Italy (Early Modern History)

This article analyses the debates about mixed marriages held within the Roman Curia (and especially the Roman Inquisition) between the sixteenth and the eighteenth centuries, integrating these debates with the normative and prescriptive literature. These authorities generally considered mixed marriages between Protestants and Catholics valid and even sacramental in virtue of the shared sacrament of the baptism, but at the same time constructed such unions as ‘carnal crimes’ to ‘abhor’. They believed that the most harmful effect of these polluting unions was that the Catholic partner might become tolerant of Protestantism, rendering the ‘heretic’ dangerously, contagiously familiar and abandoning future generations to heresy. Women were a particular concern for these authorities. Drawing upon traditional and somewhat contradictory ideas about women, they saw the wives in these marriages on one hand as particularly likely to be seduced by the ‘false faith’ because of their presumed weakness, but on the other hand they recognised women as a group with a special talent for beguiling men and so entrusted them with a missionary function towards their ‘heretical’ husbands. The role women could assume in mixed marriages therefore dynamised gender relations, but also caused social tension because of the challenge to patriarchal society, especially if they continued to practice their own faith and were entrusted with the religious education of the children.

In 1509 Elijah Capsali of Crete, which had been under Venetian rule for over three centuries, journeyed to Padua in the hope of studying at the renowned yeshivah of Rabbi Judah Minz. Barely a week after his arrival, however, the great rabbi, who had been the undisputed spiritual leader of Ashkenazic Jewry in northern Italy, fell ill and died. Capsali was able to be present at Minz's deathbed and to participate in his unusually (and controversially) elaborate funeral, con cerning which he later composed a detailed account, possibly the first such ac count in Jewish literature.' His decision to include a detailed description of these events in the history of the Venetian republic he composed, in Hebrew, after his return to Crete, suggests that while witnessing Minz's death and burial Capsali felt himself, perhaps for the first time, to be experiencing history. As Minz lay dying, we are told, he summoned the rabbis of Padua to his bed side in order to deliver before them a final exhortation. Afterward, he conferred special ordination upon one of them and blessed some of the others present, in cluding Capsali himself. At that point Rabbi Abraham, Minz's son and pre sumed successor, approached, together with two of his own sons. Minz placed his hand upon their heads, kissed them, and then embraced them. He began to bless them as well, but suddenly drew his feet up onto the bed and expired. This, we are told, all occurred on a Friday evening. On the following day, the leaders of Padua's Jewish community met in the synagogue in order to deliberate "what should be done for the man whom the King wishes to honor" (Esther 6:6). It was decided that the entire community, young and old, should observe a fast on the next day, the day of the burial, and that all stores and businesses should be closed then as well. It was further agreed that the wooden furnishings of the yeshivah would be broken and a coffin fash ioned out of them; also that torches would be kindled and held aloft around the deceased while he was being eulogized, though not (by implication) in the pro cession itself. On the following Sunday morning, the entire community gathered in the Ketubbah, Lugo, Italy, 1786 (dated 15 Adar II5546). Gouache, metallic paint, graphite on vellum. (In the permanent collection of The Magnes Museum, Berkeley; 67.1.6.3. Photo: Ben Ailes) CULTURES OF THE JEWS

A vivid recreation of how the governors and governed of early seventeenth-century Florence confronted, suffered, and survived a major epidemic of plague

SURVIVING PLAGUE IN AN EARLY MODERN CITY – FLORENCE UNDER SIEGE BY JOHN HENDERSON

In Florence Under Siege: Surviving Plague in an Early Modern City, John Henderson examines how a major city fought, suffered and survived the impact of plague. Going beyond traditional oppositions between rich and poor, this book provides a nuanced and more compassionate interpretation of government policies in practice, by recreating the very human reactions and survival strategies of families and individuals at all levels of society.

Wider Implications
Each age faces the challenge of new diseases from cholera to AIDS and Ebola, but plague remains the paradigm against which reactions to epidemics are often judged. Early modern Italy, famous as the birthplace of the Renaissance, has long been portrayed as having developed public health policies which formed the basis of models developed in later centuries. This book, while focussing on seventeenth-century Florence, examines the Tuscan capital within a wider Italian and European context to assess the effect and real impact of these policies on the city, the neighbourhood, street and family. Writing in a vivid and approachable way, this book unearths the forgotten stories of doctors and administrators struggling to cope with the sick and dying, and the impact of plague on individuals and families through the personal diaries of the literate to the verbatim testimony in court cases of the poorer levels of society.

