Cross-cultural transfer of ideas

This paper presents an overview of the adoption of Adam Smith’s work in the Central European countries, namely the Czech lands and the Hungarian Kingdom in the last third of the 18th and the first half of the 19th century. The paper is divided into two parts. In the first one, after a short presentation concerning the teaching and writing on economic issues in Smith’s time, we discuss various channels through which Smith’s ideas reached Central Europe. We take stock of the economists influenced by his thoughts, most of them students at the University of Göttingen. In the second part, we discussed the life and the work of Gregorius von Berzeviczy, an eminent economist living in the Kingdom of Hungary, who seemed to be most influenced by the teaching of the Great Scotsman. We reviewed Berzeviczy’s main works and discussed his influence.

The development and construction of identities in medieval Europe, through the circulation of people and the exchange of knowledge, are fields of study that have gained an increasing amount of recognition in recent years.
For that reason, for the 4th ARDIT International Congress, we are organising a meeting of researchers who are open to innovative ideas on the construction and evolution of the diverse representations of identity in the Middle Ages.
During the congress we will focus on two main areas: cultural transmissions and material exchanges, as we see these two as fundamental elements in the development of identity traits in the Middle Ages, be it from an individual, social, spiritual, artistic, literary, or architectural perspective. These two interconnected areas give room to a wide range of aspects of study: the transmission, reception, acceptance and diffusion of literary and linguistic shapes, artistic and architectural models, technological systems and structures of knowledge, the flow-planned or not-of people and commodities, and the exchange of ideas in official or marginalized fields, as examples.
With a clear interdisciplinary orientation, the 4th International Congress of ARDIT aims to present research from various fields of medieval studies, such as history, philology, philosophy, history of art and archaeology, among others, to discuss a Middle Ages that was in constant flux. Likewise, one of the main goals of the congress is to create a space of active debate that allows a real exchange of knowledge among attendees, and this is why we encourage you to participate. The final structure of strands will be defined based on the accepted proposals.

Britain and its Neighbours explores instances and periods of cultural contact and exchanges between communities in Britain with those in other parts of Europe between c.500–1700. Collectively, the twelve case studies highlight certain aspects of cultural contact and exchange, present neglected factors, previously overlooked evidence, and new methodological approaches. The discussions draw from a broad range of disciplines including archaeology, history, art history, iconography, literature, linguistics, and legal history in order to shine new light on a multi-faceted variety of expressions of the equally diverse and long-standing relations between Britain and its neighbours. Organised chronologically, the volume accentuates the consistency and continuity of social, cultural, and intellectual connections between Britain and Continental Europe in a period that spans over a millennium. With its range of specialised topics, Britain and its Neighbours is a useful resource for undergraduates, postgraduates, and scholars interested in cultural and intellectual studies and the history of Britain's long-standing connections to Europe.

The paper traces how the creation and development of the disciplines of political science in the United States and in Germany have mutually influenced each other. The protagonists of both transfers of ideas pointed across the Atlantic for examples to be emulated for a useful study of politics. In an ironic twist, however, both transfers of ideas occurred at a time when the ideas to be transferred tended to be on the decline.

The paper examines how global, national, agency-level factors explain the variations between legitimating discourses of indigenous and imported practices in the source and recipient countries. Drawing upon the world-society, word-systems, comparative institutionalism, and translation perspectives, it empirically compares the legitimating discourses of M-form in the US and its adapted version in Turkey, holding structure. The findings indicate that legitimating actors transform M-form both symbolically and materially under the influences of the peripheral position of Turkey in the world-system, the dominant developmentalist ideology, and their perceived management problems specific to the Turkish context. The findings also indicate that there are similarities in legitimating M-form and holding due to the rationalized world-culture. The paper emphasizes a need for a multi-level integrated approach to the issue of glocalization.

