European Languages and Societies Commons^™

Pedro Mexía And The Politics Of Translation In The Early Modern World, Erin Fairweather, Robert Fritz

Posters-at-the-Capitol

Spanish humanist Pedro Mexía (1497-1551) wrote two highly influential texts in the sixteenth century, the Silva de varia lección (1540) and the Historia imperial y cesárea (1545), which were, notably, written in Spanish, a vernacular language, as opposed to Latin, the academic language of the age. As these books presented previously inaccessible scientific and historical knowledge to the common person, they were soon translated into several languages, achieving widespread fame and influence. However, the texts have been mostly forgotten and have seen little study in recent times. Nevertheless, the Silva and the Historia can help us better understand the politics …