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In 1605 a small octavo volume entitled Mundus Alter et Idem Sive Terra Australis ante hac semper incognita appeared in London. Supposedly written by Mercurius Britannicus and supposedly printed in Frankfort, Germany, this work describes an imaginary voyage to Antarctica and the people and government discovered there. The « British Mercury » was Joseph Hall (1574-1656), future bishop of Norwich, the place of publication London. Although little known today, this whrk was in its time quite popular, going through two Latin editions, two editions of the English translation, and one edition of the German within ten years of its appearance. Its close relationship to More's Utopia was soon noted, for the German translation of 1613 is bound with a 1612 translation of More's Utopia and entitled Utopia Pars II : Mundus Alter et Idem.2
While not the first English utopia to appear after More, 3 Mundus Alter et Idem rewards comparison with its predecessor for Hall knows More's work well and is intent upon treating the same societal problems More addresses. Moreover, there are good reasons to believe that he saw himself following More's lead, because many features in the Mundus seem purposely antithetical to those in Utopia 4. Built upon the conceit of a voyage to Antarctica, Hall's work pictures a mundus inversus, 5 a community of people who turn every Renaissance ideal upside down. Hall's work enforces this idea of opposition and inversion from the start, for mundus alter in the title means not just « another world, » but carries the negative overtones of an « unfavorable world » and an « opposite world, » exactly what this demonic « unknown southern continent » reveals itself to be. It is divided into five regions : Crapulia (from crapula, « excessive intoxication ») where temperance in eating and drinking is replaced by gluttony and drunkenness ; Viraginia (from virago, « a man-like female ») where women reign supreme and men are treated as slaves, the reverse of England ; Moronia (from µ???? ,« a fool ») where all of Europe's greatest follies in religion, politics, and learning are prized as the greatest wisdom ; and Lavernia (from La verna, the patron goddess of thieves and rogues) where...