Material, technology and knowledge transfer between Britain and Russia during the Enlightenment was possible, roughly, in two ways: the indirect way, that is via France, German states, and other countries, and the direct way. The last one was strictly supervised and expertly, etc. All these things and persons were valued for their origin and ideas they contained, however, there were a lot of special missions of the group aimed at ideas. Excursions across the country were organized for mining engineers, mechanics, nobles who came from Russia. Those interested visited the most advanced factories and mills in Soho and Scotland. To implement all this, the ambassador and his staff established and carefully kept personal relations with British ministers and secretaries, MPs, leaders of opposition, entrepreneurs, bankers, scientists. Watching carefully the situation and trends in the sphere of political, organizational, technological, artistic and scientific ideas, the count and his men collected the information and sent it in thousands of letters to Russia. Letters were sometimes accompanied by new books just from print, like, for instance, Adam Smith's 'Wealth of Nations'. Thus, the flow of ideas from Britain to Russia, in a great variety of forms and containers, supported by the flow of raw materials coming from Russia, was thoroughly controlled and purposefully organized.

This study focuses on the problem of interpreting Lajos Vajda's Icon Self-Portrait Pointing Upward (1936) while attempting to rethink the artist's relationship to the ideas of Russian religious philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev (1874-1948). In one of his letters dedicated to Júlia Richter, his future wife, Vajda wrote that Berdyaev's book entitled The New Middle Ages had greatly influenced his thinking. Through it, he became acquainted with the notion of universalism-the synthesis between East and West as part of a critique of Western individualism and positivism-which would gain in popularity in the early twentieth century. Based on the proximity between the dates of the letter and the time that Vajda formulated his so-called 'Szentendre Programme,' this article argues that the establishment of the Programme was directly influenced by Berdyaev's thinking. Consequently, it suggests that Icon Self-Portrait Pointing Upward can be read as a summary of Vajda's thoughts on culture as renewable through the synthesis of 'two types of European man.' From this perspective, Vajda's criticism of Western individualism leads to a rethinking of his relationship both to European modernism and to conservative artistic and cultural ideas. This article connects all these broader questions to the interpretation of Icon Self-Portrait Pointing Upward, offering new directions in research into this enigmatic key work and masterpiece.

in: S. Bayer/ K. Dickhaut/ I. Herzog (Hrsg.), Lenkung der Dinge. Magie, Kunst und Politik in der Frühen Neuzeit, Frankfurt/Main 2021 (Zeitsprünge. Forschungen zur Frühen Neuzeit, 25) 121-140.

Die Studie untersucht die sogenannten Hieroglyphica des Horapollo: eines kurzen griechischen Textes der Spätantike, der vorgibt, eine Übersetzung aus dem Ägyptischen zu sein, und in seiner Entstehungszeit kein besonderes Interesse hervorrief. Ein Jahrtausend später jedoch wurden die wiederentdeckten Hieroglyphica zu einem Leittext der italienischen Renaissance und bald darauf zu einem Bestseller des frühen Buchdrucks in ganz Europa.
Meine Fragen richten sich v.a. auf das erste Jahrhundert seiner Druckgeschichte, die Jahre zwischen 1505, dem Jahr des Erstdrucks, und ca. 1600. Wie wurde dieses schmale Werk zu einem solchen Bestseller? Mit welchen anderen frühneuzeitlichen Bucherfolgen könnte man es vergleichen? Welche Erwartungen knüpfte man an diesen Text? Was waren die intendierten Publika der jeweiligen Editionen? Welche dadurch bedingten Transformationen durchlief der Text in dieser Zeit? Aus der Arbeit an den verschiedenen Textvarianten hat sich sukzessive eine weitere Frage herausgeschält, die ich am Ende anhand eines Beispiels genauer konturieren möchte: Was bedeutet es eigentlich für die Frühneuzeitforschung, dass dieser Text so hochvariabel ist – d.h. wie treffend kann ein Verweis auf die Quelle „Horapollo“ überhaupt sein, und welche weiteren Informationen würde die nötige Gegenfrage „Welcher Horapollo?“ wohl ergeben?

В статье трансфер цивилизационных представлений между Францией, Англией, Германией и Россией в XIX в. рассматривается в контексте современных исторических теорий о «связанности» исторических явлений и необходимости изучать их «перекрестно». Показано, как эти новые подходы позволяют переосмыслить ситуацию трансфера в условиях функционирования и кризиса Венской системы международных отношений, а также роль цивилизационных представлений в общественной жизни и развитии исторической теории.