{"title":"The Power of Scenery: Frederick Law Olmsted and the Origin of National Parks","authors":"R. Barker","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2044226","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2044226","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"95 - 96"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48093810","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Ottoman Scramble for Africa: Empire and Diplomacy in the Sahara and the Hijaz","authors":"R. Fritze","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2044231","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2044231","url":null,"abstract":"many discoveries about the universe outside our planet. Ralph D. Lorenz’s book chronicles the history of climate science and planetary exploration, investigating the expanding evidence concerning climatology on Earth and that bearing on planetary neighbors Mars and Venus and Saturn’s moon, Titan. Lorenz begins with historical observations from classical antiquity, the Islamic Golden Age, the Middle Ages, and Renaissance in Europe. The first chapter described how early scholars paved the way for the eras of telescopes, satellites, and climate-sensing technology. Eventually, changes in the world would be witnessed first-hand by astronauts from space, including the extent of the damage incurred by the Arctic ice and the shrinking of the Aral Sea. This timeline takes in the technological developments that have led to the acquisition of crucial satellite data bearing on climate projections and the development of solutions in order to mitigate the effects of climate change. The third chapter reaches the “Age of Numbers,” characterized by advances in climate science such as heat modeling using Stefan’s Law, infra-red spectrum monitoring on Earth, Mars, and Titan, the dawn of numerical weather forecasting, and classification of “habitable zones” on the surface of Mars. The 1900s to late 1980s were characterized by applications that utilized the heat of geothermal energy in melting permafrost on Mars. The identification of sources of water in Titan, as well as phosphine and other biogenic compounds in Venusian clouds, incited many novel discussions in the scientific community on the possibility of life outside Earth. The exponential growth of climate technology and planetary innovation is well documented in these chapters, with a large emphasis on the growing desire to investigate and understand climate change on Earth and habitability outside our planet. Lorenz moves on to characterize the period from 1990 to 2000 as one in which there was a growing interest in Mars. From 1994 onwards, there were many technological advances such as the Hubble Space Telescope, deployed for more careful observation of bodies like Titan. In addition, with the launch of rovers to Mars, and the discovery of methane there, both experts and laypeople entertained speculations concerning extraterrestrial life on that planet. However, there were differing views concerning the existence of methane, some contending that it was the result of chemical reactions concerning water and carbon dioxide, while others maintained that it was derived from microorganisms. Lorenz then describes the period from 2004 to 2012, calling it “Dune Worlds,” and it is apparent from his review that this is a fitting name. The landmark Cassini Saturn brought back a wealth of weather data, generally confirming the view that the planets are composed of harsh, desert-like environments. The nature of their weather remains anything but clear, however, following the Cassini observations. The final period, 2012 to","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"100 - 102"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42329529","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Greatest Adventure: A History of Human Space Exploration","authors":"J. Johnson","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2044224","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2044224","url":null,"abstract":"Zimbabwe, and other countries. Although Morrison stretches his religious analogies to the breaking point, when it comes to Brexit, he kicks things off already beyond the breaking point. He clearly does not like the gold standard and clearly does not like Brexit, so why not contend that they are, in some sense, the same sort of thing? Actually, in one case, Britain returned to an international institutional arrangement at the behest of almost all its elite opinion makers, whereas, in the other case, Britain left an international institutional arrangement against the advice of almost all its elite opinion makers. Maybe both decisions were bad, but, if so, they were bad for opposite reasons. This is really two books in one. Its core is an excellent history of Britain’s return to the gold standard after World War I. Morrison is a skilled and diligent researcher and has unearthed a very interesting tale. Unfortunately, like a live oak draped in Spanish moss, the central story is carrying an enormous amount of parasitic growth: all of the talk of religion, orthodoxy, heresy, apostles, Mount Sinai, and so on. Morrison would have done better to have produced the excellent work of history of which he was clearly capable and cleared his tree clear of all the epiphytes.","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"91 - 92"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45487014","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Geographical Knowledge as Power: The Role of the Society of Jesus and the Society of Foreign Missions of Paris in the Early Exploration of Louisiana","authors":"Mirela Altic","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2046944","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2046944","url":null,"abstract":"The Society of Jesus and the Society of Foreign Missions