Plants, Maps, Amuletts

The Middle East has been the subject of colonial projects and theological research since the 19th century. What ideas about the environment, space, and cultural history underpinned scientific collections and maps of the region? Did the prospect of a future German colony or the projection onto a Land of the Bible take center stage in the narrative constructed from the compiled evidence? How did Zionist researchers connect to Christian Palestine research?

Based on object legacies and maps, the study offers a different perspective on German Palestine research, demonstrating that by the end of the 19th century, scientific research displaced biblical spatial conceptions. A biblical Orientalism, perceiving Palestine as the original landscape of the Bible, served as a counter-narrative to colonial modernization through railways and intensive agriculture. In Zionism, maps and collections were adopted based on political inclinations. While the Zionist World Congress translated Heinrich Kiepert's maps in 1913, the Revisionist Ze’ev Jabotinsky used the maps from the Wagner and Debes publishing house in Leipzig as a basis for his Hebrew Atlas in 1925. Revisionists, national-religious, and left-wing Zionists utilized maps of Palestine research, interpreting them differently and establishing distinct spatial conceptions. By examining previously understudied sources, the dissertation reveals turns and shifts in the intellectual history of Palestine research.

The dissertation was defended in May 2021, and a publication is currently in preparation.

_{Picture: Karl v. Raumer, Friedrich v. Stülpnagel: Palästina, 3. Aufl., Gotha 1853–1862 © Sammlung Perthes.}