Article
Rereading Elizabeth I as Europa
PMLA
(2023)
Abstract
Albeit widely cited, the 1598 engraving known as Elizabeth I as Europa is something of a mystery: little to nothing is known of its authorship or of the circumstances of its production and circulation. Tracing the print's origins to one of Europe's earliest news periodicals, I argue that Elizabeth I as Europa is not about Elizabeth but about Europa—which is to say, about the construction of an early modern public that could understand itself as European. The print participated in this construction in two interrelated ways: as an intervention in Europa Regina cartography, it thematized Europe as a shared (if highly contested) space of discourse that could cut across national, linguistic, and confessional differences; as a piece of transnational reportage meant for broadscale circulation, it helped conjure up the public on which that space of discourse depended.
Disciplines
Publication Date
2023
Citation Information
Carmen Nocentelli. "Rereading Elizabeth I as Europa" PMLA Vol. 138 Iss. 2 (2023) p. 321 - 342 Available at: http://works.bepress.com/nocentelli/11/