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Gábor Almási

PhD

Gábor Almási is interested mostly in 15–18th-century history of ideas. His Ph.D. dissertation, obtained at the Central European University (Budapest) in 2005, and later developed into a book – The Uses of Humanism. Johannes Sambucus (1531–1584), Andreas Dudith (1533–1589), and the East Central European Republic of Letters (Leiden: Brill, 2009) – concerned subjects like intellectual and information networks (the Republic of Letters), intellectual and political ideology, court culture and court careers, patronage, social advancement and mobility, religion and politics (the Reformation and the confessionalisation), and the religious attitudes of humanists (tolerance, nicodemism, and irenism). Since then he has continued researching these themes and showed interest also in early modern patriotism and ‘otherness’, in the history of education, in the problem of virtue and merit in society, and in several interrelated aspects of the history of science and the history of political thought. This latter interests included research on political propaganda and the reception of Machiavelli in late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. At the LBI, together with Lav Subaric, his research focused on the language question in late eighteenth-century Hungary, i.e. the history of Latinity and its social dimensions, which led to research on the origins of nationalism via discourse analysis. He is presently working on two projects: on a shorter book project as an editor concerning the history of the work ethic and on the writing of a monograph entitled Science Meets Politics, which is a study of Machiavelli’s positive reception.

Neo-Latin publications

Books

  • Latin at the Crossroads of Identity. The Evolution of Linguistic Nationalism in the Kingdom of Hungary. Ed. by Gábor Almási and Lav Šubarić. Leiden: Brill, 2015.
  • A Secretissima instructio (1620). A kora újkori politikai paradigmaváltás egy Bethlen-kori röpirat tükrében [The Secretissima instructio (1620). The paradigm shift in early modern politics as reflected in a pamphlet of the Bethlen era]. Ed., comm., trans. and intro. by Gábor Almási. Budapest: ELTE BTK, 2014. 234. p.
  • The Uses of Humanism. Andreas Dudith (1533–1589), Johannes Sambucus (1531-1584), and the East Central European Republic of Letters. Leiden: Brill, 2009. (Brill’s Studies in Intellectual History 185.) 388 p.

Text editions

  • Humanistes du bassin des Carpates II. Johannes Sambucus. Ed., comm. and intro. by Gábor Almási and Gábor Farkas Kiss. Turnhout: Brepols, 2014. (Europa Humanistica 14.) 404 p.
  • Languages, Identities and Early Nationalism in the Kingdom of Hungary. An Anthology of the Language Debates (c. 1784−1809). Ed. Gábor Almási and Lav Šubarić (Leiden: Brill) [forthcoming in 2022].
  • Johannes Sambucus: Epistulae, ed. Gábor Almási and Gábor Farkas Kiss (Turnhout: Brepols) [forthcoming in 2022].

