Gaius Iulius Solinus is the author of the Collectanea rerum memorabilium or Polyhistor, a late antique survey of memorable lands, peoples, stones, plants, animals, and on life, the universe and everything. He has been called the "chief Latin geographer to a millennium", and a large number of manuscripts as well as a host of early printed editions are witness to the long-lasting popularity of his work.
This changed after the end of that ?millennium?: ?As we still have Solinus? sources today, the Collectanea are in substance irrelevant for us,? thunders Pauly-Wissowa?s Real-Encyclopädie. This lack of interest in Solinus is also evident in the rarity of more recent research on Solinus. New studies are certainly not amiss.
Most of the contributions to this volume were first presented at a dedicated colloquium held in the University and Research Library Erfurt/Gotha, which houses a large number of early editions of the Collectanea. The lively conference showed that Solinus rewards the study of his text, his sources, his position as an author, and his "Nachleben".
A survey of the contents of Solinus' work, a revised handlist of manuscripts transmitting it and a full research bibliography complete this collection of new studies.
With contributions by Arwen Apps (Sydney), Caroline Belanger (St Andrews), Kai Brodersen (Erfurt), Paul Dover (Kennesaw), Francisco Javier Fernández Nieto (Valencia), Tom Hillard (Sydney), David Paniagua (Salamanca), Barbara Pavlock (Bethlehem), Félix Racine (Montreal), Frank E. Romer (Greenville), Karin Schlapbach (Ottawa), and Zweder von Martels (Groningen).