Glossary

analytic (as a noun)
mode or lens chosen to analyze something

Anglican
observing the religion of the Church of England

anthropological
relative to anthropology, the study of humanity at the intersection of biology, cultural studies, archaeology, linguistics, and other social sciences

antiquarianism
intense interest in Antiquity, the past, and its remains

archipelagic
relative to an archipelago, a group of islands scattered over a body of water

atlas
bound collection of maps

baptizand
person who receives baptism

blazon
genre of poetry that catalogs the physical attributes of a person ​—​ usually a woman. The genre was popularized by early Renaissance Italian poet Petrarch

bozal
in the Hispanic world, enslaved person of African descent who is not yet acculturated to Hispanic culture and speaks Spanish imperfectly by Castilian standards

brocade
silk fabric with raised patterns in gold and silver

canon
religious rule approved by the Catholic Pope

cartographer
mapmaker

cartouche
ornamental frame containing text

castas painting
Latin American painting from the eighteenth century representing several patterns of racial mixing in a hierarchical manner

catechization
act of bestowing catechism in order to convert people

caveat
warning that acknowledges some limitations

cedula
official administrative document in the Spanish-speaking world

cenotaph
commemorative monument dedicated to a person buried elsewhere

chauvinism
undue belief in the superiority of one’s own group

choreography
art of designing, patterning, or scripting movement

citational
citing someone or something else

codex (plural, codices)
bound manuscript often containing ancient texts

compendium
abridgement or summary of a longer work

conquistador
Spanish colonizer in the Americas, especially in sixteenth century Mexico and Peru

contrapposto
position in which one leg holds the full weight of the subject’s body

copyist
person who copies, imitates, or transcribes documents

cosmological
relative to cosmology, which studies the universe as a whole, at the intersection of astronomy and metaphysics

cosmographer
person who maps the general features of the celestial and terrestrial worlds

Critical Indigenous Studies (CIS)
field of inquiry centering global Indigenous political, epistemological, and ideological concerns and conditions. It studies the structures and relations of power in a world (including the academic world) dominated by settler colonialism

Critical Race Theory (CRT)
offshoot of what was known since the mid-1980s as Critical Legal Theory, which is premised upon the idea that the law is not neutral and supports the interests of those who make it. CRT highlights the specific role of race in the legal apparatus. It is a movement that started in the 1980s, when law professors of color and allies noticed that the Civil Rights movement had fallen short of its objective in that racial discrimination and inequality had remained in place, and they started investigating the structural enmeshment of racism in law and its institutions. Building upon the pioneering work of Derrick A. Bell, Richard Delgado, and Alan David Freeman, legal scholars such as Kimberlé Crenshaw, Mari Matsuda, Cheryl Harris, Patricia Williams, and others developed a vibrant field of inquiry that is now influencing other disciplines

cross-cultural
establishing a conversation between different cultures

curatorial
relative to curator, a person in charge of displays and exhibitions in museums and libraries, and, by extension, any manager of cultural content

damask
jacquard whose patterns are woven in satin into a different material

demographics
quantifiable composition of a human population

diaphanous
transparent, see-through

didactics
pedagogy, a system for teaching something

divinatory
relative to prophecies

Doctrine of Discovery
in the case Johnson v. McIntosh (1823), Chief Justice John Marshall explained the Supreme Court’s unanimous view “that the principle of discovery gave European nations an absolute right to New World lands.” Based on 1490s papal bulls that allowed Spaniards to “discover” any land one hundred leagues west of the Azores and Cape Verde Islands that was not habited by Christians, the Doctrine of Discovery stripped Indigenous Americans of their land and sovereignty

ecclesiastic
clergyman

ecocriticism
field of inquiry that studies the environment and the environmental crisis through a humanistic lens that combines literature, culture, history, and ecology

ecumenically
in a manner that promotes the unity of the Christian Church across schisms and partitions (such as exist between Catholic, Protestants, and Orthodox Christians, for instance)

émigré
person who emigrated, leaving their homeland

empiricism
method for forming knowledge based on sensory experience

encomendero
encomienda beneficiary

encomienda
patent granting conquistadores the right to colonial lands and to the labor of enslaved Indigenous people on those lands

encomium (plural, encomia)
piece of writing written in praise of someone or something

engraving
image printed from a metal plate that has been manually engraved

epigram
concise and witty poem with a satirical edge

episteme
regime of knowledge, system for understanding the world

epistemic
relative to knowledge and the different ways knowledge is produced

epistemology
theory and study of the systems we use for understanding the world

etching
image printed from a metal plate that has been manually and chemically processed

ethnographic
relative to ethnography, the study and description of people, societies, and cultures around the world

ethnology
cultural anthropology, the methods of which yield ethnographic scholarship

etymology
study of the origin and original meaning of words

Eurocentric
exclusively focused on Europe to the exclusion of the wider world

facsimile
exact copy of something

folio
large book printed on paper sheets that were folded only once (by contrast with a quarto). Also refers to a single page in such a book

