Jerry Brotton author page

Jerry Brotton biography

Jerry Brotton is Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary University of London. His work as an author focuses on history, maps, Renaissance culture and encounters between England, Europe and the wider world. He is also a regular broadcaster and critic.

His books include The Sale of the Late King’s Goods: Charles I and his Art Collection, This Orient Isle: Elizabethan England and the Islamic World, The Renaissance Bazaar, The Sultan and the Queen, A History of the World in Twelve Maps and Four Points of the Compass. The Sale of the Late King’s Goods was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction and the Hessell-Tiltman History Prize.

A History of the World in Twelve Maps was published by Penguin in paperback on 2 May 2013. In the book, Brotton examines twelve maps from ancient history to satellite-derived imagery and explores how maps reflect the power, authority and ideas of the cultures that produced them.

This Orient Isle: Elizabethan England and the Islamic World examines Elizabethan England’s political, commercial and cultural relationships with Muslim powers, including the Ottoman Empire and Morocco. The book covers treaties, ambassadors, trade, diplomacy and the influence of those contacts on Shakespeare and his contemporaries.

Four Points of the Compass: The Unexpected History of Direction was scheduled for September 2024 as a 224-page hardback. The book studies north, south, east and west across cultures, including Hebrew culture, Renaissance European mapmaking, Islamic traditions, Aztec directional systems and digital navigation.