Eleonora Travanti

2025/2026
Gerda Henkel Tandem Scholarship for Global History of Ideas at the Gotha Research Centre Project: "Obicinis Isagoge: Idest, breve Introductorium Arabicum in Scientiam Logices. Genesis, transmission and reception of the Īsāġūjī al-Abharīs from the Middle Ages to the late Renaissance"

2023/2024
Scholarship holder at the Gotha Research Centre of the University of Erfurt (TMWWDG scholarship holder)
Project: "Late Renaissance Aristotelianism between Philology and Philosophy. The reception of the De sermonibus exotericis Ottaviano Ferraris"

2023
Scholarship holder at the Wittenberg Research Library for the History of the Reformation (research grant from the Evangelical Wittenberg Foundation)
Project: 'Antisocinianism as a pretext for the consolidation of orthodoxy. Anti-Socinian writings in the RFB Wittenberg"

2023
Scholarship holder at the Herzog August Bibliothek Wolfenbüttel (funded by the state of Lower Saxony)
Project: "Lessing as editor of the journals of the ducal library in Wolfenbüttel (1770-1778)"

2022
Scholarship holder at the Gotha Research Library of the University of Erfurt (TMWWDG scholarship)
Project: "Contra Socinianos. Anti-Socinian writings in the Gotha Research Library"

2015/2016
Scholarship holder at the Herzog August Library Wolfenbüttel (Dr Günther Findel Foundation)
Project: Lessing's journal Zur Geschichte und Litteratur (1770-1781)

2014/2021
Doctoral studies in the history of Philosophy at the Philipps University of Marburg

2021
Dr. phil. doctorate at the Philipps University of Marburg
Topic: "Lessing's defence of orthodoxy against Enlightenment theology in the early Wolfenbüttel years (1770-1774)"

2010/2012
M.A. programme in History of Philosophy at the Università degli Studi di Macerata

2008/2009
Scholarship holder at the Freie Universität Berlin (Erasmus programme)

2005/2010
B.A. studies in Philosophy at the Università degli Studi di Macerata

2004/2005
B.A. programme in Physics at the Università degli Studi di L'Aquila

2004
Mathematics and Science High School "A. Orsini", Ascoli Piceno (Italy)

 

Obicinis Isagoge: Idest, breve Introductorium Arabicum in Scientiam Logices. Genesis, transmission and reception of the Īsāġūjī al-Abharīs from the Middle Ages to the late Renaissance

In the late Renaissance, a learned Franciscan missionary, Tommaso Obicini, began to publish materials on the linguistic training of future missionaries in the Middle East. Among these works, in 1625 he published a bilingual introduction to logic in Arabic and Latin entitled Isagoge: Idest, breve Introductorium Arabicum in Scientiam Logices. This is the Latin translation of the Arabic text opposite, which comes from the textbook of the Arabic philosopher al-Abharī. However, this logician is not explicitly mentioned by Obicini. The paradoxical fate of forgetting and being misunderstood is shared by both Obicini's isagoge as well as the Īsāġūjī al-Abharīs.

Al-Abharī’s Īsāġūjī is a brief and fundamental introduction to logic, written in the second half of the 13th century, which in the following centuries became widely used as the primary logic textbook in the madrasa curriculum. Even though, according to the author himself, the book was written for beginners, its brevity and conciseness provoked numerous commentaries and explanations. As the word "Īsāġūjī" has been misunderstood, al-Abharī's work is still frequently misinterpreted in the research literature as a commentary on the Isagogeof Porphyrios, as is also the case in Pertsch's catalogue.

In order to evangelise the Near East, the Sacra Congregatio de Propoganda Fide had called for the opening of schools in the Franciscan monasteries in Rome in order to train future missionaries not only in languages but also in theological matters. The Isagoge is a shining example of the scholarly production of the Roman Catholics in Arabic. The reconstruction of the genesis, transmission and reception of this bilingual textbook on logic makes it possible to vividly illustrate the cultural exchange processes between West and East, between the Christian and Islamic worlds and between the disciplines of Philosophy and Theology.

This project can help to trace a network of references in the global history of ideas that extends from the Arabic and Islamic Middle Ages to the Christian and Latin late Renaissance. The work is based on the important collection of Arabic manuscripts by the logician Abharī (texts, commentaries and glosses) in the Gotha Research Library.

Monograph

Lessings exoterische Verteidigung der Orthodoxie. Die Wolfenbütteler Beiträge gegen die Aufklärungstheologie (1770–1774). Berlin 2023. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110793055.

Editorship

Hannes Kerber, Marco Menon, Eleonora Travanti (eds.): Leo Strauss. la dottrina essoterica. saggi su Lessing. Pisa 2025.

Magdalena Fricke, Hannes Kerber, Eleonora Travanti (eds.): Practices of provocation. Lessing's writing and controversial strategies. Hanover 2024.

Essays

Mösers Schreiben an Herrn Aaron Mendez da Costa und die christlich-pharisäischen Erdichtung der Auferstehungslehre. Sadduzäische Quellen eines antichristlichen Arguments. [Im Erscheinen.] 

Lessings „Leibnitz von den ewigen Strafen“. Die theologische Provokation eines Aufklärers. In: Magdalena Fricke, Hannes Kerber, Eleonora Travanti (Hg.): Praktiken der Provokation. Lessings Schreib- und Streitstrategien. Hannover 2024, S. 191-211.

Lessing und seine Bibliothekszeitschrift Zur Geschichte und Litteratur. In: Helmut Berthold, Franziska Schlieker (Hg.): Beiträge zur jüngeren Lessingforschung. Wolfenbüttel 2018, S. 115–138. 

