IRMACS: The Interdisciplinary Colloquium: "The Molyneux Globes: Mathematical Instruments, Practice, and Community in 16th century England"

Abstract

The first engraved globes began to appear in Europe in the early sixteenth century. At first specialty items, with a limited and esoteric clientele, by 1600 globes were widely manufactured and distributed, especially in northern Europe. But what was the purpose of large terrestrial and celestial globes? Were they mathematical and scientific instruments? Aids to exploration and navigation? Images of empire? Pedagogical tools? Historians have long admired these beautiful objects and taken for granted their utility in navigation and in the creation of empire in this period of European expansion. Contemporary treatises all claimed the mathematical utility of these instruments. And yet, how useful was a globe on a tossing ship? Or in a gentleman