Paola Bertucci wins 2025 Paul Bunge Prize for latest book
Her book, In the Land of Marvels, was honored with the most prestigious international award for works on the history of scientific instruments.
Paola Bertucci, Professor of History and of History of Medicine, won the 2025 Paul Bunge Prize for her book In the Land of Marvels: Science, Fabricated Realities, and Industrial Espionage in the Age of the Grand Tour (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023).
The Paul Bunge Prize is awarded annually to the author of the best book on the history of scientific instruments. Sponsored by the Hans R. Jenemann Foundation and the German Chemical Society, the prize is endowed with a purse of 7,500 euros and is known as the most prestigious international award for works on the history of scientific instruments.
In the Land of Marvels begins in 1749 and charts a nine-month journey of French physicist Jean-Antoine Nollet through Italy. Nollet was supposedly attempting to “solve an international controversy over the medical uses of electricity.” But in reality, he had been hired by the French state to go undercover and learn the secrets of Italy’s silk manufacturing industry.
By contrasting published material with private documents, Bertucci illuminates “how eighteenth-century scientists published fictional events and results to bolster their careers, ultimately leading to long-lasting misrepresentations of scientific practice and enduring stereotypes.”
Bertucci will receive the award on March 17 at the 2025 Bunsen Conference, which will be held at the University of Liepzig in Germany.