Sabine MacCormack

Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, CSC, Professor of Arts and Letters
Professor of History and Classics
University of Notre Dame
Kellogg Institute Faculty Fellow

“The Worlds of José de Acosta (1540–1600)”

Thursday, February 1, 2007
4:15 pm - C103 Hesburgh Center

Abstract

Currently, José de Acosta of the Society of Jesus, author of the Historia natural y moral del nuevo mundo (Seville 1590) enjoys a certain obscurity mingled with occasional patches of moderate attention from academics. But in early modernity, the Historia was a best seller in several languages. Acosta also wrote a manual for missionaries, which likewise has been enormously influential. His two Latin treatises on the Last Days, and his Latin sermons on the liturgical year were reprinted a couple of times in the 17th century, but have been ignored ever since. Acosta came from a Jewish family from Old Castile. He entered the Society of Jesus at the age of 14 and spent 17 years in Peru and Mexico before returning to Spain in 1587. Reading him, one sees in turn the expert on Andean history and culture (this is what he is best known for), an admired preacher, skilled administrator and somewhat less skilled ecclesiastical politician who was as influential in the Andes as he was in Spain. No one has ever attempted to fit these pieces together: in my current work, I'm having a try. At the core of the enterprise is not any desire to resuscitate Acosta's fame. Instead, I'm trying to understand the coherences and disjuncture of the life that this gifted, energetic and deeply reticent man lived in America and Europe, and also something of his impact and influence.

Biography

MacCormack (DPhil, Oxford University) is the Rev. Theodore Hesburgh, C.S.C. College of Arts and Letters Chair, jointly appointed in History and Classics. Her research interests focus on the Roman Empire and late antiquity, the Andean region in the 16th and 17th centuries and the Interaction between Andean and European cultures and religions. Her current research investigates the conflict and accommodation between Andean and Spanish political and religious ideas and practices in the early modern period.

MacCormack is a member of the American Philosophical Society, Fellow of the Medieval Academy of America, and a recipient of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's Award for Distinguished Achievement in the Humanities.