and transfer of such concepts between and within various ancient and medieval cultures. The single contributions try to answer questions concerning the sources of knowledge, the strategies of transfer and legitimation as well as the conceptual changes over time and space. After a comprehensive introduction, the volume is divided into three parts: The contributions of the first section treat various theoretical and methodological aspects. Two additional thematic sections deal with a special field of knowledge, i.e. concepts of the moon and of the end of the world in fire.