Wood, Trade, and Spanish Naval Power (c.1740-1795)

Wood, Trade, and Spanish Naval Power (c.1740-1795)
Author: Rafał B. Reichert
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 277
Release: 2024-06-11
Genre: Science
ISBN: 9004689648

By focussing on timber sourcing, this book sheds light on the exploitation of forests in settings outside the Iberian Peninsula, including foreign states in the southern Baltic region and the colonial territory of New Spain between the c.1740-1795. Analysis of contracts, projects, and their implementation by the Spanish crown in the 18th century allow for a better understanding of the position of the Spanish monarchy’s nearly global efforts to sustain its naval commitments in the Atlantic World.

The Ancient Mediterranean Environment between Science and History

The Ancient Mediterranean Environment between Science and History
Author: William V. Harris
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 354
Release: 2013-07-25
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004254056

Scientists, historians and archaeologists are at last beginning to collaborate seriously on studies of the long-term history of the environment. The fruit of an international conference held in Rome in 2011, The Ancient Mediterranean Environment between Science and History brings together scientists and scholars who are interested in the interaction of their several disciplines as well as in specific problems such as the effects of climate change and other environmental factors on historical developments and events, the sources of the energy and fuel used in ancient civilizations, and the effects of humans on the lands around the Mediterranean. The collection balances broad Mediterranean-wide studies and tightly focused studies of particular regions in Italy and Jordan.

Silver by Fire, Silver by Mercury

Silver by Fire, Silver by Mercury
Author: Saul Guerrero
Publisher: European Expansion and Indigen
Total Pages: 440
Release: 2017
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9789004343825

In Silver by Fire, Silver by Mercury Saul Guerrero presents a chemical history of the refining of silver ores in New Spain and Mexico, 16c to 19c, with a quantitative analysis of its industrial practice, and its environmental impact.

Santa Bárbara’s Legacy

Santa Bárbara’s Legacy
Author: Nicholas A. Robins
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2017-04-24
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 9004343792

In Santa Bárbara’s Legacy: An Environmental History of Huancavelica, Peru, Nicholas A. Robins presents the first comprehensive environmental history of a mercury producing region in Latin America. Tracing the origins, rise and decline of the regional population and economy from pre-history to the present, Robins explores how people’s multifaceted, intimate and often toxic relationship with their environment has resulted in Huancavelica being among the most mercury-contaminated urban areas on earth. The narrative highlights issues of environmental justice and the toxic burdens that contemporary residents confront, especially many of those who live in adobe homes and are exposed to mercury, as well as lead and arsenic, on a daily basis. The work incorporates archival and printed primary sources as well as scientific research led by the author.

Baltic Connections

Baltic Connections
Author: Lennart Bes
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 2409
Release: 2007
Genre: Baltic Sea Region
ISBN: 9004164294

In the late Middle Ages and the Early Modern period, Northern Europe was a crucible of political, maritime and economic activity. Ships from ports all around the Baltic Sea as well as from the Low Countries plied the Baltic waters, triggering market integration, migration flows, nautical innovations and the dissemination of cultural values. This archival guide is an essential research tool for scholars studying these Baltic connections, providing descriptions of almost 1000 archival collections concerning trade, shipping, merchants, commodities, diplomacy, finances and migration in the years 1450-1800. These rich and varied sources kept at more than 100 repositories in Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia and Sweden are herewith collected for the first time.

Climate and Political Climate

Climate and Political Climate
Author: Sarah Kate Raphael
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 231
Release: 2013
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004216561

The twelfth and thirteenth centuries in the Levant saw a substantial rise in the number of droughts. This coincided with some of the most violent tectonic activity the region had witnessed. Nature, however, could conjure other powerful disasters: swarms of locusts, armies of mice, scorching winds and thick dust storms. The data for this research is drawn from contemporary Arabic and Latin sources. The main aim is to try and determine the long and short-term repercussions of environmental, disasters on the political, military and social affairs in the Levant during the Crusader, Ayyubid and Mamluk periods. Did environmental disasters spur o binder conflict? This research: examines the most destructive disasters and gradual climate chances within broader historical context. Book jacket.