Official Reactions
Many histories of public health concentrate on chronicling government policies, whereas here equal emphasis is placed on the lived experience. Underpinning this narrative is a vivid recreation of the stories and experiences of individuals who endured and survived the epidemic. Contemporary political and medical rhetoric often blamed disproportionately the lower levels of society as the spreaders and even cause of plague, but official measures are examined to establish their real impact on the whole population. These included the cordon sanitaire along the frontiers of the Tuscan state; sanitary surveys of the living conditions of the poor; inspection and locking up of infected houses. A range of treatments are examined from the plague doctor’s prescribing of the ‘miraculous’ drug of Theriac to the surgeons’ lancing of buboes to the complex recipes devised by empirics.

Lazaretti or Isolation Hospitals
Lazaretti or vast, crowded isolation hospitals above all served to distinguish many Italian cities from their northern European counterparts. Some cities built new structures, but many took over existing buildings, as in the case of Florence, where the beautiful Romanesque convent and church of San Miniato al Monte on the hill overlooking Florence to the south of the river Arno became the city’s major Lazaretto. Together with the other Lazaretti around the city, San Miniato housed and treated over 10,000 people during the epidemic of 1630 to 1631, but did, as was claimed at the time, they lead to a reduction in mortality? or simply provide a convenient way for the poor to be enclosed?

Religion
Religious strategies also form an important theme of this book, reflecting contemporary belief in the necessity to placate divine ire at the sins of Mankind, through prayers and public masses. But elaborate processions with holy relics were an integral part of the ceremonial response. How far did this lead to conflict with the health board officers given the perceived threat of the spread of disease when large numbers collected together?  The plague in Florence also led to the commissioning of major works of art and architecture from the Medici Grand-ducal family to the more and less affluent, as they paid for chapels, altarpieces, and silver and wax votive offerings. This truly inter-disciplinary study examines these commissions and asks how far the iconography of votive saints in Tuscany, such as St. Sebastian and San Rocco, have in common or differ from other parts of Italy.

Individual Experience and Survival Strategies
Florence Under Siege seeks above all to look behind the optimistic gloss of official printed accounts to examine individual experiences. It recreates the often moving and tragic narratives of the individuals who ran isolation hospitals, the doctors who treated plague victims, and above all of the ordinary men and women left bereft and confused by the sickness and death of family members.

Plague on Trial
Analysis of the large corpus of contemporary court records provides fascinating evidence of the numerous survival strategies through which individuals coped with the very real fear generated by a city under siege from an invisible enemy and how they attempted to side-step regulations in order to preserve their possessions and their normal way of life. Examination of detailed trials reveals not just the extraordinary variety of ‘crimes’, but also reveals greater compassion than suggested by the draconian punishments prescribed in law and thus helps to break down the traditional picture of the opposition of rich and poor, the governors and governed.

Chapter outline:
1. Plague and Public Health in Italy and Europe Plague and Italy’s Reputation in Europe Historians and Plague in Italy Plague in Florence: Themes and Sources

PART I, FLORENCE UNDER SIEGE: COPING WITH PLAGUE
2. The Invasion of Plague in Early Modern Italy Plague approaches Florence:
Border Controls and cordons sanitaires
Plague on the Outskirts of Florence, Summer 1630
Plague Mortality in the City, 1630–1

3. Medicine, the Environment and the Poor Doctors and Diagnosis: ‘A certain sickness with suspicion of contagion’
Preventive Measures and the Environment
‘Filth is the mother of corruption’: The Sanitary Survey, August 1630
Marginalisation of the Poor: ‘It was not the time to make the body of the city worse with such malign humours, the most inclined towards putrefaction’
Poverty and Charity: The Growth of ‘misery, necessity and sickness’

4.  Plague and Public Health: Treating the Body of the City and the Body of the Poor
Official Reactions in August Public Health and Prevention
The Control of Plague Doctors and Medicine: Treating the Body of the Poor

5. Fighting the Plague
The Spread and Impact of Plague
Coping with Death
Quarantine and the City
Quarantine and the Countryside

PART II, RELIGION, ISOLATION AND SURVIVAL

6. Religion in the Time of Plague
The Plague Approaches: The Church and Preventive Measures Plague at its Height and the Practice of Religion
Celebrating with Sant’Antonino: The Plague Relents
Plague, Religion and the Grand-Ducal Court: The Cult of Domenica da Paradiso
Religion and Quarantine: ‘Providing for the health of the soul is more important than [providing for the health] of the body’
SS. Annunziata and Plague
The Madonna dell’ Impruneta and the Return of Plague, 1633