Selected articles

  • with Lav Šubarić, ‘The new discourses of nation: the origins of nationalism in late eighteenth-century Hungary (Parts 1 and 2)’, Nations and Nationalism 28 (2022): Part 1: http://doi.org/10.1111/nana.12827; Part 2: http://doi.org/10.1111/nana.12826.
  • ‘Astrology in the Crossfire: The Stormy Debate after the Comet of 1577’, Annals of Science 79 (2022), 1-27 (https://doi.org/10.1080/00033790.2022.2030409).
  • ‘Educating the Christian prince for learning and peace: the cases of Archdukes Rudolf and Ernst in Spain (1564–1571)’, Central European Cultures 1 (2021), 2-43 (https://doi.org/10.47075/CEC.2021-1.01).
  • “The familiar style of Latin humanist correspondences: the case of Johannes Sambucus (1531–1584),” Acta Comeniana 33 (2019) [2020], 9-26.
  • “Temistio e la questione della tolleranza nel Cinquecento veneto,” Ateneo Veneto 206, 3. serie, 18/II (2019) [2020], 167-187.
  • “The Work Ethic in Humanist Biographies: the Case of Willem Canter,” Hungarian Historical Review 8 (2019), 594-619.
  • “Machiavelli’s scientific method: a common understanding of his novelty in the sixteenth century,” History of European Ideas 44 (2018), 1019-1045 (https://doi.org/10.1080/01916599.2018.1503482).
  • “Faking the National Spirit: Spurious Historical Documents in the Service of the Hungarian National Movement in the Early Nineteenth Century.” Hungarian Historical Review 5 (2016): 225-249. (= Nationalism & Discourses of Objectivity: The Humanities in Central Europe in the Long Nineteenth Century, ed. Bálint Varga.)
  • “Experientia and the Machiavellian turn in religio-political and scientific thinking: Basel in 1580.” History of European Ideas 42 (2016), 857-881 (http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01916599.2016.1161531).
  • “Rehabilitating Machiavelli: Kaspar Schoppe with and against Rome.” History of European Ideas 42 (2016), 981-1004 (http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01916599.2016.1161537).
  • “Egy különleges életút a 16. század első feléből: Martin Brenner, erdélyi szász humanista” [A curious career: Martin Brenner Transylvanian humanist of Saxon origins]. Magyar Könyvszemle 132 (2016): 14-30.
  • “Latin and the language question in Hungary (1700–1844). A survey of Hungarian secondary literature (Part 2).” Das Achtzehnte Jahrhundert und Österreich 30 (2016): 237-290.
  • “Latin and the language question in Hungary (1700–1844). A survey of Hungarian secondary literature (Part 1).” Das Achtzehnte Jahrhundert und Österreich 28 (2014): 211-319.
  • “Epistolographie.” In Renaissance-Humanismus. Lexikon zur Antikerezeption. Hrsg. Manfred Landfester. Der Neue Pauly –Supplemente, Band 9 (Stuttgart: J. B. Metzler, 2014), 327–335.
  • “Was Astronomy the Science of Empires? An Eighteenth-Century Debate in View of the Cases of Tycho and Galileo.” In Negotiating Knowledge, Decentering Empires: The Sciences of Heavens, Earth, and Man, c. 1550–1810. Ed. by L. Kontler, A. Romano, S. Sebastiani and Zs. Török. Basingstoke-New York: Palgrave, 2014. 25-51.
  • “Touring Europe: Comparing East Central European Academic Peregrination in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century.” In A Divided Hungary in Europe. Vol. 1: Study Tours and Intellectual-Religious Relationships. Ed. by G. Almási. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2014. 17-34.
  • with Farkas Gábor Kiss, “Szöveggondozás és kapcsolatápolás: Zsámboky János életműve a reneszánsz filológia tükrében.” Irodalomtörténeti Közlemények 117 (2013): 627–691.
  • “Tycho Brahe and the separation of astronomy from astrology: the making of a new scientific discourse.” Science in Context 26/1 (2013): 3-30.
  • “Bethlen és a törökösség kérdése a korabeli propagandában  és politikában [Gábor Bethlen and the problem of the Turkish association in contemporary propaganda and politics].” In Bethlen Gábor és Európa. Ed. by G. Kármán and K. Teszeleszky. Budapest: ELTE 2013, 311-366.
  • “The Humanist Dog.” In Renaissance Studies in Honor of Joseph Connors, ed. by Machtelt Israëls and Louis A. Waldman. Florence: Villa i Tatti, 2013. Vol. 2, 392-398.
  • with Paola Molino, “Nikodemismus und Konfessionalisierung am Hof Maximilians II.” Frühneuzeit-Info 22 (2011): 112-128.
  • “Humanistic Letter-writing” In Europäische Geschichte Online (EGO). Published by the Institute of European History (IEG), Mainz 2010-12-03. URL: http://www.ieg-ego.eu/almasig-2010-en
  • “Conflicts and strategies of a religious individualist in confessionalising Europe: Andreas Dudith (1533-1589).” In Between Scylla and Charybdis Learned Letter Writers Navigating the Reefs of Religious and Political Controversy in Early Modern Europe. Ed. by Jeanine De Landtsheer and Henk Nellen. Leiden: Brill, 2010. 161-184.
  •  “I Valacchi visti dagli italiani e il concetto di barbaro nel Rinascimento.” Storia della Storiografia 52 (2007): 49-66.
  • “Miért Cicero? A cicerói értelmiségi modell és értékek reneszánsz adaptációjáról.” [Why Cicero? On the adaptation of Ciceronian values and models in the Renaissance] Korall 6 (2006): 106-131.
  • “Humanisten bei Hof: Öffentliche Selbstdarstellung und Karrierermuster.” In Funktionen des HumanismusStudien zum Nutzen des Neuen in der humanistischen Kultur. Ed. by Gerrit Walther and Thomas Maissen. Göttingen: Wallstein, 155-165.
  •  “The riddle of Themistius’ ‘Twelfth oration’ and the question of religious tolerance in the sixteenth century.” Central Europe 2 (2004): 83-108.