Imagining Otherness: The Pleasure of Curiosity in the Middle Ages

The main aim of this paper is to take a closer look at both the philosophical and religious presumptions upon which the medieval concept of curiosity was premised. Such an enterprise needs to go back to Aristotle in order to fully comprehend the limitations for curiosity introduced by St. Augustine in his City of God and developed by such medieval thinkers as Isidore of Seville and Thomas of Aquinas. These conceptions will be analysed in reference to Foucauldian archeology of knowledge. Much attention should be paid to the ideas of curiositas, admiratio and studiositas.