7. Lazaretti and Isolation: ‘More feared than death itself’?
First Experiments and the Hospital of Messer Bonifazio
The New Isolation and Quarantine Centres Lazaretti: Form and Function
‘The medicines in this period play an important role’
Spiritual Medicine
Assessing Patient Mortality: ‘More feared than death itself’?
Life, Death and Serving the Poor Sick: ‘I desire that you pray God for me, because I am suffering under the heaviest of crosses’
Life in the Lazaretti: The Perspective of the Staff

8. Surviving Plague
Plague and the Law
Punishment and Enforcement
Prosecution: General Categories
Prosecuting the Popolo

EPILOGUE: THE RETURN AND END OF PLAGUE, 1632–3

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A closely-researched and detailed study of the operations and tactics of early modern armies, it uses the French and Savoyard invasion of Spanish Lombardy in 1636 to explore warfare through a neo-Darwinian lens. This emphasizes the universal features of human behavior and psychology as they relate to violence and war. Oxford University Press, January 2016, Paperback version 2018; Italian translation LEG 2018.

[The English Grand Tour in Pisa (17th-18th Centuries)]. This essay was published as part of the proceedings of the conference on The residences of Pisa. The art of living in the palaces of an ancient Maritime Republic from the Middle Ages to the Unification of Italy, held in Pisa in October 2009. The essay reconstructs the history of the Grand Tour in Tuscany, and Pisa in particular. After discussing the image of Pisa that emerges from the accounts of early travelers in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Villani describes the British presence in the city in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century. The 1820s mark the years in which the residence of Shelley and Byron in Pisa would make the city “a little nest of singing birds.” The stay in Pisa of the Shelleys, Byron and their friends made it a something of a cult place in subsequent years.

From antiquity through to the 20th century, Italy was at the forefront of Western cultural development and the foundation and origin of the Etruscan civilization, the Roman Empire, the Roman Catholic Church, the Italian Renaissance, and Humanism, all of which influenced and impacted the development of the Italian peninsula. However, few cultural components have influenced and shaped the cultural identity and history of Italy and for that matter, Western civilization, more profoundly than religion and language.

