Ancient and modern knowledges

In this editorial, we introduce the main themes discussed in this special issue and advocate for a more integrative history of knowledge across disciplinary boundaries through a reconsideration of the language of 'ancient' and 'modern'. We discuss how the essays collected in this special issue seek to go beyond the recurring metaphor of quarrel and competition between antiquity and modernity, and the related representations of key individuals and groups as ‘pioneers’ of modern approaches, in order to move towards a more complex relationship of crossfertilization of 'ancient' and 'modern' knowledges. Each essay maintains that an appreciation of knowledge making as a fully embodied practice is vital for understanding the complex and sometimes contradictory role played by classical authors in the knowledge making of later periods. In different ways, all the essays demonstrate how ancient authors not only provided scholars in later ages (working in a range of disciplines) with a rich supply of evidence for their own works; more interestingly, perhaps, much of what has been viewed as innovation involved scholars drawing on ancient authors and techniques in new ways.