Alessandro Scafi

Italian historian of medieval and Renaissance culture and the history of cartography, based at the Warburg Institute, known for work on sacred geography and representations of paradise, including the book Mapping Paradise: A History of Heaven on Earth.

This list of books are ONLY the books that have been ranked on the lists that are aggregated on this site. This is not a comprehensive list of all books by this author.

  1. 1. Mapping Paradise

    A History of Heaven on Earth

    A richly illustrated history of how Western scholars and mapmakers sought to locate the Garden of Eden on real-world maps from late antiquity to the Renaissance. It traces shifting interpretations—from biblical exegesis and classical geography to medieval mappaemundi and early modern cartography—showing how theology, symbolism, and emerging scientific ideas intertwined in representations of the world. Through an extensive survey of texts and images, it reveals why the quest for a terrestrial paradise endured and how it shaped geographical imagination.

    Purchase from Bookshop.org