franciscan
member of the Order of Friars Minor founded by St. Francis of Assisi in 1209

frontispiece
illustration facing a book’s title page

gentile
person who is not Jewish

glyph
symbol that conveys meaning without resorting to language

grisaille
technique that uses only one color (gray) to produce an effect of depth

hagiographic
relative to the account of saints’ lives

hatching
technique that uses fine lines in proximity in order to create a shade effect in a drawing or an engraving

hermaphrodite
person who has both male and female reproductive organs

heteronormativity
worldview that takes heterosexuality as the norm by default

heuristic
process or method for problem-solving, and the study of that process

hidalgo
person who belongs to the lowest rank of Spanish nobility

historicize
to place something in its proper historical context in order to understand it

historiography
process of writing history, and the study of that process

humanistic
relative to humanism, a European intellectual movement from the fourteenth to the sixteenth century characterized by a renewed interest in classical texts and epistemologies

humoralism
ancient medical theory still in vogue during the early modern period, according to which a healthy body had a balanced combination of four liquid humors
blood, phlegm, bile, and melancholy. External factors, including geography and environment, were believed to influence that humoral balance

iconographically
by means of iconography

iconography
synonym for pictorial representation

ideogram
non-verbal symbol used to represent a concept in a system of writing

ideological
relative to ideology, the aggregated ideas and sociopolitical values that constitute one’s worldview

ideologist
someone invested in spreading and imposing a specific ideology

illumination
painted embellishment on a manuscript that often includes gold or silver

in situ
in the very place in question

incunable
early book printed before 1501, the design of which is still informed by manuscript culture

indentured
subjected to indenture, the contract by which a person bound themselves to serve a master for a limited amount of time in the premodern world

intaglio
printed from a plate on which the image is incised or engraved below the surface

interpolation
process of inserting additions into a text

interregnum
period in English history (1649–1660) when, following a Civil War, England was a republic, between the reigns of Charles I and Charles II

intersectionally
in a manner that attends to what Kimberlé Crenshaw has defined as “intersectionality,” that is, the ways in which the many features of one’s identity, such as race, gender, class, ability, and sexuality, intersect and compound with one another

itinerarium (plural, itineraria)
travelogue

jacquard
fabric with intricate patterns woven into it (as opposed to printed or embroidered)

janiform
in the form of the Latin god Janus, that is, with two faces

landsknecht
German mercenary pikeman (a soldier armed with pike)

Lapland
northernmost region of Finland

lateran Council
ecclesiastical council of the Catholic Church held in Rome in the Lateran Palace next to the Lateran Basilica in order to rule on questions of doctrine

latitude
angular distance of a place North or South from the Earth’s equator

letterpress
text printed using relief printing

Levant
(obsolete) stretch of land in the Eastern Mediterranean corresponding to today’s Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and some Turkish regions

lexicographical
relative to lexicography, the art or practice of writing dictionaries

libretto
text to which an opera or other extended musical composition is set

lithograph
image printed from a flat stone through chemical reaction

liturgy
form of public worship, especially in the Christian Church

locus
place where something happens, in the literal or figurative sense

longue durée
term introduced by historian Fernand Braudel and the French Annales School to describe their particular approach to historiography. This French phrase means “long duration.”

macro-regional
specific to a large geographic area

Mandarin
learned official in the former Chinese Imperial civil service

masthead
section in a newspaper (often on the editorial page) giving information such as the owner’s name, a list of the editors, the advertising and subscription rates

mestizo
person of mixed European and Indigenous American ancestry

methodology
body of methods self-consciously used in different disciplines

metonymically
in the manner of a metonymy, a figure of speech that consists in mentioning a thing for another thing with which it is somehow associated

miscellany
separate pieces of writing collected in one volume

misnomer
wrong name or designation

misogyny
prejudice against women, male chauvinism

mnemonically
in the manner of a device that helps memorize something

modicum
small quantity of something

Morocco
fine flexible leather from goatskin tanned with sumac

mores
manners and moral attitudes towards those manners

mythopoetic
relative to the creation of myths

nadir
opposite of the zenith, lowest point of something

neoclassical
European aesthetic movement that advocated for the revival of ancient Greek and Roman aesthetics in domains such as literature, music, art, or architecture

normativity
quality of being the norm

ontological
relative to ontology, that is, the theory and study of the nature of being

Orientalism
Edward Said defined “Orientalism” as a body of Western theories and practices that represent the East as fit to be colonized

orthography
proper spelling

pamphlet
printed publication that is unbound, with no cover

paradigm
salient example, typical instance of something

parchment
animal skin dressed and prepared for writing, painting, or bookbinding

patriarchal
relative to patriarchy, a social organization characterized by the supremacy of fathers in families and the power of men over everyone else

patristic
relative to the Christian Church Fathers or their writings

peddler
itinerant salesman who sells small items in the street or door to door

periodization
established ways of dividing human history into distinct time periods (such as the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, Early Modernity, and the Enlightenment) for the purpose of academic study

phenomenological
refers to the dimension of things that we apprehend through experience

phenotype
in the scientific context, the observable characteristics of an organism produced by the interaction between its genetic material and its environment. In everyday context, the physical characteristics of an individual used to identify and categorize them

philological
relative to philology, the classical study of language and literature

physiognomy
facial features and the pseudo-science based on their scrutiny

piazza
public square in an Italian city

pictography
system of writing that uses non-verbal pictures to represent objects they resemble

portolan
nautical map featuring ports and harbors, generally drawn by hand or in manuscript

postcolonialism
field of inquiry that grew in the aftermath of Western colonialism
it studies the political, economic, historical, cultural, and social impact of European colonial rule around the world from premodernity to the present. It often centers the conditions, agency, and epistemologies of colonized and formerly colonized people

pragmatic
realistic and committed to a concrete approach

prefatory
serving as a preface

Premodern Critical Race Studies (PCRS)
term coined by Pr. Margo Hendricks at the RB4R symposium “Race and Periodization” at the Folger Shakespeare Library in 2019 to designate retroactively a field of academic inquiry that was over thirty years old at the time. PCRS extends Hendricks’s definition to include the study of race-making informed by Critical Race Theory’s methods and ethos in any premodern time period

premodernity
era in the history of the Western world that precedes the late-seventeenth-century and eighteenth-century intellectual movement of the Enlightenment

processional
designed to be carried and displayed during religious processions

proselytism
eagerness to convert others to one’s own religion

quadrant
quarter divided from other quarters by a rectangular coordinate axis

racialization
interpretive process of ascribing racial value to something or a racial identity to someone

rebus
riddle representing words or syllables through pictures of objects or through symbols that sound like the intended words or syllables

redact
to remove a portion of text from a document by making that text illegible

reconquista
series of medieval Catholic campaigns launched to conquer territories that had been under Moorish rule since the eighth century in the Iberian Peninsula. King Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabelle of Castile successfully concluded the Reconquista with the Fall of Granada in 1492

romance
genre of marvelous verse or prose narrative popular in premodern Europe, often but not always centered around a knight’s quest

sartorial
relative to clothing

Satyr
in Greek and Roman mythology, minor forest deity having both human and goat-like features

scenography
stage scenery designed for a theatrical production

scribe
someone who copies manuscripts

Sephardic
refers to the Jewish and Jewish-descended people expelled from Spain and Portugal in the late fifteenth century, and by extension to Mediterranean Jewish culture

settler colonialism
defined by historian Patrick Wolfe as a distinct type of colonialism in which colonizers destroy Indigenous peoples and cultures, replace them, and establish themselves as the new rightful inhabitants. Settler colonial discourse normalizes and thus perpetuates in the present the logic of elimination and the mechanisms of dispossession that have animated it over time

shrine
holy space containing the relics of a Saint, place of pilgrimage

sociologist
scholar studying the development, structure, and functioning of society, social institutions, and social relationships

somatic
relative to the body

sovereignty
for a state or a people, political independence, and self-determination

subaltern
inferior, subordinate

supersessionary
bound to replace something else

synecdochically
in the manner of a synecdoche, a figure of speech that consists in mentioning a part to refer to the whole, or vice-versa

T-O mappa mundi
medieval map of the world representing the Mediterranean, the Nile, and the Don River conjoined to form a “T” separating Europe, Africa, and Asia, all encircled by the Ocean in the form of an “O.”

taxonomy
detailed and complex system of categorization

teleological
moving towards a strategically pre-determined endpoint

theological
relative to theology, the knowledge and study of God and religion

topography
science or practice of describing a particular location

topos
a commonplace, synonym for trope

transdisciplinarily
in a manner that applies across academic disciplines (such as history, literature, and art history)

transhistorical
applying across different historical periods

transliterate
to translate a word into a different alphabet (for instance an Arabic word into the Latin alphabet)

travelogue
travel-focused narrative

trope
very commonly used phrase, idea, or device

troped
turned into a trope

type
block bearing a relief character used with other blocks for printing purposes

typesetter
person who arranges the type composing the page for printing purposes

typographic
relative to typography, the arrangement of elements on a printed page

vellum
parchment of superior quality made from the skin of calves

venality
quality of a person who can easily be bribed

vernacular
quality of a language or dialect native to the people who speak it (rather than a literate or foreign language)

versification
process of turning someone or something into the subject of poetry written in verse

vestimentary
relative to clothing

Viceroyalty
colonized territory ruled by a Viceroy in the name of a foreign king

watercolor
painting whose paint is made with a water-soluble binder and thinned with water rather than oil

western
in premodern times, Europe and its direct sphere of influence in North America

woodcut
image printed from a wooden block that has been manually carved