The publication incorporated selected papers concerning the emblematic books published by the Jesuits during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in the Spanish Netherlands where they were more active than anywhere else. Jesuits published more emblematic books than any other group during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. And they were probably more active in both the print and material culture in the Spanish Netherlands than anywhere else. The essays are revised versions of papers presented at the Fourth International Emblem Conference held at Leuven in 1996.

The publication incorporated selected papers concerning the emblematic books published by the Jesuits during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in the Spanish Netherlands where they were more active than anywhere else. Jesuits published more emblematic books than any other group during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. And they were probably more active in both the print and material culture in the Spanish Netherlands than anywhere else. The essays are revised versions of papers presented at the Fourth International Emblem Conference held at Leuven in 1996.

Antwerp and Amsterdam were among the most active publishing centres for emblematic forms in Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Nowhere else was the emblematic mode more integrated into the literary and artistic culture than in the Low Countries. The essays are revised versions of papers presented at the Fourth International Emblem Conference held at Leuven in 1996. The table of contents provides an overview of the variety of topics and approaches represented in the volume.

The volume is a cross-section of contributions to the Glasgow International Emblem Conference 1990, and demonstrates the range of research currently under way into the emblem tradition in the Renaissance and Baroque periods and the variety of its development across the centuries in many European countries. The seventeen papers are arranged here in broad national and thematic groupings, showing the emblem tradition in France, Italy, the Low Countries, Germany, Britain, within the field of alchemy, and extending into wider European traditions. The volume is generously illustrated, and an index is provided for the orientation of the reader. An impression of the richness of the European emblem tradition is given for the general reader, whilst the specialist is provided with a comprehensive insight into the many and varied strands of current emblem research and the diversity of approach adopted by scholars internationally.

An astounding history of the accomplishments of the Society of Jesus, from painting and poetry to cartography and physics, from Europe to New France to China.

The thirteen articles in this volume deal with the Neo-Latin emblem book after the birth of the genre with Andrea Alciato's Emblematum libellus (1531). While the interest in emblematics has grown considerably during the last decades, the seminal Neo-Latin production has received relatively little attention. In Mundus Emblematicus an international team of experts in the field makes this part of the emblem tradition accessible to a broad scholarly audience. The articles cover a variety of emblem books published at the time, ranging from influential humanist collections (for instance those by Achille Bocchi, Hadrianus Junius, or Joachim Camerarius) to alchemist (Michael Maier) or religious emblems (such as the books of the Calvinist Theodere de Beze, or the Jesuit Herman Hugo). In each paper subjects dealt with include the historical context of the work and its makers, the relation between word and image, the structure of the collection as a whole, and the emblematic game (intertextuality in word and image). Moreover, several articles explore the interaction between the emblem and connected literary phenomena, like the commonplace-book, the fable or the use of commentaries. All papers are in English and all examples from Latin texts are translated. Together, these articles show the variety within the Neo-Latin emblem production, thus challenging traditional approaches of the emblem. As such Mundus Emblematicus contributes towards a more comprehensive view of the forms and functions of the genre as a whole.