Acknowledgements
The volume is the result of a conference project started in 2021, which was realized in May 2022 in Berlin in the Tagungsstätte Villa Altenstein. There was some positive synergy between research and teaching thanks to the attendance by many students of the summer semester’s ’22 courses 13155, 13156, 13165 on Early Modern Global Port Cities; Renaissance, Humanism and Politics; Early Modern Cultures. This has been a particularly fruitful experience beyond the dialogue among scholars.
During the preparation of the conference the editors got notice of at least three other conferences regarding sovereignty, also in its historical dimensions, of which the proceedings were not yet all accessible at the moment of finalizing this manuscript. However, we draw the attention of the reader to these parallel endeavors which seem to overlap quite little with the content of the volume. By contrast, they bear a fortunate proof of the re-ignited interest in the subject.1 The meeting at Berlin, attended by half of the group who could make it physically to post-Covid-Germany, as well as the Creative Common licence for open access three years after the otherwise completely un-subsidized publication, were financially supported by German Research Foundation’s Heisenberg-Grant and the Sachbeihilfe of Cornel Zwierlein (DFG grant numbers GZ Zw 164-7/1, -8/1 and -9/1, 2018 to March 2023). The chapters were pre-circulated among the contributors and have been read by both editors.
Thanks goes to all who have helped during the realization and organization of the conference, Anna Sprawska, Marc Schremmer, Cora Teichmann, Felicia Duschek; to Ivo Romein and Gera van Bedaf from Brill and, above all, to all contributors for their intellectual generosity.
Cf. Smith C. (ed.), Sovereignty. A Global Perspective (Oxford: 2022) – here, the historical dimension covered is the Ancient period. A conference Regard critique sur les souverainetés (Afrique, Amériques, Asie, Europe) Moyen Âge – XXIe siècle (June 2021); a conference Souveränität: Konzept und Schlagwort im Wandel. Frankreich und Deutschland, 14.–21. Jahrhundert (April 2022).