„Finiti ad infinitum nulla est proportio“. Eternità delle pene e giustizia di Dio nella controversia tedesca da Soner a Lessing. In: Omero Proietti, Giovanni Licata (Hg.): Tradizione e illuminismo in Uriel da Costa. Macerata 2016, S. 355–404.

Reviews

Hanspeter Marti, Karin Marti-Weissenbach (Hg.): Nürnbergs Hochschule in Altdorf. Beiträge zur frühneuzeitlichen Wissenschafts- und Bildungsgeschichte. Köln, 2014. In: Arbitrium 35 (2), 2017, S. 180–183.

Online Journal: Ritiri filosofici (https://ritirifilosofici.it), Roma, ISSN 2284-2446.

• 03.2020, Ritiri filosofici: Della temerarietà delle congiure contro il tiranno
• 02.2020, Ritiri filosofici: Machiavelli e l’autodissoluzione di ogni tirannide
• 10.2019, Ritiri filosofici: Spinoza sull’inutilità dell’uccisione del tiranno
• 04.2019, Ritiri filosofici: Machiavelli e la necessità della religione civile
• 03.2019, Ritiri filosofici: Metti una sera un massone a cena: il pathos calmo di Lessing
• 02.2019, Ritiri filosofici: Socrate, l’uomo dagli atti giusti prima delle parole giuste
• 01.2019, Ritiri filosofici: L’ozio di Seneca contro la corruzione dello Stato 

Lectures

09.2025

Comparatus fuit Loligini. Quellen, Funktion und Zweck der Dunkelrede bei Leibniz und Lessing. 

Tagung „Dunkelrede. Konzeptionen esoterischen Schreibens in Aufklärung und Romantik“, Universität Bielefeld.

01.2025

„Was alle alte Philosophen in ihrem exoterischen Vortrage zu tun pflegten“. Lessing als Leibniz-Interpret: Antike und frühneuzeitliche Quellen

Auf Einladung des Philosophischen Seminars und der Leibniz-Forschungsstelle der Universität Münster

10.2024 

Antisozinianismus als Vorwand. Lessings exoterische Kritik der Aufklärungstheologie 

Tagung „Die intellektuellen Linien von den Sozinianern bis zu Kant“, Johannes a Lasco Bibliothek Emden.

06.2024 

Aristoteles’ exôterikoi logoi. Ein Interpretationsschlüssel aus der Spätrenaissance 

Intellectual History Seminar, Forschungszentrum Gotha, Universität Erfurt 

05.2024 

Conversazioni inter absentes. La riscoperta della scrittura essoterica di Leo Strauss 

„Passione dell'intelletto e levità dello sguardo. In ricordo di O. Proietti“, Università di Macerata 

03.2024 

Antisozinianismus in Wittenberg als Identitätsstiftung (1604–1684) 

Tagung „Lutherische Traditionsbildung im Umfeld Abraham Calovs (1612–1686)“, Leucorea, Wittenberg. 

10.2023 

Mösers Schreiben an Herrn Aaron Mendez da Costa und die christlich-pharisäische Erfindung der Auferstehungslehre. Frühneuzeitliche Quellen eines sadduzäischen Arguments 

Tagung „Justus Möser – Philosoph, Staatsmann, Publizist“, Universität Osnabrück 

07.2023 

Lessings exoterische Verteidigung der Orthodoxie. Die Wolfenbütteler Beiträge gegen die Aufklärungstheologie (1770–1774) 

Lessing Workshop Online (Lessing Akademie & Lessing Society) 

03.2023 

Lessing als Herausgeber. Die Zeitschrift Zur Geschichte und Litteratur 

Stipendiaten-Kolloquium, Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel 

11.2022 

Contra socinianos. Αntisozinianische Schriften in der Forschungsbibliothek Gotha 

Stipendiaten-Kolloquium, Forschungszentrum Gotha der Universität Erfurt, Gotha 

07.2022 

Lessing als Kritiker der Aufklärungstheologie. Die exoterische Rhetorik in Leibnitz von den ewigen Strafen 

Tagung: Praktiken der Provokation: Lessings Schreib- und Streitstrategien, Herzog August Bibliothek

11.2021 

„Was alle alte Philosophen […] zu tun pflegten“. Die Quellen der exoterischen Lehre Lessings 

Oberseminar, Institut für Deutsche Philologie, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München 

12.2017

From Lessing to Plato. Leo Strauss’s Return to Ancient Political Philosophy 

Political Philosophy and its History: Leo Strauss and Beyond, KU Leuven 

11.2017 

Il debito di Leo Strauss nei confronti di Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1937–1973) 

Workshop su Leo Strauss (1899–1973), Fondazione San Carlo, Modena 

11.2017 

Lessing und seine Bibliothekszeitschrift Zur Geschichte und Litteratur 

Jüngere Lessing- und Aufklärungsforschung, Lessing-Akademie e. V., Wolfenbüttel 

09.2017 

The Idealization of Jesus in the Theologico-Political Treatise. Excommunication and Rehabilitation of Spinoza among German Jewish Thinkers 

IV Bertinoro Annual Meeting „History of Research on Jesus“

01.2017 

Should a Philosopher Believe in Eternal Punishment? Lessing’s Vindication of Leibniz’s Hypocrisy 

Lying and Hypocrisy, Colloquium in The History of Moral and Political Philosophy, Braga 

09.2015 

Eternal Punishment and Justice of God in German Controversy from Soner to Lessing 

International Congress on Uriel da Costa, Exame, 1624. Sources, Themes, Traditions, Macerata

• Lessing as an interpreter of Leibniz
• Spinoza reception in Germany
• Socinianism and anti-Socinianism
• Renaissance Aristotelianism and Averroism
• Machiavelli and republicanism
• Leo Strauss and the exoteric style of writing