It has been forty-one years since I presented my initial work on the Etruscan language to the curator of the Louvre Museum in Paris, France. It was about this time of the year and at the time I was thirtyeight years old. The curator kindly met with me but was not able to help me beyond suggesting meeting with some professors at the Sorbonne University. I was looking, of course, for the scholastic world s interest in the work and help in pursuing it in detail. I went to the Sorbonne without any positive result. I had been working then on the Etruscan language for about ten years, having been curious about Michael Ventris decipherment of Linear B, a writing system used in Crete by the Mycenaean civilization. Having spent some time on it and Linear B (which continues to be undeciphered, I switched to the examination of a curious Etruscan lead tablet called the Magliano Disk which had an inscription in the form of a spiral or meander. The Magliano Disk has been date to be around 500 B.C. Another document like the Magliano Disk is the Phaistos Disk which dates to 2,000 B.C. The Magliano Disk prompted me into searching out all of the Etruscan texts I could find, the results of which are provided on my Etruscan Phrases web pages. All written documents are intended to be understood and assume that the reader knows the value of the characters used to communicate the ideas expressed in a document. The Etruscan characters posed a unique problem, since they are almost the same as the Roman or Western alphabet and one is tempted to assign the values we know and understand to the Etruscan writings. But there is a problem with this, since the Etruscan writing often did not separate characters, phrases, or sentences, and separating distinct words in the texts is a challenge. Complicating the reading of the texts is the problem peculiar to Phoenician and later Hebrew texts where vowels are omitted. The omission of vowels in the Etruscan texts, however, did not appear to be systematic. The values of the Etruscan characters turn out to be not the same as our alphabet. The V, for instance, is not the Roman v but used as a u and o. The Etruscan F is interesting since it serves both as a consonant and a vowel. It is a v and a u, as in the word for Dionysus, Bacchus, L. Euias, Euan, which is Etruscan EFAIS, Euais. Euan is Etruscan EFAN. These and other similar relationships will be seen in the Copeland-English-Etruscan Dictionary (as well as the Etruscan Glossary A). In any event, it is now October 17, 2022 after preparing the Introduction to the Etruscan Language and further pursing the draft findings of this document, identifying specific declension and grammatical applications, another document has grown out of the work which is the Copeland-English-Etruscan Dictionary. It has been compiled using a worksheet at the end of this document called the Etruscan Glossary. Since the Etruscan Glossary is an excel spreadsheet, it could be used to organize refine and translate the Etruscan words of the Etruscan texts. Associated with preparation of the Etruscan Glossary is my Indo-European Table1 which is in 11 parts, available on academia.edu at: Introduction to the Etruscan language 2 https://www.academia.edu/35148685/Etruscan_Phrases_Indo_European_Table_1_Update_02_06_22_ The purpose and function of the table can be easily discerned by one s first look at the table and its succeeding 10 parts. Its 11 parts can also be easily accessed at: http://www.maravot.com/indo-european_Table.html. The Indo-European Table is not what I intended it to be, for it has grown into a table and worksheet on Eurasian languages. Each language represented in the Table reveals relationships that may be surprising. For instance, those who are interested in the origins of certain English words will see entries on origins (taken from The Concise American Heritage Dictionary, 1987 Houghton-Mifflin Company. Many of the English source or origin entries may not be correct, as will be seen in the Table. What does all this have to do with the Etruscans, who date from about 1,000 B.C. in Tuscany, Northern Italy? A good part of the English language derives from Latin, and Latin is very closely related to Etruscan (an older civilization that the Latin/Roman civilization). Civilizations influence on another, either by trade or conquest or both. We know the relationship of English-Latin, or French-Latin, etc. because of the Roman conquests. The Etruscan-Latin relationship is more perplexing, since the Etruscans had an established civilization long before, hundreds of years before, Rome came into existence. There were Latin-speaking tribes that were neighbors of the Etruscans but since the relationship between them and the Etruscans was before Rome came into existence we can t speak to the history of the Etruscans and Latin-speaking people. Could they understand one another? It s hard to say. We can assume that old Latin was closer to Etruscan than Roman Latin. The name of Hercules, for instance, in Etruscan is HERCLE, in old Latin it appears to be the same. In French the name of Hercules is Hercule. There is a possibility that we can write a history the Etruscan world from the Etruscan point of view and that is through the translation of the Etruscan texts. This leads you to the Copeland-English-Etruscan Dictionary, currently in preparation. There are 136 pages in the document and growing, as I convert the Etruscan Glossary A data into a working dictionary. The final Etruscan dictionary will be in excess of 300 pages, estimated to include about 3,000 words.

Il libro ricostruisce una vicenda poco conosciuta: l’arrivo in Italia di migliaia di esuli moriscos, discendenti di origine arabo-musulmana, da secoli insediati nella penisola iberica, battezzati a seguito della Reconquista cristiana (1492), sovente accusati di cripto-islamismo e tradimento della patria, infine espulsi e deportati dalla Spagna (1609-1614). Quali sono gli ostacoli incontrati dai rifugiati nel cammino dell’esodo? Quale il comportamento delle autorità di fronte agli sbarchi? E in che termini i profughi hanno interagito con le popolazioni locali? Domande attuali poste a problemi antichi che l’Italia, nella sua frammentazione politica, ha vissuto già in altre occasioni.

The personalities and biographies of the young gentlemen both reflect and influence, at the same time, the variety and the dynamics of the Italian aristocratic world in the eighteenth century. According to a commonplace of the time, masterfully developed in the poem Il giorno (The Day) of Giuseppe Parini, the scions of aristocratic families are often lazy, narcissist and effeminate dandies. Many unpublished archival sources of different provenances allow to specify the reasons and the effective historical role of this social phenomenon. But above all, they help to clarify similarities and differences in attitudes and customs of the «giovin signori» (young noblemen) of the Peninsula and the major adjacent islands during the last century of the Old Regime. Thus, in light of their family relationships, their cultural background, their progressive integration into the «gran mondo» (high society), the young aristocrats are manifested in the concreteness of their experience and in the reality of their class membership.

The early modern Mediterranean was a space of expansive linguistic mixing, and multilingual discourse was a common response to the exigencies of communication within this context. There is a growing body of scholarship on male multilingualism; however, women have been largely overlooked. This article argues that far from marginalized outsiders, as they were often depicted, women were active participants in the Mediterranean linguistic ecology. They developed communication strategies and techniques to navigate language difference in trade, travel, work, diplomatic, and domestic settings. The numerous and varied spaces that they occupied were not barriers but doorways to their participation in the multilingual Mediterranean.

