[Geneva, France, pharmacist. An outline on a little-known French-Genovoise pharmacopoeia]

In the time of the French occupation of Geneva and the formation of a << Départment du Léman >> from 1798 to 1813, the physician Louis Odier published a Manual of practical medicine destined for the Health officers of the Departement. This work encloses at its end a short pharmacopoeia, till today practically unknown in the pharmaceutical bibliography, which is described here. An analysis shows that this formulary does not belong to the popular literature but is corresponding, with some exceptions, to the other similar pharmacopoeal works of the Enlightenment.

From «Pflantz-Gart» to «Stammregister». On the history of knowledge of fruit cultivation in the canton of Bern

Among the efforts for the improvement of agricultural productivity, the cultivation of useful plants is particularly at the center of the Economic Enlightenment. In contrast to fodder and textile plants, cereals and potatoes, fruit trees are not included among its favoured subjects. This may be considered as astonishing in view of the significance that fruit has acquired in the contemporary diet. Be that as it may, efforts to improve fruit cultivation go back to even before the classical period of the Economic Enlightenment. The example of Bern in particular is suited to such an analysis over the Longue durée that covers the time from Daniel Rhagor’s «Pflantz-Gart» (1639) to the «Register of varieties of excellent species of pome fruits for the canton of Bern» (Stammregister, 1865). From the perspective of the history of knowledge, the connections between scholarly knowledge and local experience on the one hand and the changing actors in these knowledge systems on the other hand are of special interest here

Ancient History as a Means of Transforming Colonial India in the Late-Eighteenth and Early-Nineteenth Centuries

This article focuses on the studies and discourses of mostly British scholars of the early colonial period belonging to two schools of thought. It shows how the studies of both schools – European orientalism and utilitarianism – were intricately connected to the political development of the emerging British paramountcy over the South Asian sub-continent, as both were looking for means of establishing and/or strengthening colonial rule. Nevertheless, the debate was not just a continuation of discussions in Europe. Whereas the ideas of the European Enlightenment had some influence, the transformation of the Mughal Empire and especially the idea of a decline of Muslim rule offered ample opportunities for understanding the early history of India either as some sort of “Golden Age,” as the orientalists and their indigenous supporters did, or as something static and degenerate, as the utilitarians did, and from which the population of sub-continent had to be saved by colonial rule and colonial values. Fearing the spread of the ideas of the French Revolution, the first group of British scholars sought to persuade the native elites of South Asia to take the lessons of their past for the future development of their homeland. Just as the classicists back in Europe, these scholars were convinced that large-scale explanations of the past could also teach political and moral lessons for the present although it was important to deal with the distant past in an empirical manner. The utilitarians on the other hand believed that India had to be saved from its own depravity through the English language and Western values, which amounted to nothing less than the modern transformation of the true Classical Age.

Rollenporträts als Agenten der aufklärerischen Theaterreform

Initiiert von G. E. Lessings Hamburgischer Dramaturgie und in direkter Nachfolge von G. Ch. Lichtenbergs Briefen aus England, in denen dieser versucht, die Kunst des berühmten englischen Schauspielers David Garrick zu schildern, entstehen im deutschsprachigen Raum ab den 1770er Jahren erstmals ausführliche Rollenporträts von Schauspielenden. Ziel dieses neuen Genres ist der Versuch, der Transitorik des Schauspielerischen mittels Verschriftlichung habhaft zu werden und gelungene Beispiele der neuen realistisch-psychologischen Schauspielkunst in ihrer Vorbildhaftigkeit einem breiteren Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Der ideale Schauspieler gilt als ‚Dollmetscher’ und Experte der Seele. Die im Spiel graduelle Sichtbarmachung innerer Vorgänge ist ein wesentlicher Baustein der realistisch-psychologischen Schauspielkunst und versetzt die Zuschauer in die Position der Lesenden ebenso wie darin das Bewusstsein um die eigene Lesbarkeit evident wird. Rollenporträts werden bis ins 20. Jahrhundert von Theaterhistoriografen unreflektiert als ‚Zeitzeugenberichte’ und damit als authentische zeitgenössische Quellen interpretiert. In meinem Beitrag möchte ich die Wechselwirkungen zwischen der Erfindung einer realistisch-psychologischen Schauspielkunst im Genre Rollenporträt und der Funktionalisierung dieser Erfindungen durch eine reform- und aufklärungsaffine Theaterhistoriografie untersuchen.