Adam Mosley

Adam Mosley is Associate Professor of History in the School of Culture and Communication at Swansea University. A historian of early-modern science, he is former Director of MEMO (Swansea’s Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Research) and member of CODAH (Centre for Digital Arts and Humanities). He has held fellowships at Princeton, Trinity College Cambridge, CRASSH/Wolfson College Cambridge, and the Huntington Library, and served on the Council and as Chair of the British Society for the History of Science.

Education & Training

• BA Natural Sciences, University of Cambridge (Physics, Chemistry, Biochemistry, Pharmacology)
• MPhil History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge
• PhD History of Early Modern Astronomy, University of Cambridge
• Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Research Interests

Mosley’s scholarship focuses on the intellectual and material culture of science in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe. His work addresses:

• The development of cosmography and astronomy, especially the legacy of Tycho Brahe
• The roles of books, instruments, and correspondence networks in the production and dissemination of scientific knowledge
• The historiography of scientific disciplines and the categories used by historians to describe them
• The relationship between science, religion, and political power in post-Reformation Europe

Across his publications he combines meticulous archival research with an interest in how physical objects—sundials, globes, armillary spheres—mediate scientific understanding.

Publications Trajectory

From his 2007 monograph Bearing the Heavens: Tycho Brahe and the Astronomical Community of the Late Sixteenth Century to a forthcoming 2025 essay on the history of the term “cosmology,” Mosley’s output traces a sustained investigation into the social and intellectual structures that supported early modern astronomy. Edited translations, such as Christoph Rothmann’s Discourse on the Comet of 1585, complement studies of cometary historiography and cosmographical instruments, illustrating how editorial and museological practices shape historical narratives.

Awards & Fellowships

• Jane Eliza Proctor Fellowship, Princeton University (1999–2000)
• Junior Research Fellowship, Trinity College, Cambridge (2000–2004)
• Visiting Fellowship, CRASSH & Wolfson College, University of Cambridge (2007)
• Dibner Research Fellowship, Huntington Library, San Marino, California (2015–2016)
• Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Postgraduate Supervision & Teaching

Mosley is currently involved in supervising doctoral and MPhil projects on Tudor–Stuart visual culture and on the diaries and collections of the Victorian philanthropist Richard Glynn Vivian. At undergraduate and taught-postgraduate level he convenes and teaches modules covering:

• Early modern European history (1500–1800)
• Historiography and methodological reflection
• Heritage studies, museums and GLAM institutions
• Dissertation and long-essay supervision

Public Engagement

He has contributed to BBC Radio 4’s In Our Time, discussing Johannes Kepler and Rudolfine Prague, and maintains an active presence in public-facing heritage debates.