Ein grundlegender Beitrag zu Forschungswegen und Forschungsstand macht dazu den Auftakt. Um ihn herum sind Beiträge gruppiert, die sowohl die allgemeine Prosopographie als auch einzelne Persönlichkeiten im römischen Umfeld betreffen. So ndet man Beiträge über «Rom und Italien als Kriterien des sozialen Erfolgs» am Beispiel deutscher Gelehrter des 15. Jahrhunderts, über den gelehrten Ritteradeligen Ulrich von Hutten und den späteren Kardinal Wilhelm von Enckenvoirt «im kosmopolitischen Rom», über die Frage, welche Rolle die päpstlichen Hofpfalzgrafen beim Erwerb von Universitätsgraden «auf Schleichwegen in Rom» spielten, über «Polnische Studenten im Rom der frühen Renaissance», über zwei Kollegien und ihre Kollegiaten im Rom des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts (in italienischer Sprache: Lo studio dei collegiali), über die vornehmlich rhetorischen und humanistischen Studien, die selbst Bürgersöhne Roms am heimischen Universitätsort betrieben (in italienischer Sprache: Letture e studi dei cittadini romani), sowie über «Gelehrtennetzwerke zur Zeit der Renaissance am Beispiel von Johannes Regiomontanus» am römischen Studienort. Die Beiträge zeigen gesamthaft auf, dass auch die «Rom-Studien» wichtige Bestandteile der universitären Sozial-und Kulturgeschichte Europas sind.

This course introduces students to the neglected Granducal period of Florentine and Tuscan history, from 1530 to 1737. It deals with the political, economic, religious, artistic and cultural realms over two centuries of the early modern era. An array of primary sources, drawn mostly from archival research, are introduced week by week alongside a sample of scholarly literature in English published over the last several decades.

The concentration of small and medium-sized dynastic states in the central Po valley, yet in the second half of the seventeenth century, offers numerous opportunities for meetings between the representatives of their respective sovereign families, while the appointments of these princes with the members of the other Italian ruling families are rarer. The meetings between the princes of the Peninsula always play a familiar political role, so that the existence of disputes over their respective titles and «treatments» may require preventive action of ministers and advisers. The extensive use of the «incognito», ie private character, by the princes, both sovereign and non-rulers, who are traveling outside their home states allow them to avoid these embarrassments, sometimes even giving up the magnificent reception by foreign courts. Advocates of meetings are particularly princesses married abroad, for which their appointments with the beloved brothers are valuable opportunities to keep alive the ties with the homeland and with the memories of a spent childhood.

Carlo Borromeo (b. 1538–d. 1584), who was a cardinal archbishop of Milan (1564–1584), represented a model bishop in the post-Tridentine Catholic Church and was a leading figure of early modern Catholicism. Born in Arona (Novara), he was the nephew of Giovanni Angelo de’ Medici, later Pope Pius IV (1559–1565), who made the young Borromeo a cardinal and nominated him Secretary of State (1560). Until 1565 he was in Rome; he served in the Curia during the last period of the Council of Trent (1562–1563) and conducted the papal correspondence with the legates in Trent. In 1563 he was ordained priest and received episcopal consecration. From the beginning of 1566, after the death of Pius IV and until the end of his life, he resided almost continuously in the archdiocese of Milan, where he started an ambitious program of reform. Following the decrees of the Council of Trent, Borromeo introduced systematic pastoral visitations and provincial and diocesan synods. He improved the education of the secular clergy and the control of the religious orders. He supported confraternities for lay people and reinforced the value of penance and confession. His patronage of arts and music and his care for sacred architecture also had a great influence beyond the archdiocese. This plan of reform created frequent conflicts both with the Spanish governor of Milan, since Borromeo refused to allow political authorities to intervene in religious matters, and with the papacy, because of Borromeo’s insistence on episcopal rights. He became the model of the post-Tridentine bishop in Italy and beyond. On 22 October 1569, while he was praying in the chapel of the episcopal palace, Borromeo escaped an assassination attempt. A member of the Brothers of Humility (Humiliati) who was opposed to Borromeo’s reforms fired a shot that grazed Borromeo’s side. His survival was considered a miracle and bolstered his saintly reputation. He died in 1584 and was canonized in 1610. His feast day is 4 November.

When the Duke of Parma, Odoardo Farnese, summoned his noble subjects to join his
army with a view to joining the French alliance against Spain in 1635, he was gratified by
a turnout of astonishingly high proportions. Not nearly enough of them had personal
experience of modern war, and so the prince appointed military nobles from much of
northern Italy to fill the cadres, alongside the French officers whose contingents on loan
from Louis XIII made up a third of the infantry. Unlike Spanish nobles, Odoardo’s
subjects were even willing to serve in the ranks, while waiting for their advancement.
The two brief campaigns turned out to be a disaster for Odoardo and his subjects. War
quickly receded from Parma’s horizon, but the experience reveals that Italy’s aristocrats
had not yet consigned their weapons to display cases.

Large, concentrated settlements known as ‘agro-towns’ abound across Southern Italy and other parts of the Mediterranean. The prevalence and persistence of these settlements are very curious but not yet well understood. Initially, scholars interpreted their development as stemming from Southern Italy's economic and social ‘backwardness’ and inequality. This view has now been challenged by scholarship which emphasises that the pre-industrial Mezzogiorno supported not only a dynamic economy but also a diverse array of institutional structures. By recourse to a comparative study within Apulia, this paper suggests that both interpretations are equally correct. ‘Agro-towns’ in Southern Italy were linked to the inequitable distribution of land, perpetuated over the long term, but the institutional origins of this inequality were both diverse and dynamic.

Y a-t-il un modèle «agro-urbain» dans le Sud de l'Italie? Racines et développement d'une structure agro-urbaine: une étude comparative dans les Pouilles
En Italie du Sud, comme dans d'autres régions méditerranéennes, les grandes colonies de peuplement concentré appelées «agrovilles» sont nombreuses. La prévalence de ces localités surprend autant que leur persistance qui reste encore mystérieuse. Initialement, les chercheurs interprétaient le développement de cette forme d'habitat groupé comme issu du «retard» économique et social de cette région méridionale et d'inégalités spécifiques. Mais ce point de vue a été maintenant contesté par de récents travaux scientifiques qui soulignent que le Mezzogiorno préindustriel a connu non seulement une économie dynamique, mais aussi un large éventail de structures institutionnelles. La présente étude comparative, menée dans les Pouilles, suggère que ces deux interprétations sont de fait également correctes: les «agrovilles» du sud de l'Italie étaient liées à une distribution inégalitaire du foncier, situation perpétuée sur le long terme, mais les origines institutionnelles de cette inégalité étaient à la fois diversifiées et dynamiques.

Gibt es ein Agrarstadt-Modell für das südliche Italien? Eine vergleichende Fallstudie für Apulien fragt nach den unterschiedlichen Wurzeln und Entwicklungssträngen der agrarstädtischen Struktur
Süditalien und andere Regionen im Mittelmeerraum wimmeln von großen, konzentrierten Siedlungen, die als Agrarstädte bezeichnet werden. Die Verbreitung und Langlebigkeit dieser Siedlungen sind äußerst seltam, aber noch kaum wirklich verstanden. Während man ihre Entwicklung ursprünlich als Folge der wirtschaftlichen und sozialen „Rückständigkeit“ und Ungleichheit Süditaliens gedeutet hat, wird diese Auffassung inzwischen durch Forschungen angezweifelt, die darauf abheben, dass das vorindustrielle Mezzogiorno nicht nur eine dynamische Wirtschaft, sondern auch ein vielschichtiges Spektrum institutioneller Strukturen besaß. Unter Bezugnahme auf eine vergleichende Studie innerhalb Apuliens legt dieser Beitrag nahe, dass beide Auffassungen gleichermaßen richtig sind. Agrarstädte in Süditalien waren mit der ungerechten Landverteilung, die langfristig aufrechterhalten wurde, eng verknüpft, aber die institutionellen Ursprünge dieser Ungleichheit waren sowohl vielschichtig als auch dynamisch.

