Albert the Great’s Arabic Sources

In medieval philosophy, theology, and science, Albert the Great (d. 1280) represents the highest example of reliance on authors of different cultural provenances, and his multifarious references to sources granted him paramount influence in coeval and subsequent European thought. Building on previous research, the project aims at a systematic analysis of the multi-cultural background of the philosophical, theological and scriptural works of Albert, and of the impact of his use of sources in contemporary and later authors, circles, and intellectual trends.

Research on a series of representative test-cases chosen among the main disciplinary and doctrinal areas of Albert's production will lead to:

A) a full appreciation of the wide range of Greek, Latin, Arabic, and Hebrew and other oriental sources employed by Albert in his writings, a detailed explanation of the finality of this intertextual and intercultural strategy, and a study of the wide resonance in subsequent authors of the repository of sources which Albert made available to Latinity, with respect to university institutions (faculties of arts), ecclesiastic academic centers (Dominican school of Cologne), and non-academic contexts (cultural environments of Dante Alighieri), involving pseudo-epigraphical writings, vernacular productions, and encyclopedias;

B) a new interpretation of the crucial phase of the Middle Ages in which Albert the Great lived (13th century) from an intercultural perspective, with the philosophy of Greek origin playing the pivotal role of rational common ground at the intersection of the three Mediterranean cultures, across dogmatic barriers and political fluctuations;

C) an attempt to apply Albert the Great's model of intercultural philosophical dialogue to contemporary concerns, with special regards to issues like the theory of the alleged “clash of civilizations”, the debate about the “cultural roots” of Europe, and the project of a sustainable, inclusive, and tolerant society, respectful of human diversity and attentive to environmental needs.

The most up-to-date technologies in digital humanities and computer science will assist the historical and philological research of the project by planning and start building an online inventory of the sources quoted by Albert the Great in his works, in the form of a searchable repository of citations. In its final form, the project’s front-end will also contain codicological and bibliographical tools, as well as devices for facilitating the exchange of ideas between experts of Albert the Great and of medieval philosophy in general. This technical apparatus aims to become progressively a full-fledged open-access portal on the life, works, and thought of AtG and on his fortune until nowadays.