The poetic mode most often associated with the marvellous is epic: an inherently hybrid form of poetry that combines narration with enactment. In his Discorsi del poema eroico (1587; pub. 1594), Torquato Tasso (1544–95) conveyed his own understanding of meraviglia, which in epic poetry is essential as long as it is tempered, in his view, by verisimile (verisimilitude). This chapter explores the transformation of epic from poem to madrigal to reveal how musical setting recalibrated the representational balance achieved in epic poetry. Following the lead of Giaches de Wert (1535–96) and Luca Marenzio (1553–99), Monteverdi would bring epic poetry in ottava rima – particularly musical settings of Tasso’s epic Gerusalemme liberata (1581) – into the lyric-dominated world of the madrigal book.

Poetic, literary and philosophical dreams of automata in the ancient world tended to focus on humanoid or at least mammalian entities. Yet when automata are realised in practice, they are considerably different in quality.This chapter explores the gap between the automata of ancient fantasy and reality, in terms of their physical nature and the concepts and categories with which they were implicated (statues, slaves, theatre, the divine).  It asks how far the sense of wonder that is associated with automata changed over time and how far it (ever) depended on a naturalistic or realistic reproduction of the body, human or animal. I argue that although the earliest known automata seem to have made gestures towards naturalism, both in terms of movement and other activities (if not in how these effects were realised), interest rapidly moved towards mechanical wonder (as Hero of Alexandria suggests) and theatrical wonder rather than any kind of naturalistic wonder. Perversely, the more technically sophisticated ancient automata became, the less the interest in mimicking human or animal bodies. The explanation may be sought partly in the non-naturalistic nature of ancient mimesis and partly in the changing status and sophistication of ancient mechanics. As a result, the path from ancient automata to modern notions of the robot or android is not at all straightforward.

This chapter considers Defoe’s profound interest in the language and mores of popular culture. It illustrates the way that the Tour uses the speech and activity of the people to show how each region contributes to the diverse culture of the nation, as a means to evoking the variety of Britain. The “talk and activity” of the people, as G.A. Starr puts it in an important article, help to flesh out this evocation of Britain. Defoe had a special penchant for proverbs, which he used in the title of several works, and which are scattered through the text of his major books in both fiction and non-fiction. Proverbial usages reflect not just habits of mind among the population at large, but also the outlook of those who live in particular corners of the kingdom. The treatment owes much to his keen ear for speech patterns, evident in the dialogues found elsewhere in his oeuvre. Moreover, in a number of places within the Tour, Defoe cites local customs, often related to tales and legends, that he generally treats with obvious scepticism. Apart from all else, he was a pioneer in the literary use of folklore.

Chapter 13: This chapter traces the theatrum mundi (theatre as world) metaphor back to its technical and philosophical roots. By comparing iconographic sources from scientific texts with scenographic ones, the chapter follows the evolution of the notions of machine and wonder in the seventeenth century and argues that the material culture of theatre played an important role in the development of Cartesian physics and the new cosmology and, in particular, in the mechanization of the world picture. The chapter focuses on the relationship between Fontenelle, Descartes, and the engineer and architect Giacomo Torelli, whose scenography gained him the name of ‘the great sorcerer’. Paradoxically, it is by taking up Torelli’s design, combined with Descartes’s new definition of meteors, that Fontenelle manages to define a new type of ‘wonder’, scientific and no longer magical.

Accounts of miracles and visions feature prominently in each of Flodoard’s histories. Notably, he recorded a huge number of wonders that occurred during his own lifetime. This constitutes a striking contrast with contemporary authors of history and hagiography, many of whom doubted whether miracles still happened or whether they were necessary. This chapter examines Flodoard’s attitude to the supernatural, asking in particular how it evolved over the course of his lifetime. I argue that Flodoard came to perceive miracles as validation of the work carried out by monks, clerics and bishops, and that he heeded seriously reports of visions and other phenomena as divinely inspired responses to moral failings. Flodoard contrasted the earthly vices of the leaders of the West Frankish kingdom with the greatness of spiritual power, thus providing a rationale for episcopal authority in a time of political upheaval.