Spanish Books in the Europe of the Enlightenment (Paris and London)

Spanish Books in the Europe of the Enlightenment (Paris and London)
Author: Nicolás Bas Martín
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 375
Release: 2018-02-12
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9004359524

In Spanish Books in the Europe of the Enlightenment (Paris and London) Nicolás Bas examines the image of Spain in eighteenth-century Europe, and in Paris and London in particular. His material has been scoured from an exhaustive interrogation of the records of the book trade. He refers to booksellers’ catalogues, private collections, auctions, and other sources of information in order to reconstruct the country’s cultural image. Rarely have these sources been searched for Spanish books, and never have they been as exhaustively exploited as they are in Bas’ book. Both England and France were conversant with some very negative ideas about Spain. The Black Legend, dating back to the sixteenth century, condemned Spain as repressive and priest-ridden. Bas shows however, that an alternative, more sympathetic, vision ran parallel with these negative views. His bibliographical approach brings to light the Spanish books that were bought, sold and ultimately read. The impression thus obtained is likely to help us understand not only Spain’s past, but also something of its present.

Environment, Trade and Society in Southeast Asia

Environment, Trade and Society in Southeast Asia
Author:
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2015-03-20
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004288058

In Environment, Trade and Society in Southeast Asia: A Longue Durée Perspective, eleven historians bring their knowledge and insights to bear on the long Braudelian sweep of Southeast Asian history. In doing so they seek both to debunk simplistic assumptions about fragile traditions and transformational modernities, and to identify real repeating patterns in Southeast Asia's past: clientelistic political structures, periodic tectonic and climatic disasters, ethnic occupational specializations, long cycles of economic globalization and deglobalization. Their contributions range across many centuries: from the Austronesian expansion to the Aceh tsunami, and from the Sanskrit cosmopolis to the Asian financial crisis. The book is inspired by, and dedicated to, Peter Boomgaard, a scholar whose work has embodied the Braudelian spirit in Southeast Asian historiography. This title is available online in its entirety in Open Access.

Roots of Empire

Roots of Empire
Author: John T. Wing
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 282
Release: 2015-01-27
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004261370

Roots of Empire is the first monograph to connect forest management and state-building in the early modern Spanish global monarchy. The Spanish crown's control over valuable sources of shipbuilding timber in Spain, Latin America, and the Philippines was critical for developing and sustaining its maritime empire. This book examines Spain's forest management policies from the sixteenth century through the middle of the eighteenth century, connecting the global imperial level with local lived experiences in forest communities impacted by this manifestation of expanded state power. As home to the early modern world's most extensive forestry bureaucracy, Spain met serious political, technological, and financial limitations while still managing to address most of its timber needs without upending the social balance.

The East India Company at Home, 1757-1857

The East India Company at Home, 1757-1857
Author: Margot Finn
Publisher: UCL Press
Total Pages: 540
Release: 2018-02-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1787350274

The East India Company at Home, 1757–1857 explores how empire in Asia shaped British country houses, their interiors and the lives of their residents. It includes chapters from researchers based in a wide range of settings such as archives and libraries, museums, heritage organisations, the community of family historians and universities. It moves beyond conventional academic narratives and makes an important contribution to ongoing debates around how empire impacted Britain. The volume focuses on the propertied families of the East India Company at the height of Company rule. From the Battle of Plassey in 1757 to the outbreak of the Indian Uprising in 1857, objects, people and wealth flowed to Britain from Asia. As men in Company service increasingly shifted their activities from trade to military expansion and political administration, a new population of civil servants, army officers, surveyors and surgeons journeyed to India to make their fortunes. These Company men and their families acquired wealth, tastes and identities in India, which travelled home with them to Britain. Their stories, the biographies of their Indian possessions and the narratives of the stately homes in Britain that came to house them, frame our explorations of imperial culture and its British legacies.