Article ID: CBB555691679

Hannibal versus Phormio: Theory and Practice in Italian Military Literature at the End of the Renaissance (2019)

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At the end of the Renaissance, the anecdote relating the dispute between Hannibal and the Greek philosopher Phormio was often mentioned in Italian military literature, especially in order to illustrate the opposition between theoretical knowledge acquired in books and practical skills gained on the battlefield. Authors corresponding to different profiles –such as the letterato Francesco Patrizi da Cherso and the engineer Gabriele Busca– generally used this story in order to claim the predominance of either teoria or pratica in the definition of expertise, even though the relation between the two was admittedly much more complex than a simple contraposition. This essay intends to investigate such a paradoxical situation and to unveil some of the reasons why the authors of these military books have so often chosen to build the defense of their credibility and legitimacy with this seemingly scarcely representative dispute. I intend to demonstrate that the famous anecdote is the object of a precise and clever rhetorical exploitation serving strategies dictated by professional, economic and social motives.

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Authors & Contributors
Magdalena Kersting
Haglund, Jesper
Ayça Fackler
Papadopoulos, Dimitris
Magdaléna Jánošíková
Rolf Steier
Concepts
Expertise
Authorities; experts
Experience; witness
Knowledge and learning
Technoscience; science and technology studies
Epistemology
Time Periods
21st century
Early modern
20th century, late
Modern
Medieval
20th century, early
Places
United States
Provence
Edinburgh
France
Institutions
Wernerian Natural History Society
Royal Society of London
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