of Paris played prominent roles in the early exploration of French Louisiana. The two societies competed over territorial jurisdiction since the presence of their missionaries provided privileged access to the latest geographical data. In times of exploration and colonial territorial expansion, geographical data proved to be an important lever of power, and French missionaries were one of the principal agents of acquiring and disseminating knowledge. We follow the role of the two mentioned missionary societies through the eyes of the Jesuit Father Paul du Ru, the priest of the Society of Foreign Missions of Paris, Francois Le Maire, and two Jesuit travelers, Antoine de Laval and François-Xavier Charlevoix. Their journals, travel narratives, and maps offer an early testimony to Louisiana’s rich history and cultural encounters between European settlers and native nations. This article is based on original research.","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"5 - 37"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49452599","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Exploring Planetary Climate: A History of Scientific Discovery on Earth, Mars, Venus and Titan","authors":"P. A. Johnson","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2044230","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2044230","url":null,"abstract":"descriptions from the seventeenth, fourteenth, and nineteenth centuries. Each route and traveler essentially stand on its own. This is true even of the chapters on the Hajj and the trans-Saharan caravan routes, both of which follow the narrative of Ibn Battuta, but with virtually no references to each other. Not too surprisingly, only one of the travel-writers in the book is a woman (Lucy Duff Gordon, traveling the Nile in 1862); four of the twelve travelers are not European. The chapters are just over fifteen pages long, including notes, so there is not really room for more than a historical summary and some basic details. The style of writing is also noticeably, almost intrusively, simple: uniformly short sentences and easy vocabulary. There is definitely an art to this kind of writing, but the style is odd for a book published by Oxford University Press on a seemingly specialist topic. However, while There and Back concerns a particular type of history, it is certainly meant for a popular audience. There are interesting touches in most chapters. I enjoyed the chapter on the Silk Road (part of section II: “Pilgrimage Routes”), which followed the narrative of the Buddhist monk, Fa Xian, quite closely. Fa Xian and his companions traveled the Silk Road, starting in 399 CE, from their monastery in China to the places where the Buddha lived in India, searching for better translations of Buddhist sacred writings. Gordon, whose area of expertise is Asian history, is of course aware that the Silk Road is usually viewed as a trade route, rather than a pilgrimage route. By following Fa Xian’s story, Gordon focuses on “ . . . the less well-known, mental aspect of the Silk Road as a route, and tells us how ideas moved along it” (p. 64). This different perspective and the poignant details of Fa Xian’s story are compelling. On the other hand, I disliked the chapter on the Indian Ocean (in section IV: “Trade Routes”). The chapter supposedly followed the story of Malik Ambar from slavery (captured on the east coast of Africa) to being the ruler of an enclave in the Deccan Plateau of India. The story is interesting enough, but seemed somehow muddled or at least poorly edited – and, as an historian, I found the lack of footnotes for key parts of the story very frustrating. The very general “overview” of the Indian Ocean “route,” three pages at the end of the chapter, seemed better thoughtout than the narrative involving Ambar, but it was also a little ludicrous for such a vast region and span of time. As I was evaluating this book, I tried to figure out how it might be used. Parts of it are interesting for general reading, of course, but for people who have been engrossed in the history of travel for some time, such as the readers of this journal, it offers little that is particularly new or exciting. The book would not fit a typical freshman class at college either, with its spread of topics and confusing lack of chronology. But perhaps a chapter or two could b","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"99 - 100"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43693737","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Fossilization: Understanding the Material Nature of Ancient Plants and Animals","authors":"Richard V. Francaviglia","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2044228","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2044228","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"97 - 98"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47236897","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Nuno Da Silva’s Third Relation: An Unknown Report on Francis Drake’s Voyage (1577–1580)","authors":"José María Moreno Madrid, D. Salomoni","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2048246","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2048246","url":null,"abstract":"This paper presents a hitherto unknown account of Francis Drake’s voyage (1577–1580). The author is Nuno da Silva, a Portuguese pilot whom Drake seized on the Island of Santiago in Cape Verde. Since Da Silva was released in Huatulco on 13 May 1579, the account only covers events up to this date. The transcription of the source in its original language (Spanish) and an English translation are provided.","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"64 - 82"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43748926","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Animal Studies and Exploration History: Amundsen’s Sledge Dogs