La mia relazione si propone di analizzare la violenza intra- familiare contro le donne in età moderna, nelle sue forme ritenute legittime (la  moderata correzione della moglie da parte del marito o delle figlie da parte dei genitori)  e trasgressive (violenza eccessiva o immotivata). Vuole inoltre evidenziare come il potere dell’uso della violenza delegato dal capo famiglia influisca sulle relazioni di genere e generazionali, e indagare quali figure e istituzioni sono individuate come possibile alleato da chi subisce violenza. Le fonti principali sono processi matrimoniali discussi davanti ai tribunali ecclesiastici italiani in età moderna: processi in cui si richiede la separazione per violenza o l’annullamento di un matrimonio stipulato per costrizione parentale; processi di annullamento dei voti per monacazione forzata; processi in cui a detrimento dei testimoni viene addotto un comportamento violento verso i familiari; infine, alcuni processi inquisitoriali intentati contro uomini accusati di violenza sessuale verso le figlie, i quali avevano giustificato con loro i propri crimini con l’argomento del legittimo esercizio dell’autorità paterna.

Machiavelli’s vision of realities allowed him to perceive things that his contemporaries did not see, such as the nature and behaviour of the collective, the mental character of the political or religious bond or the importance of opinion in the governance of the states.

Originating from the consideration that Machiavelli constitutes an historical case not yet fully explored, this original study puts forward new questions regarding the works of the Florentine secretary with a series of unpublished approaches to his archives, his knowledge of the New World and his way of conceiving understanding intellectual practises such as reading and writing.


Lo sguardo che Machiavelli porta sulla realtà gli consente di vedere cose che i suoi contemporanei non vedono, come la natura e il comportamento dei collettivi, il carattere mentale del vincolo politico e religioso o l’importanza dell’opinione nel governo degli stati.

Nato dalla constatazione che Machiavelli costituisce un caso storico non ancora pienamente esplorato, questo originale studio pone domande nuove all’opera del segretario fiorentino, aprendo una serie di piste inedite sulle sue fonti, sulle sue conoscenze del Nuovo Mondo, sul suo modo di concepire pratiche intellettuali come la lettura e la scrittura.

Filippo Neri (1515-1595) was a religious known to behave in an insolent, licentious and ignorant manner in order to dissimulate and counter his reputation for sanctity, that even during his lifetime crowned his name. Humility was the cornerstone of his ascetic discipline. The Florentine rejected, however, austere exercises in humilitas (for example, wasting away through fasting and continual discipline) that might arouse flattery in others or be occasions for pride and therefore, paradoxically, thwart the chosen path of perfection. Neri’s method was to impose on his practice of humilitas a muddled and apparently invalidating mode of expression that provoked a suspicion of ineptitude and frivolity and even insults by the Roman people. The paper examines Neri’s repertoire of ironical personas and inquires into the references for the ascetic practices of this founder of the Oratory. Finally, it focuses on a critical consciousness able to distance itself from the fabricated scene and to perceive at once both the way of thinking of the mocker and the grotesque image of the derided person. Filippo laughs while looking at himself from the "opposing side", but his smile betrays a feeling of pain for the importance that appearances enjoy on the worldy scene. A clear vision about the difference between the ideal and the real and, at the same time, affliction for that same intellectual privilege: the reflective divide, veined with grief, typical of humor.

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La llegada al trono de España de la dinastía de los Borbones con la persona del rey Felipe V abrió, como es bien sabido, una etapa en la que nuevos aires internacionales comenzaron a convivir en el campo del arte y la cultura con las expresiones más tradicionalmente hispánicas. La misma familia real fue un claro espejo de aquella situación, reflejándola de manera constante en sus usos y costumbres. En el particular ámbito de las devociones religiosas, existen inequívocos testimonios del apego del monarca y su entorno más inmediato a ciertos cultos de fuerte arraigo en España, como lo fue el de la Virgen de las Angustias, que llegaría a convertirse en aquellos años por voluntad regia en titular de la parroquia del Real Sitio del Buen Retiro. La dedicación de una iglesia en el Buen Retiro a la Virgen de las Angustias, por más que es una circunstancia poco conocida, no revestiría un interés tan singular en el contexto cultural de nuestra Edad Moderna si no fuera porque, como aquí se expondrá, su imagen titular no fue otra que una réplica de la célebre Piedad de Miguel Ángel, la cual tras sufrir una serie de transformaciones había sido convertida en Virgen de las Angustias.

una particolare rilevanza storiografica, in quanto permette di esplorare aspetti fondamentali della scienza e della cultura settecentesca quali la relazione tra newtonianesimo e tradizione galileiana, il declino della scienza postgalileiana in Italia, e la posizione della Chiesa cattolica nei confronti delle dottrine newtoniane .

Keywords

Republic of Genoa, Bank of San Giorgio, Marquisate of Finale, smuggling, sea trade, repression, patrol boat, XVIIth century.

