This issue, composed of ten essays, investigates the relationship between travel and the Holy Land from the 19th century to the beginning of the 21th century. In particular, it deals with perceptions, representations and narrations provided both by travelers to the Holy Land and by subjects (individuals, as well as groups, organizations and institutions) who envisioned it without ever having traveled there. In this way, this issue intends to identify reciprocal and intertwined influences between narratives of the imagined Holy Land and travelers' accounts, thus exploring to what extent the construction of the Holy Land has been carried out according to a combination of travelers' reports and imagined narratives.
More specifically, this issue simultaneously presents the way in which different travelers, coming from various geographic, religious, cultural, socio-economic and political backgrounds perceived the Holy Land, depicting, narrating and constructing it, irrespective of their reasons for traveling, whether based on religion (i.e. Jewish, Christian and Muslim pilgrims) profession, or tourism. Thus, it collects diverse viewpoints in order to shed light on the similarities and differences, continuities and fragmentations concerning the Holy Land that may have occurred during the last three centuries.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Travels to the “Holy Land”: Perceptions, Representations and Narratives by Serena Di Nepi, Arturo Marzano
“Thousands great saints:” Evliya Çelebi in Ottoman Palestine by Yaron Ben-Naeh
Images, Views and Landscapes of the Holy Land. Catholic and Protestant Travels to Ottoman Palestine during the 19th Century by Paolo Maggiolini
Travels of Russians to the Holy Land in the 19th Century by Simona Merlo
An Unusual Traveler: Ida Pfeiffer’s Visit to the Holy Land in 1842 by Jennifer Michaels
Stillness and Motion: Depicting the Urban Landscape of Palestine in the 19th Century by Guy Galazka
Encounters of a Third Kind: Mark Twain, William C. Prime and Protestant American Holy Land Narratives by Milette Shamir
“With Eyes towards Zion:” Visions of the Holy Land in Romanian Synagogues by Ilia Rodov
Visiting British Palestine: Zionist travelers to Eretz Israel by Arturo Marzano
Graphic Novels Explore an (Un-)Holy Land by Nina Fischer
Beholding the Holy City: Changes in the Iconic Representation of Jerusalem in the 21th Century by Dana Hercbergs, Chaim Noy
Discussion:
Maristella Botticini, Zvi Eckstein The Chosen Few: How Education Shaped Jewish History, 70-1492
Contribution by:Sergio Della Pergola Contribution by:Cristiana Facchini
Reviews:
Pál Hatos and Attila Novák (eds.) Between Minority and Majority. Hungarian and Jewish/Israeli Ethnical and Cultural Experiences in Recent Centuries by Ferenc Laczó
Klaus Kempter Joseph Wulf. Ein Historikerschicksal in Deutschland by Ulrich Wyrwa
Asher Salah L’epistolario di Marco Mortara. Un rabbino italiano tra riforma e ortodossia by Carlotta Ferrara Degli Uberti