A servant of Two masters: the Translator Michel Angelo Corai as a Tuscan Diplomat (1599-1609)

On 14 January 1597, as recorded by the archivist in the Archivio di Stato di Mantova on the carta 475 of the Fondo Gonzaga, Fr Giovan Battista Ruffini wrote directly to Manerbio Aderbale, secretary of Duke Vincenzo I’s Chancellery, from Venice. Ruffini rejoices for having arrived in Venice on Christmas day after his journey to the Holy Land; with a tone of satisfaction, he reveals that he has brought a ‘special gift’ back for the Duke. With me I brought back a Syrian, who owns beautiful writings, and can make beautiful things with his hands; I would like you to consent for me to take him to meet His Serenissima Highness … He [the Syrian] has three or four very ancient books in Ajiam-Farsi, Chaldaic, and Arabic and I hope he will have something to please His Highness; he speaks very well; and he writes Arabic, Persian/Farsi, and Turkish. He is a person that I imagine will not displease His Highness; he was the personal scribe of Cigalah when this was the Sinan Pasha of Babylon, he has father, wife, and children in Aleppo but he came with me because he was persecuted by a fellow Turkish

Translators, interpreters, and cultural negotiators : mediating and communicating power from the Middle Ages to the modern era.

This book reconsiders the intellectual, social and professional identity of translators and interpreters when their role involves an intercultural negotiation with institutional powers, be them medieval rulers, modern States, an army of invasion or a dominant culture. Surprisingly little is known of how historical mediations took place, how the mediators worked, and the ways in which transcultural mediations become implicit or explicit forms of power. The chapters seek to address how translators and interpreters can emerge in a position of power by presenting visions, methods, and case studies dealing with a wide thematic range of issues, such as historical concerns, cultural identity, and the role of translation in mediation and cultural transfer. With far-reaching analysis of history, politics, religion and literature, this book will appeal to researchers and students of translation, the history of communication, and institutional power