Making the Earth Global: Early Modern Nautical Rutters and the Construction of a Global Concept of the Earth

Project Information

RUTTER

Grant agreement ID: 833438

DOI

10.3030/833438

Project closed

EC signature date 29 August 2019

Start date 1 September 2019

End date 31 August 2025

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 2 078 331,00

EU contribution

€ 2 078 331,00

Coordinated by

FACULDADE DE CIENCIAS DA UNIVERSIDADE DE LISBOA
Portugal

Periodic Reporting for period 4 - RUTTER (Making the Earth Global: Early Modern Nautical Rutters and the Construction of a Global Concept of the Earth)

Reporting period: 2024-03-01 to 2025-08-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

The RUTTER Project explored the idea that the conception of the Earth as a single coherent object, epistemically congruent, and accessible to scientific enquiry emerged in the 16th century as the result of regular long distance sea travels. In the 16th century deep transformations occurred in consequence of the establishment of regular and stable long distance maritime routes and the knowledge, the perceptions and the convictions that were formed about the Earth gradually acquired a greater cultural weight. The RUTTER project, rather than on the economic, geo-political, or military aspects, focused on how a scientific description of a global Earth was created using an interdisciplinary approach.
The RUTTER Project demonstrated that the notion of a “global Earth” emerged not only from intellectual advances but from changing living conditions that linked local and global realities. It argued that globality requires lived experience, not just abstract understanding, and explored the diverse historical processes that shaped this concept.
RUTTER is based on a corpus of early modern nautical rutters, logbooks, and maritime manuals: all technical documents that recorded the first regular, lived experience of navigating the world’s oceans. These sources reveal how global concepts of the Earth emerged from practical navigation, not abstract theory. The project also examined how such knowledge circulated through networks, institutions, and schooling, and how cross-cultural exchanges shaped maritime traditions. Ultimately, RUTTER traced how sixteenth- and seventeenth-century seafaring contributed to a scientific understanding of a global Earth.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

Since its start in September 2019, RUTTER researchers have carried out extensive archival work in Iberia and across Europe, uncovering many previously understudied documents on long-distance oceanic navigation. Their studies addressed the circulation of maritime knowledge, the spread of rutter literature, the influence of new geographical information on European education, and the transnational exchanges, especially between Islamic and Western traditions, that reshaped early modern understandings of the Earth.
Thematic international workshops, held both online and in person, explored the project’s main research themes as well as the significance of its results. They brought together leading experts in the field and attracted numerous participants from various countries.
A series of seminars with invited speakers was held (https://rutter-project.org/rutter-seminars/) whenever possible with in-person presentations. The RUTTER team members actively presented the results of their work in a considerable number of conferences and academic meetings.
Online sessions "Scholar Meets RUTTER" (https://rutter-project.org/scholar-meets-rutter/) were held. In these sessions well known scholars were invited to discuss their work with the RUTTER team, while at the same time becoming familiar with RUTTER research.
Four PhD dissertations were made in the RUTTER team. One completed with public examination; one completed but waiting for public examination; two in the last sates of the writing of dissertation.
Internal sessions of training in paleography and Latin were held, especially directed to the younger researchers and PhD students.
Committed to open science, the RUTTER team has made its research widely accessible through Technical Notes, a Virtual Library, Book Reviews, and a Blog. The collected information is shared via a database, a forthcoming catalogue, digital editions, and publications in English and Portuguese.
The RUTTER database (https://rutterdb.fc.ul.pt/home.php) aims at compiling a comprehensive inventory of early modern oceanic rutters preserved in archives worldwide. It standardises metadata on their origin, content, and routes, creating a unique digital resource for historical navigation studies. Published during the project, it will still be increased over the next months. Social media (Facebook, X/Twitter and YouTube) were used to share information about the project and its activities. RUTTER team members, including the PI, were invited to present the project’s results to both academic and public audiences.
A blog specifically devoted to the study of Arabic sources has been created (https://lisbon-arabic-reading.blogspot.com/) and online reading sessions are held periodically.
The RUTTER Project created an internship program so that young students could experience joining an ERC research team during a period of some months. Up to now, 15 students were interns of the Project.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The research made by the RUTTER team has opened new areas of research or deepened the knowledge in already established ones. First, in strictly documentary terms, the team has identified and catalogued a great mass of documents (rutters, ship's logbooks, nautical manuals, etc). Although many of these documents were known, they were poorly catalogued and in most cases and had never been analysed. But most of all, new documentation was located and studied. This information is now available to the wider community of scholars either via inventories, catalogues online publications, research papers and books. A Database was created and is already operational. This will provide an absolute quantum leap in the accessibility of these documents to the wider academic community.
The team has also worked on Digital Humanities techniques for the presentation of these materials. The transcription of 46 manuscripts was made, a hyperlink tagging was created, georeferencing was set up and a dedicated website developed. The RUTTER Digital Library consists of fully-digital editions in TEI-compliant XML and PDF formats. The text elements were tagged according to international standards, and are thus searchable and actionable in numerous ways conducive to new research developments.
Significant progress has been achieved in the understanding of mechanisms for the circulation of nautical and cosmographical information in the early modern period. Whereas traditionally historians had focused on the circulation of books and their impact in learned circles, the RUTTER team has been showing that circulation of this information was happening via other many other channels, such as diplomatic ones and espionage, artisanal contacts and the exchange of professionals (pilots), etc. A considerable amount of translation and adaption from one maritime context to another was also a key element, and this has been examined attentively.
RUTTER has also clearly progressed beyond the historiographical state of the art in other directions: By a close comparison of the most important Arabic maritime documents of the period (mostly the works by Ibn Majid and al-Mahri) with European texts, RUTTER researchers have identified evident cross cultural influences between different maritime traditions. Also very novel and beyond the state of the art was the research of RUTTER showing the impact of maritime and geographical novelties in the European schooling system. And finally, major advances were made in understanding how traditional doctrines -- specifically Astrology -- where altered by the reality of the Southern Hemisphere.

Photo of the RUTTER team at the final workshop of the project