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IMC 2018: Sessions

Session 1733: In Honour of Richard Holt, III: Of Mills and Medieval Technology

Thursday 5 July 2018, 14.15-15.45

Sponsor:‘Creating the New North’ Research Programme, Universitetet i Tromsø - Norges Arktiske Universitetet
Organiser:Stefan Figenschow, Institutt for historie og religionsvitenskap, Universitetet i Tromsø - Norges Arktiske Universitetet
Moderator/Chair:Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough, Department of History, Durham University
Paper 1733-aResistance and Recidivism in Scholarly Attitudes toward Technological Change in the Middle Ages
(Language: English)
Adam Lucas, School of Humanities & Social Inquiry, University of Wollongong, New South Wales
Index terms: Archaeology - General, Economics - General, Historiography - Modern Scholarship, Technology
Paper 1733-bScholastics and Humanists on the Medieval Technological Revolution
(Language: English)
Steven A. Walton, Department of Social Sciences, Michigan Technological University
Index terms: Historiography - Medieval, Historiography - Modern Scholarship, Mentalities, Technology
Paper 1733-cDiscovering the Plough in John Whethamstede's Invenire
(Language: English)
Shana Worthen, Department of History, University of Arkansas at Little Rock
Index terms: Historiography - Medieval, Learning (The Classical Inheritance), Monasticism, Technology
Paper 1733-dVitruvius and Mills in the Low Countries
(Language: English)
Karel Davids, Faculteit der Geesteswetenschappen / De Faculteit der Economische Wetenschappen en Bedrijfskunde, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Index terms: Architecture - General, Historiography - Medieval, Learning (The Classical Inheritance), Technology
Abstract

The criticism of two widely-held theories of technological change during the Middle Ages is outlined. How has this criticism been acknowledged and integrated into subsequent medieval and history of technology scholarship? The medieval technological revolution is well developed by modern scholars, but did the intelligentsia of the 14th to 16th centuries really recognize or understand what was happening to their world? John Whethamstede's discussion of the plough's origins, including six possible inventors for it, in Invenire, part of his encyclopaedic Granarium is examined. Finally, in what respects and in what ways Vitruvius' work De architectura influenced the development of mills in the Low Countries from the 15th to the early 17th centuries is addressed.