Research Training Group "Expert Cultures from the Twelfth to the Eighteenth Century"

Gion Wallmeyer, M.A.

Vita


  • 2015-2018 Research Associate at the Research Training Group "Expert Cultures from the Twelfth to the Eighteenth Century" of the Georg-August University Göttingen
  • 2013-2014 Research Student at the Research Training Group "Vorsorge, Vorhersage, Voraussicht" of the Duisburg-Essen University
  • 2012-2013 Guest Student at the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities (KWI), Essen
  • 2010-2011 Student Assistant at the Chair for Later Medievial and Early Modern History of the Duisburg-Essen University
  • 2010-2014 MA in History and Philosophy at the Duisburg-Essen University
  • 2006-2007 Freelancer at the "Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung"
  • 2006-2010 BA in History and Applied Philosophy at the Duisburg-Essen University

    • Contribution for lecture series "Wagnisse" at the university Duisburg-Essen in winter semester 15/16



Project Title


De recuperatione Terre Sancte - The Production of Crusade Experts within the Royal Courts of the Late 13. and Early 14. Centuries

In May 1291 the city of Acre was captured by the Egyptian Sultan Al-Ashraf Khalil. After the fall of their once-great capital the crusader states collapsed rapidly, and by the end of the same year every single crusader strongpoint on the Levant had succumbed to the Mamluk rule. While for many recent-day historians this series of events had put an end to the age of crusading, contemporary Christian rulers refused to accept the loss of their Holy Land and quickly began to plan its recovery. In the wake of utter defeat the noble ruling class started to question their military modus operandi and concentrated on finding completely new ways and means to reconquer the Holy Sites from the Egyptian Sultan. The latest knowledge from all fields of medieval society was collected at the courts and carefully examined for its potential military application. Bristling with such planning activity, Latin courts from Naples to London quickly became the center of attraction for all kinds of experts, which tried to use their specialist knowledge for the purpose of crusade-planning. With the traditional crusading-knowledge called into question, the battle-hardened veterans of past crusades suddenly had to share their seats on courtly planning councils with mendicant friars like Guillelmus Adae or merchants like Marino Sanudo.
But how did one become such an expert in crusading? What kind of knowledge employed these experts in courtly planning-sessions? In what way did they represent this knowledge to their courtly audience? And how did they try to reach these elite circles with their advice? In my dissertation, I want to address these questions by examining royal registers, correspondence and the so-called de-recupertione treatises with the combination of social network analysis, content analysis and the sociology of knowledge.


Research Interests


  • History of the Crusades in the Later Middle Ages
  • Historical Theory
  • Social Network Analysis
  • History of Science
  • History of Cartography
  • Social- and Cultural History of Royal Courts
  • History of Universities and History of the Orient-Perception in the Later Middle Ages