Animals had key economic and cultural importance in pre-industrial European society. More specifically, it was their bodies which were of almost exclusive interest to early modern Europeans. In the meat-heavy diet of courtly cuisine they were as indispensable as their labour was in agriculture and warfare. Their skins, fur, feathers and bones were irreplaceable as raw materials in almost every pre-modern industry and were, like other commodities, entangled in local and global trading networks. In the visual and performing arts, animal bodies were laden with a virtually unlimited wealth of symbolic meanings, while the anatomical comparison between the bodies of humans and animals became an increasingly important part of medical research. Likewise, the live, moving animal body continued to be an indispensable element of urban entertainment for instance in horse races, dog and cock fighting.

Historians of gender and early modern identity have pointed out the way in which attitudes to the human body were closely linked to discourses at all levels of early modern society. In regards to the bodies of animals, individual aspects of the importance of animal bodies in early modern society have been discussed in works on the history of anatomy, food, slaughtering, fashion and the arts.

In the light of the astonishing increase of historical enquiry into the human-animal relationship and the fact that it has begun to branch out into a wide range of sub-fields, we believe that at this point in time an interdisciplinary forum for exchange is necessary to encourage exchange and debate on the various aspects of the significance of animal bodies to early modern Europeans.

We propose to approach the significance of the body of animals to early modern Europeans from the vantage point of four broadly-defined themes:

The representation of animal bodies in early modern Europe

The dissected and preserved bodies of animals in early modern science

Precious bodies: exotica, trading companies and animals as commodities

Animals and their bodies in captivity: intimacy and entertainment

Organised by:

Silvia Sebastiani (École des hautes études en sciences sociales, Paris)
Pierre Serna (Institut de l'histoire de la Révolution Française, Paris)
Alan Ross (Humboldt Universität zu Berlin/ Institut d’histoire moderne et contemporaine, Paris)
Antonella Romano (Centre Alexandre Koyré, Paris)

The keynote lecture on 11 December held by Daniel Roche (Collège de France).

Venue: Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Unter den Linden 6, 10099 Berlin, Raum 2249a.

The conference is open to all subject to prior registration by 7 December 2015. Please contact: Alan Ross, alan.ross@hu-berlin.de

A Humboldt University KOSMOS Workshop organised in collaboration with the Centre Alexandre Koyré, the Institut de l'Histoire de la Révolution Française and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales.