When, in the second half of the 17th century, three national academies were founded in Europe – the Holy Roman Empire’s Academia naturae curiosorum (Leopoldina) (1652) in Schweinfurt, the English Royal Society (1660/63) in London, and the French Académie des sciences in Paris (1666) – styles and techniques of scientific communication changed rapidly. Whereas before researchers had been communicating their experiences, inventions, and theories through the publication of books, individual visits, or by exchange of learned letters and manuscripts, now other forms of communication manifested themselves: Organized scientific symposia if possible, but mostly scientific journals.

Against this background, the workshop planned is to focus the emergence of scientific journals in the second half of the 17th century in a comparative approach. Light will be shed on the journals’ different functions, on their diverging types of texts and illustrations, on their role as carriers of old and new concepts and theories in the field of medicine and natural knowledge, and of course on their entrepreneurs, learned men, observers, collectors, academic travelers, editors, readers.