Abstract (ITA)

La presente tesi ha l'obiettivo di colmare la lacuna storiografica insistente attorno al «vascello» guardacoste armato dalla Casa delle Compere di San Giorgio verso la metà del XVII secolo. Partendo dalle coordinate macrostoriche entro le quali l'esperienza del «vascello» si è sviluppata, inizialmente si delinea sommariamente la strutturazione del fisco genovese dell'epoca, per poi passare a una più corposa messa a fuoco dell'ambiente economico e sociale legato alle frodi doganali commesse nel mare Ligure. Uno specchio acqueo, quest'ultimo, attorno al quale durante tutto il Seicento si sviluppa un'accesa diatriba diplomatica tra la Repubblica di Genova e Madrid. Motivo principale dello scontro è il mancato rispetto da parte dei sudditi del Marchesato del Finale (enclave appartenente alla Corona spagnola ma situata entro i confini del Dominio genovese) della normativa doganale emanata da San Giorgio. I contrabbandi sono, infatti, per il ceto di governo della Superba un grave «attentato» alla sua giurisdizione che quindi, in un clima di generale rinnovamento degli indirizzi politici, opta per un potenziamento della sua tradizionale azione di contrasto agli illeciti condotta attraverso l'impiego di piccoli natanti. Dopo un paio di esperienze preliminari, tra il 1654 e il 1656 viene così messa in mare una unità di grosse dimensioni, e pesantemente armata, per costringere tutti i trasgressori ad ottemperare agli obblighi verso il fisco e, al contempo, per svolgere una forte azione di dissuasione. Sullo sfondo della più acuta crisi ispano-genovese, nella seconda parte della tesi si analizza quindi la genesi e l'attività del suddetto bastimento guardacoste, ponendo anche una discreta attenzione su alcuni aspetti della vita condotta a bordo.

Abstract (ENG)

Starting from the macro-historical coordinates within which the experience of the «vessel» developed, the structure of the Genoese revenue of the time is initially outlined briefly, and then the focus moves with a more hefty attention on the economic and social environment linked to commercial fraud conducted in the Ligurian sea. A stretch of water, this one, around which a heated diplomatic dispute between the Republic of Genoa and Madrid developed throughout the 17th century. The main reason for the clash is the lacking observance by the subjects of the Marquisate of Finale (an enclave belonging to the Spanish Crown but located within the boundaries of the Genoese «Dominio») of the customs legislation issued by San Giorgio. Smugglers are, in fact, for the ruling class of the Superba a serious «attack» on its jurisdiction which therefore, in a climate of general renewal of political policies, opts for an enhancement of its traditional action to combat illicit acts conducted through the use of small boats. After a couple of preliminary experiences, between 1654 and 1656 a large and heavily armed unit was put into the sea, to force all transgressors to comply with their obligations towards the tax authorities and, at the same time, to carry out a strong action of dissuasion. Against the background of the most acute Hispano-Genoese crisis, so the second part of the thesis analyzes the genesis and activity of the aforementioned coastguard «vessel», also dedicating a moderate attention to some aspects of life on board.

La notte tra il 20 e il 21 febbraio 1513 la morte pone fine al decennale pontificato di Giulio II Della Rovere, figura cardine del papato rinascimentale, di cui incarna la grandiosità e le contraddizioni. La popolazione romana gli tributò un omaggio senza precedenti: «da quarant’anni che vivo in questa città non ho mai visto una folla così straordinaria al mortorio di un papa», racconta il cerimoniere pontificio Paride de’ Grassi.
Come sovrano pontefice, politico spregiudicato e sommo mecenate Giulio II rimane uno dei personaggi che maggiormente condizionano l’immaginario collettivo del Rinascimento. Ma quale fu l’immagine che ne ebbero i contemporanei (non solo gli uomini di lettere, i prelati e i professionisti della politica, ma anche il popolo urbano del primo ‘500)?
Questo libro risponde a tale domanda ricostruendo l’immagine di Giulio II nella sfera pubblica e nella comunicazione politica in vari contesti italiani ed europei (Bologna, Ferrara, Roma, Venezia, Londra e Parigi). Intrecciando i racconti dei cantastorie con i dispacci dei diplomatici, le voci e le canzoni di piazza con i trattati degli umanisti, si delinea un ritratto inedito del ‘papa guerriero’, una rappresentazione in perenne oscillazione tra laude e vituperio, tra guerra e beatitudine.