1. See in general Anthony Grafton, What Was History? The Art of History in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), esp. Chapter 3.
2. For a general map of the field see Anthony Grafton, Joseph Scaliger: A Study in the History of Classical Scholarship (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983–1993), II, pt. 1,
3. and Benjamin Steiner, Die Ordnung der Geschichte: Historische Tabellenwerke in der Frühen Neuzeit (Cologne: Böhlau, 2008). On eclipse dating in this period, and its fortunes from Bacon through the sixteenth century, see C. Philipp E. Nothaft, Dating the Passion: The Life of Jesus and the Emergence of Scientific Chronology (200–1600) (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 160–171, 238–240, 261–282.
4. Mark Pattison, “Joseph Scaliger,” in Henry Nettleship, ed., Essays, 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon, 1889), I, 162–163.
5. For an excellent review of Mercator’s life, work, and posthumous reception see Mark Monmonier, Rhumb Lines and Map Wars: A Social History of the Mercator Projection (Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press, 2004).