Unglaubliche Genealogien: eine Neubestimmung

Eine Neubestimmung der genealogischen Literatur in der Neuzeit

The genealogies of peoples and families developed in Europe during the modern period are prevalently studied by scholars from the perspective of the political history of ideas, with the aim of explaining the practical utility of genealogical works. These analyses do not foreground the aspect that is the focus of this paper: the fact that genealogical reconstructions are full of absurdities. They mix factual information, or information that may seem credible, with fabulous details, often false, sometimes ridiculous, in a word “incredible”. This is all the more interesting since these texts were composed during the centuries in which scientific methods applied to historical research were developed. Using tools borrowed from cultural anthropology, this paper suggests an epistemological approach that takes into consideration the meaning and credibility of the genealogical materials in the still authoritative framework of the Historia Salutis, the unitary vision of human history as a fusion of the classical legacy and Biblical tradition.