Albrecht Dürer, sometimes spelled in English as Durer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in contact with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I.
Johannes Kepler was a German astronomer, mathematician, astrologer, natural philosopher and writer on music. He is a key figure in the 17th-century Scientific Revolution, best known for his laws of planetary motion, and his books Astronomia nova, Harmonice Mundi, and Epitome Astronomiae Copernicanae, influencing among others Isaac Newton, providing one of the foundations for his theory of universal gravitation. The variety and impact of his work made Kepler one of the founders and fathers of modern astronomy, the scientific method, natural and modern science. He has been described as the "father of science fiction" for his novel Somnium.
Erwin Panofsky was a German-Jewish art historian, whose academic career was pursued mostly in the U.S. after the rise of the Nazi regime.
Margaret Ann Boden is a Research Professor of Cognitive Science in the Department of Informatics at the University of Sussex, where her work embraces the fields of artificial intelligence, psychology, philosophy, and cognitive and computer science.
Lyndal Anne Roper is a historian. She was born in Melbourne, Australia. She works on German history of the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, and has written a biography of Martin Luther. Her research centres on gender and the Reformation, witchcraft, and visual culture. In 2011 she was appointed to Regius Chair of History at the University of Oxford, the first woman and first Australian to hold this position.
Johannes Stabius (1450–1522) was an Austrian cartographer and astronomer of Vienna who developed, around 1500, the heart-shape (cordiform) projection map later developed further by Johannes Werner. It is called the Werner map projection, but also the Stabius-Werner or the Stab-Werner projection.
Duchess Anna of Prussia and Jülich-Cleves-Berg was Electress consort of Brandenburg and Duchess consort of Prussia by marriage to John Sigismund, Elector of Brandenburg. She was the daughter of Albert Frederick, Duke of Prussia, and Marie Eleonore of Cleves.
Anton Fugger was a German merchant and member of the Fugger family. He was a nephew of Jakob Fugger.
Peter Mandler is a British historian and academic specialising in 19th and 20th century British history, particularly cultural history and the history of the social sciences. He is Professor in Modern Cultural History at the University of Cambridge and Bailey fellow in History at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge.
Katharina Kepler was a woman from Leonberg, Württemberg, who was the mother of the famous astronomer Johannes Kepler. She was accused of witchcraft in 1615, but was defended by her son and released.
Timon Screech was professor of the history of art at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London from 1991 - 2021, when he left the UK in protest over Brexit. He is now a professor at the International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Nichibunken) in Kyoto. Screech is a specialist in the art and culture of early modern Japan.
A shrew's fiddle or neck violin is a variation of the yoke, pillory, or rigid irons whereby the wrists are locked in front of the bound person by a hinged board, or steel bar. It was originally used in the Middle Ages as a way of punishing those who were caught bickering or fighting.
Christopher Ocker is a historian and Professor of Medieval and Early Modern Studies at the Institute for Religion and Critical Inquiry in the Australian Catholic University, Melbourne. He is also professor of the history of Christianity at San Francisco Theological Seminary; a member of the Core Doctoral Faculty of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley; series editor of Studies in Medieval and Reformation Traditions, and a co-editor of Arbeiten zur Kirchengeschichte. He served as Interim Dean of SFTS and Assistant Provost of the Graduate School of Theology in the University of Redlands from 2021 to 2023. Ocker is known for his work on the history of religion in Europe, Medieval and early modern intellectual and cultural history, and the social and political history of late medieval and early modern Central Europe.
The Heller Altarpiece was an oil on panel triptych by German Renaissance artists Albrecht Dürer and Matthias Grünewald, executed between 1507 and 1509. The artwork was named after Jakob Heller, who ordered it. Dürer painted the interior, Grünewald the exterior.
Matthäus Schwarz was a German accountant, best known for compiling his Klaidungsbüchlein or Trachtenbuch, a book cataloguing the clothing that he wore between 1520 and 1560. The book has been described as "the world's first fashion book".
Susan Elizabeth Brigden is a historian and academic specialising in the English Renaissance and Reformation. She was Reader in Early Modern History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Lincoln College, before retiring at the end of 2016.
David Hotchkiss Price is an American historian and a scholar of early modern culture. He teaches at Vanderbilt University, where he is Professor of Religious Studies, History, and Jewish Studies. Price studied classics (BA) and German literature (MA) at the University of Cincinnati before receiving his PhD in German Studies from Yale University (1985). He also studied at the University of Tübingen and the University of Munich. From 2005 to 2016, he was a professor at the University of Illinois. He previously taught at Yale and the University of Texas at Austin. Price is the author of numerous books and articles on the Bible in English, Reformation drama, humanist poetry, Albrecht Dürer, and Johannes Reuchlin and the Jewish Book Controversy of the early sixteenth century.
Alexandra Marie Walsham is an English-Australian academic historian. She specialises in early modern Britain and in the impact of the Protestant and Catholic reformations. Since 2010, she has been Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge and is currently a fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge. She is co-editor of Past & Present and vice-president of the Royal Historical Society.
Felicity Margaret Heal, is a British historian and academic, specialising in early modern Britain. From 1980 to 2011, she was a lecturer at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford. She had previously taught or researched at Newnham College, Cambridge, the Open University, and the University of Sussex.
Sara Binzer Hobolt, FBA is a Danish political scientist, who specialises in European politics and electoral behaviour. She holds the Sutherland Chair in European Institutions at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
