Hakluyt@400: A Commemorative Series to Enhance Public Understanding of the History of English Exploration and Voyages of Discovery

2016 marks the 400th anniversary not only of Shakespeare's death but that of his contemporary, Richard Hakluyt, the key exponent of commercial and colonial expansion in the period. The program of events outlined here will greatly increase public awareness of the expanding world in the sixteenth century, the books and maps that informed this vision (and gave meaning to plays like Othello and The Tempest). The 400th anniversary of Hakluyt's death on 23 November 2016 provides a timely and unique opportunity to organize a series of free-to-attend knowledge exchange events, of exhibitions, workshops/symposia, lectures, and outward-facing publications. Running from October-December 2016, the Hakluyt@400 series is designed to enable attendees from wide and diverse backgrounds to understand and appreciate the importance of Hakluyt's editorial work to promote English overseas exploration, trade, and expansion, especially through understanding the significance of his collection of accounts of exploration, The Principal Navigations ... of the English Nation (1589; 2nd ed. 1598-1600).

The impact and engagement program derive from a research project to produce the first-ever scholarly edition of Hakluyt's landmark publication, The Principal Navigations (1598-1600), with a team of 35 international scholars under the leadership of Prof. Claire Jowitt (PI) and Prof. Daniel Carey (CI) (the research has been previously supported by an AHRC Network Grant AH/L000687/1., and see also the project website http://www.hakluyt.org/). The project was inaugurated in 2008 with an international, publicly accessible conference on 'Richard Hakluyt (c.1552-1616): life, times, legacy' held at the National Maritime Museum, and is now reaching maturity with the first volumes scheduled for publication in 2017-. A key aim of the Hakluyt @400 series is to make publically available the scholarship informing the edition through exhibitions, lectures, and symposia. The series of events for autumn 2016 are organized in partnership with the Hakluyt Society, in particular with Anthony Payne, Vice President of the Society, Honorary Research Fellow at UEA, and the new edition's Textual Editor. Other project partners include Christ Church, the Museum of the History of Science, and the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

Hakluyt published accounts by explorers, traders, and diplomats, well-known and obscure, as he sought to include the most up-to-date information about places, peoples, and commodities around the world, and about technical, navigational, and scientific developments. He was also a pioneer himself in the history of the book, introducing the genre of the travel writing collection to Anglophone readers, by assembling new and original information from his extensive range of contacts around the world, and editing, translating, and shaping this material for his readers. This vast body of material established a framework supportive of English commercial and colonial expansion: his project literally brought knowledge of the whole world into one book. The research shows the significance of Hakluyt's editorial labours in developing the nation's actual and anticipated role in a global economy.

The objective of the Hakluyt@400 series is to foster knowledge exchange through a range of public activities showcasing Hakluyt's importance in English history and his cultural and scientific legacies. Activities range from stunningly-housed exhibitions (at Christ Church and the Bodleian Library, Oxford) that include visually arresting early modern maps, books, and manuscripts; to hands-on workshops where attendees will discover how to use Elizabethan astrolabes and chronometers (the cutting-edge technology of the day); public lectures by prominent broadcasters; and finally, 400 years almost to the day that Hakluyt was buried in Westminster Abbey, a commemorative service on 27 November 2016 and unveiling of a wall plaque in Hakluyt's honour at Wetheringsett, his final parish.

The impact and engagement activities derive from a research project to produce a scholarly edition of Hakluyt's landmark publication, The Principal Navigations (1598-1600), previously supported by an AHRC Network Grant AH/L000687/1. The research project has been awarded grants by the British Academy, the Modern Humanities Research Association, and other major funders. This text consists of hundreds of individual documents, itineraries, reports, narratives, and archival records (extending to over 2000 folio pages) and describes every region subject to European activity and aspiration in the period, from the New World to Muscovy, and the East Indies to Africa. It is being edited by a team of 35 international scholars under the leadership of Jowitt (PI) and Carey (CI) (see the Project website http://www.hakluyt.org/). The new 14-volume edition, contracted for publication by Oxford University Press (2017-), fulfils a widely perceived scholarly need and general demand for a quality edition of a text that, despite its significance, has until now never been produced in a scholarly, critical edition, with explanatory annotations and notes. The project was inaugurated in 2008 with an international, open-to-the public conference on 'Richard Hakluyt (c.1552-1616): life, times, legacy' held at the National Maritime Museum, and is now reaching maturity.

Information about and research findings from editorial work on the new edition will be communicated in the Hakluyt@400 series, enabling knowledge exchange and generating impact through:

a) Enhancing public understanding of Hakluyt's influence on the history of early modern English exploration and his role in the creation of what later became the British Empire. The 400th anniversary of Hakluyt's death on 23 November 2016 provides an opportunity and focal point around which to organize a series of free-to-attend events, including exhibitions, workshops, and lectures, as well as outward-facing publications (October-December 2016) designed to enable people from a wide range of backgrounds to understand and appreciate the importance of Hakluyt's editorial work to promote English overseas exploration, trade, and expansion.

b) Creating a wider public appreciation of Hakluyt's political influence in his lifetime. Hakluyt offered advice on English colonial and imperial projects to the most powerful figures in the land including Elizabeth I and James I, and career politicians such as Secretary of State William Cecil, Lord Burleigh, and his son Robert. These figures are recognized as the chief architects of what became England's global, oceanic, and mercantile empire, but the research shows, and the activities disseminate, how Hakluyt himself was central to the origin of England's empire.

c) Enabling the public to understand the ways in which the genre of the travel writing collection, which Hakluyt pioneered in England, was crucial to creating a climate that supported English ambitions for exploration, trade, and expansion. The research establishes, and the activities disseminate, the significance of Hakluyt's book and the role of his editorial labours in the development of the nation's imagined, and, in due course, central role in a global economy.

d) Enlarging public appreciation of the ways Hakluyt's work contributed to scientific discovery, particularly with respect to instruments, technology, navigation, cartography, and mapping, as well as to the religious cultures of the time.

e) Enabling attendees to understand the key importance of particular places to Hakluyt's work - specifically the significance of Christ Church, where he held a Studentship (fellowship), and of the enduring contacts and networks his time in Oxford provided him with more generally, and of Wetheringsett, Suffolk, his last parish.

f) Allowing a broader public understanding of the processes and work required in editing a text such as Hakluyt's for twenty-first century readers.