Copyright

Tim Shephard; Chenxi Xiao;

Published On

2026-07-27

Language

  • English

Print Length

6 pages

THEMA

  • AVM
  • NHDL
  • NHF
  • JBCC

BISAC

  • MUS020000
  • MUS015000
  • HIS037020
  • HIS020000
  • SOC002010

Keywords

  • Renaissance
  • Italy
  • Asia
  • music
  • sound
  • travel
  • knowledge

2. Asia in Italian Print

Chapter of: The Khan’s Pifferi: Reading about the Musics of Asia in Late Fifteenth-Century Italy

This chapter reviews books describing Asia printed in Italy up to 1500 in a general way, focussing on those that will not be considered as case studies. These include the novel Guerino Meschino, contributions from the family of Alexander Romances, various classical geographies, and the earliest Italian printed account of Cristoforo Colombo’s first voyage. The printed books mentioned in this chapter are conveniently listed in chronological order by year of publication in the Appendix.

Contributors

Tim Shephard

(author)
Professor of Musicology at University of Sheffield
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4053-8916
https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/music/people/academic-staff/tim-shephard

Tim Shephard is Professor of Musicology at the University of Sheffield. He has led two major research projects funded by The Leverhulme Trust, “Music in the Art of Renaissance Italy” (2014-17), and “Sounding the Bookshelf 1501: Music in a Year of Italian Printed Books” (2020-23). He is author of Echoing Helicon: Music, Art and Identity in the Este Studioli (OUP, 2014), co-author of Music in the Art of Renaissance Italy (Harvey Miller, 2020) and Sounding the Bookshelf 1501 (OBP, 2025), and co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Music and Visual Culture (Routledge, 2014), The Museum of Renaissance Music: A History in 100 Exhibits (Brepols, 2023), and Music and Visual Culture in Renaissance Italy (Routledge, 2023), among many other publications. https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/music/people/academic-staff/tim-shephard https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4053-8916

Chenxi Xiao

(author)
Graduate Student in Musicology at University of British Columbia

Chenxi Xiao is currently a graduate student in musicology at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, following undergraduate study at the University of Sheffield. Her research focusses on music and warfare in early modern Europe, and the musical culture of early modern Italy.