Memory Palace

Today is New Year’s Eve and I am preparing to leave in the morning. I wanted to post about my favorite author on China, Jonathan D. Spence. I have access to all my books here to help discuss them.

His book The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci portrays the Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci, an Italian, who tired to bring Christian faith and western thought to Ming dynasty China. A “memory palace” is a series of mental palaces, places, or pavilions that are either real or imagined. These mental constructs are storage spaces for any concept of human knowledge (Spence, 1985, p. 2). Ricci wrote that for each thing one wishes to remember, one should give an image.

Each image is assigned a place in one of the palaces or buildings. When the item is needed, one mentally walks through the room and finds the item of knowledge.

The book is a wonderful work of cultural history.

[Simon Baker’s “The Mentalist” on CBS mentioned the technique of a memory palace in a recent episode. He used his childhood memories of a circus as the palace where he placed items to be remembered.]

Spence, J. D. (1985). The memory palace of Matteo Ricci. New York, N.Y.: Penguin Books.