Who Helped Discover the South Pole","authors":"Nicholas W. Miller","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2049969","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2049969","url":null,"abstract":"From the fictious Captain Ahab’s incessant chase of Moby Dick to fur trappers of the North American Rockies and even the wild safaris of Africa, animals have inspired and accelerated human exploration and discovery of the unknown. Like most stories, these narratives are usually far more engaged with human actors, events, and histories. For instance, Elizabeth Leane argues, “While animals frequently feature as companions in narratives of human travel, they often remain in the background, mentioned every so often but rarely well delineated.” Sandra Swart suggests, “Perhaps it is the very centrality of animals to human lives that has","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"83 - 90"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48689732","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Silk Roads Peoples, Cultures, Landscapes","authors":"S. Menefee","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2044234","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2044234","url":null,"abstract":"Cambridge, director of the Cambridge Museum of Anthropology and Archeology, and the author of several books, including Islanders: The Pacific in the Age of Empire (2011), his credentials are excellent. In the first chapter, Thomas discusses the first quarter millennium of contact between the Europeans and the peoples of the “South Sea” and what the Europeans reliably came to know about them, which he believes was very little. He sees this as the period during which the initial “theories and myths of Pacific settlement” were formed, and that none of them were valid. Yet, eventually, when centering on the Pacific voyages of Dampier and Cook in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Thomas almost grudgingly gives credence to some of the observations recorded by the leaders of these expeditions. The rest of the volume provides an uncomplicated introduction to the history of a “community of related peoples,” originating largely from Islands of Southeast Asia and Taiwan, who discovered, explored, and settled the isles of the Pacific in the centuries before the pre-contact era. In the process, several of the important technologies associated with these voyages—coconut fiber cordage (“coir”), large double hulled canoes, star and ocean/Islands mental maps, and actual ones (i.e. “stick charts”) as well—are touched upon. Given the established presence of the sweet potato, a New World commodity, in the Islands prior to European contact, the author also points to the strong possibility of an exchange between the Islanders and people of the Americas. This book is admittedly, by the author, a short and basic account, but it nevertheless offers quite a good introduction to a complicated and little-known chronicle of events. To start with, even before the Introduction, there are 12 pages of very useful maps to help the reader to locate the various landmasses of the Pacific and their positioning in relation to each other. The physical and linguistic evidence cited is rather more than convincing, and, perhaps sadly, there is a general lack of reliance on indigenous myth-historical stories (e.g. the great white shark Lono leading people on the long journey from the Marquesas to the Hawaiian Islands). The text is peppered with personal photographs from Thomas’ and other research sites and other illustrations from across the Pacific, though they are not always relevant where placed and/or explained (e.g. stick chart, p. 146). Overall, this work seems to be thoroughly researched, including in Asian and other non-European sources, but there is no real bibliography and only Notes and a three-page Further Reading section. What might be slightly off-putting to some readers and detrimental to the case Thomas is making are his occasional but overt nods toward political correctness, especially in the Introduction and Chapter 1 (e.g. Balboa, p. 17). Voyagers is a clearly and concisely written volume that reads well. It should appeal to anyone interested in the history ","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"104 - 106"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47801740","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Traversing Seas to Evading Proscription: South Asians, Race, and (Im)mobility in Canada and the United States, 1882–1929","authors":"Rishma Johal","doi":"10.1080/00822884.2022.2048247","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00822884.2022.2048247","url":null,"abstract":"This paper explores the attempts made by white settler nations to control the movement of racialized people, while examining the perspectives of those who increasingly sought to travel across seas and explore a world new to their community via the accounts of South Asian travelers. It specifically analyzes these accounts in response to changes in policy. How were South Asian travelers reacting to control over their mobility? This paper argues that in the early twentieth century intensifying racialized discourses and increasing levels of settler state control fundamentally sutured mobility with white privilege—a significant shift that can be read among many South Asian writings on travel to Canada and the United States. This paper first examines the travel writings of South Asians from the late nineteenth century, and then, analyzes responses to shifting policies in travel accounts from the early twentieth century.","PeriodicalId":40672,"journal":{"name":"Terrae Incognitae-The Journal of the Society for the History of Discoveries","volume":"54 1","pages":"38 - 63"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46119824","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}