Let’s begin with an admission of failure. When the Points blog first rolled out in January, a couple of our first comments were posted by early modern historians of alcohol and drugs. One of my cheery replies (with exclamation): “One of the great challenges with having a lot of modernists running this blog is to make sure we don’t lose sight of what’s happening in the early modern world!” Alas, our Points-sight is no better now than then. The only good news today is the continued existence of Res Obscura, a blog published by one of those early commenters, Ben Breen. Ben’s a graduate student at UT-Austin, studying the early modern trade in medicinal drugs, specifically in the worlds of the Portuguese and British empires. I don’t know if he’s published any of this work yet, but Res Obscura is a compelling blog, well worth the time and attention of our readers. Here’s why:
