Elena Bonora | Università degli Studi di Parma (original) (raw)
Research Projects by Elena Bonora
Enter the portal https://grazianiarchives.eu/
WEBSITE : https://nsa.unipr.it/ The project Nuncio's Secret Archives, funded under the PRIN 2017... more WEBSITE : https://nsa.unipr.it/
The project Nuncio's Secret Archives, funded under the PRIN 2017 program (nr. 2017JMPYTA), aims to reassemble, and enhance an extraordinary private archive, now divided between Italy and Kansas (USA), decisive for reconstructing the history of pontifical diplomacy in the crucial period between the peace of Augsburg (1555) and the Thirty Years War (1618-1648).
The archive, created by two of the greatest diplomats of the second half of the 16th century, Giovanni Francesco Commendone and Antonio Maria Graziani, will be reconstructed through the Graziani Archives portal. The construction of the portal, combined with a rigorous historical-archival investigation, will act as a driving force for a new interpretative perspective, capable not only of inserting the history of papal diplomacy in the European historiographical debate on multi-confessionality, but also of finally bringing the history of the Counter-Reformation to measure itself within a European dimension.
books by Elena Bonora
Waiting for the Emperor. Italian Princes, the Pope and Charles V [Collana: Viella History, Art and Humanities Collection 12]. Translated by Richard Bates. Viella, Rome 2022, 264 pp., 2022
In the 1540s, Italian princes, lords and cardinals wrote to each other using a secret, highly ima... more In the 1540s, Italian princes, lords and cardinals wrote to each other using a secret, highly imaginative language. They were waiting for Emperor Charles V to descend on Italy to cut the papacy and Papal States down to size once and for all. Their letters, which have never before been used by historians, were not literary fantasies; behind the fictitious names, metaphors and the ferocious satire against Pope Paul III, there were weapons, money and power. For years, against the background of the battle between the two giants – the pope and the emperor – the courts of Mantua, Florence, Milan and Ferrara, with their extensive political relations and organized networks of loyalty, pursued a grand plan of containing the pope’s power by allying with men of Charles V such as Diego Hurtado de Mendoza in Italy and Nicolas Perrenot de Granvelle at the Habsburg court. This history of Italy differs greatly from the one we are usually taught. The epoch-making conflict between the ‘Italy of the Emperor’ and the ‘Italy of the pope’, which then involved leading figures of the Italian ruling class, was not merely political: it was mixed with religious problems, it developed in the sphere of communication, and left traces in Italian cultural life, on the frescoed walls of palaces and in the pages of books. But the daring project drawn up by the Italian princes in the shade of the imperial eagle failed, and failed forever, as the Counter-Reformation advanced and the sun began to set on the Europe of Charles V.
Di una congiura contro un papa delegittimato e indebolito dalla pretesa del re di Spagna e del Sa... more Di una congiura contro un papa delegittimato e indebolito dalla pretesa del re di Spagna e del Sant'Ufficio romano di ergersi a giudici della sua ortodossia tratta Roma 1564. La congiura contro il papa (2011). Il processo contro i responsabili del fallito attentato contro Pio IV (1560-1565) mi ha permesso di partire da un microepisodio per ricostruire contesti politici più vasti. All'origine di questo libro c'è però anche il desiderio di sperimentare - in relazione a un evento-limite come la congiura – il rapporto tra narrazione e accertamento della verità storica per mezzo della critica delle fonti. Sulla base della fonte giudiziaria ho inoltre individuato nella capitale del papa uno spazio urbano della comunicazione politica ben più largo e complesso rispetto all'universo circoscritto della corte, in linea con quanto emerge da un recente filone di studi centrato sulla comunicazione scritta e orale nelle città d'antico regime.
Il volume intitolato La Controriforma (2001, VII edizione 2014; nuova edizione e-book 2009) è un ... more Il volume intitolato La Controriforma (2001, VII edizione 2014; nuova edizione e-book 2009) è un lavoro di sintesi e l’occasione di verifica di un concetto storiografico con funzione periodizzante. Ho qui messo in evidenza il nesso strutturale tra Chiesa della Controriforma e Inquisizione romana che venne stringendosi a metà '500: i contrasti tra i diversi soggetti ecclesiastici intorno alla gestione del comune progetto controriformistico; il continuo trasformarsi di questo progetto di fronte alle resistenze e alle esigenze della società civile; il suo complicarsi e stravolgersi nella trasmissione verso il basso alle migliaia di chierici incaricati d'intervenire nelle realtà locali; il suo modificarsi nella ricezione da parte dei fedeli e nella formazione di nuovi costumi, pratiche e valori sociali.
In 1583 Filippo Mocenigo - a Venetian patrician, cousin of the Doge and the last archbishop of Ni... more In 1583 Filippo Mocenigo - a Venetian patrician, cousin of the Doge and the last archbishop of Nicosia (Cyprus) before the Turkish conquest of the island - was trialed for heresy by the Holy Office. This trial, together with the stories of other French and Italian bishops prosecuted for heresy examined in the book, suggests some questions: who should judge a bishop? Who should define orthodoxy? The book shed light on the conflicting positions and struggles that divided the leadership of the church in order to answer to these questions. How an accusation of heresy against a bishop came to be handled between the papacy and Inquisition offers in fact crucial evidence for evaluating the effective articulation of power at the highest levels of the church. In this perspective, the Inquisition reveals itself as an institution that held the power to pretend to define orthodoxy even against the pope. Furthermore, most of the post-Tridentine bishops prosecuted for heresy belonged to a generation of bishops who had participated at the council, drawing from it the awareness of their role within the church; of humanist-educated churchmen that had formed themselves in the 1530s and 1540s, before the repressive turning of the 1550s estabilished new boundaries between what one could or could not write and reconfigured the limits of learned discussions. The book present them as the witnesses to a generational crisis despite a long tradition of studies mainly focused on them as the zealous pastors that implemented the decrees of the council of Trent in their dioceses.
The book offers new perspectives to the historical problem of the origins of the new religious or... more The book offers new perspectives to the historical problem of the origins of the new religious orders of the Counterreformation. Thanks to a broad research through archives all over Italy, books, correspondences and any sort of documents it offers new and substantial evidence to the astonishing tangle of heterodox religious ideas and practices through which, after severe inquisitorial repression, the early Barnabites developed their historical identity and were able to become one of the cornerstones of the post-Tridentine Catholic Church.
Il libro ricostruisce in modo nuovo un momento cruciale della storia italiana tracciando il quadr... more Il libro ricostruisce in modo nuovo un momento cruciale della storia italiana tracciando il quadro delle aspettative e delle speranze con le quali principi ed esponenti dei ceti dirigenti della penisola guardarono all’imperatore. Prende in considerazione i disegni elaborati dagli uomini di Carlo V in Italia e da gruppi di potere filoimperiali seguendo da vicino corrispondenze inedite e preziose di cardinali e principi. L’obbiettivo è portare in primo piano un’“Italia dell’imperatore” – tenacemente e assolutamente opposta all’“Italia del papa” – sinora poco studiata nella sua fisionomia complessiva e nel peso politico che rivestì durante gli anni trenta e quaranta del Cinquecento, in un quadro reso sempre più́ instabile e incerto dall’aggravarsi del conflitto tra Carlo V e il papa Paolo III.
Papers by Elena Bonora
This article sheds light on a political information channel between the Empire and Rome during th... more This article sheds light on a political information channel between the Empire and Rome during the Thirty Years' War. At its center stands the figure of the Rota Auditor Giovan Battista Remboldi, nephew of the Augsburg banker Markus Welser.
capi delle unità locali sono: Matteo Al Kalak (Modena e Reggio Emilia), Antonella Barzazi (Padova... more capi delle unità locali sono: Matteo Al Kalak (Modena e Reggio Emilia), Antonella Barzazi (Padova) e Dorit Raines (Venezia).
A vast international historiography has recently highlighted the existence of an early-modern mul... more A vast international historiography has recently highlighted the existence of an early-modern multidenominational Europe, which was the result of the religious pluralism triggered by the Protestant Reformation and the ‘religious peaces’. This Europe, marked by shifting confessional topographies densely interwoven with each other, is very different from the one that the theorists of Confessionalization and Social Disciplining have depicted during the last half-century.
Nevertheless, many questions arise if we approach multidenominational Europe from the perspective of the Church of Rome, a perspective that has been completely neglected in the above-mentioned studies: how did the Roman Curia act in this Europe, where 'heresy' was legalised and Catholicism had often become a minority? How did the Roman Church operate through its own men and its enormous resources in contexts where religious conflicts were judicially settled by competing ecclesiastical and civil authorities belonging to different confessions? This article suggests new research directions to answer these questions and explore the European dimension of the Counter-Reformation.
Quale Controriforma? Roma e l’Europa multiconfessionale
Negli ultimi anni una variegata storiografia internazionale ha messo in luce per la prima età moderna l’esistenza di un’Europa multiconfessionale, effetto dei processi di pluralizzazione religiosa innescati dalla Riforma protestante e dalle successive ‘paci di religione’. In altre parole, un’Europa marcata da topografie confessionali densamente intrecciate tra loro e mutevoli nel tempo, molto diversa da quella che hanno raccontato nell’ultimo mezzo secolo i teorici della confessionalizzazione e del disciplinamento.
Molte sono le domande che si pongono se consideriamo questa Europa multiconfessionale in una prospettiva romana, del tutto trascurata negli studi sopra menzionati. Che cosa fece la macchina della curia romana in queste aree dove l’‘eresia’ era legalizzata e il cattolicesimo era diventato minoranza? Come operò per mezzo dei propri uomini e delle proprie poderose risorse entro realtà dove i conflitti religiosi erano risolti per via giudiziaria davanti ad autorità ecclesiastiche e civili appartenenti a confessioni diverse in competizione tra loro? Il saggio suggerisce nuove direzioni di ricerca utili a rispondere a questi interrogativi e a riflettere sulla dimensione europea della Controriforma.
Hétérodoxies croisées. Catholicismes pluriels entre France et Italie, XVIe-XVIIe siècles, 2015
Rivista Storica Italiana, 2013
Rivista Storica Italiana, 2008
The article widely discusses the recent monography by Stefan Bauer on the Augustinian historian a... more The article widely discusses the recent monography by Stefan Bauer on the Augustinian historian and erudite Onofrio Panvinio (1530-1568). The paper focuses on three main issues: it examines the historical context within which Panvinio’s intellectual experience took place during the transition to the Counter Reformation period; it illustrates a more appropriate method for analyzing Panvinio’s historical writing, even in relation to the groundbreaking changes occurred in the ecclesiastical history tradition; it tackles the problem of censorship (and self-censorship) with regard to Panvinio’s works.
A Cultural History of Peace by Ronald Edsforth vol. 3: A Cultural History of Peace in the Renaissance (1450 - 1648), ed. by Isabella Lazzarini, London, Bloosmbury, 2020, 67-83
There are various possible perspectives for thinking about how peace and religion interact in the... more There are various possible perspectives for thinking about how peace and religion interact in the early modern age. If we interpreted peace as union, we might start with the failed attempts of the Greek and Latin churches to unite in the decades leading up to the fall of Constantinople (1453). If we looked at the area of the Mediterranean where members of the three so-called “religions of the book” (Christians, Muslims, and Jews) had been living side-by-side for centuries, we might examine the cohabitation between Christians and “infidels” that developed despite conflicts and religious antagonism, dwelling on the peace treaties, trading agreements, and cross-cultural exchange with the Muslim empire. From there we might move on to the world of the pax Ottomana (“Ottoman peace”), which held together the mosaic of ethnic groups and juridical-religious communities in the huge domain of the sultan. If we shifted our attention to the role of the peacemakers, we might analyze the action of those transcultural go-betweens across the globe who were the missionaries – the Jesuits in particular.
Instead, in the following pages I shall be considering Europe, starting from Luther’s Reformation (1517), as that religious break radically changed how the old continent thought and lived, posing new problems. The European space then became the theatre of many practical attempts by various historical actors to build a religious peace and coexistence between different faiths that would enable the community, the state and society to survive.
«Studi storici», 60 (2019), IV, pp. 879-892
«Studi storici», 60 (2019), IV, pp. 875-877
Enter the portal https://grazianiarchives.eu/
WEBSITE : https://nsa.unipr.it/ The project Nuncio's Secret Archives, funded under the PRIN 2017... more WEBSITE : https://nsa.unipr.it/
The project Nuncio's Secret Archives, funded under the PRIN 2017 program (nr. 2017JMPYTA), aims to reassemble, and enhance an extraordinary private archive, now divided between Italy and Kansas (USA), decisive for reconstructing the history of pontifical diplomacy in the crucial period between the peace of Augsburg (1555) and the Thirty Years War (1618-1648).
The archive, created by two of the greatest diplomats of the second half of the 16th century, Giovanni Francesco Commendone and Antonio Maria Graziani, will be reconstructed through the Graziani Archives portal. The construction of the portal, combined with a rigorous historical-archival investigation, will act as a driving force for a new interpretative perspective, capable not only of inserting the history of papal diplomacy in the European historiographical debate on multi-confessionality, but also of finally bringing the history of the Counter-Reformation to measure itself within a European dimension.
Waiting for the Emperor. Italian Princes, the Pope and Charles V [Collana: Viella History, Art and Humanities Collection 12]. Translated by Richard Bates. Viella, Rome 2022, 264 pp., 2022
In the 1540s, Italian princes, lords and cardinals wrote to each other using a secret, highly ima... more In the 1540s, Italian princes, lords and cardinals wrote to each other using a secret, highly imaginative language. They were waiting for Emperor Charles V to descend on Italy to cut the papacy and Papal States down to size once and for all. Their letters, which have never before been used by historians, were not literary fantasies; behind the fictitious names, metaphors and the ferocious satire against Pope Paul III, there were weapons, money and power. For years, against the background of the battle between the two giants – the pope and the emperor – the courts of Mantua, Florence, Milan and Ferrara, with their extensive political relations and organized networks of loyalty, pursued a grand plan of containing the pope’s power by allying with men of Charles V such as Diego Hurtado de Mendoza in Italy and Nicolas Perrenot de Granvelle at the Habsburg court. This history of Italy differs greatly from the one we are usually taught. The epoch-making conflict between the ‘Italy of the Emperor’ and the ‘Italy of the pope’, which then involved leading figures of the Italian ruling class, was not merely political: it was mixed with religious problems, it developed in the sphere of communication, and left traces in Italian cultural life, on the frescoed walls of palaces and in the pages of books. But the daring project drawn up by the Italian princes in the shade of the imperial eagle failed, and failed forever, as the Counter-Reformation advanced and the sun began to set on the Europe of Charles V.
Di una congiura contro un papa delegittimato e indebolito dalla pretesa del re di Spagna e del Sa... more Di una congiura contro un papa delegittimato e indebolito dalla pretesa del re di Spagna e del Sant'Ufficio romano di ergersi a giudici della sua ortodossia tratta Roma 1564. La congiura contro il papa (2011). Il processo contro i responsabili del fallito attentato contro Pio IV (1560-1565) mi ha permesso di partire da un microepisodio per ricostruire contesti politici più vasti. All'origine di questo libro c'è però anche il desiderio di sperimentare - in relazione a un evento-limite come la congiura – il rapporto tra narrazione e accertamento della verità storica per mezzo della critica delle fonti. Sulla base della fonte giudiziaria ho inoltre individuato nella capitale del papa uno spazio urbano della comunicazione politica ben più largo e complesso rispetto all'universo circoscritto della corte, in linea con quanto emerge da un recente filone di studi centrato sulla comunicazione scritta e orale nelle città d'antico regime.
Il volume intitolato La Controriforma (2001, VII edizione 2014; nuova edizione e-book 2009) è un ... more Il volume intitolato La Controriforma (2001, VII edizione 2014; nuova edizione e-book 2009) è un lavoro di sintesi e l’occasione di verifica di un concetto storiografico con funzione periodizzante. Ho qui messo in evidenza il nesso strutturale tra Chiesa della Controriforma e Inquisizione romana che venne stringendosi a metà '500: i contrasti tra i diversi soggetti ecclesiastici intorno alla gestione del comune progetto controriformistico; il continuo trasformarsi di questo progetto di fronte alle resistenze e alle esigenze della società civile; il suo complicarsi e stravolgersi nella trasmissione verso il basso alle migliaia di chierici incaricati d'intervenire nelle realtà locali; il suo modificarsi nella ricezione da parte dei fedeli e nella formazione di nuovi costumi, pratiche e valori sociali.
In 1583 Filippo Mocenigo - a Venetian patrician, cousin of the Doge and the last archbishop of Ni... more In 1583 Filippo Mocenigo - a Venetian patrician, cousin of the Doge and the last archbishop of Nicosia (Cyprus) before the Turkish conquest of the island - was trialed for heresy by the Holy Office. This trial, together with the stories of other French and Italian bishops prosecuted for heresy examined in the book, suggests some questions: who should judge a bishop? Who should define orthodoxy? The book shed light on the conflicting positions and struggles that divided the leadership of the church in order to answer to these questions. How an accusation of heresy against a bishop came to be handled between the papacy and Inquisition offers in fact crucial evidence for evaluating the effective articulation of power at the highest levels of the church. In this perspective, the Inquisition reveals itself as an institution that held the power to pretend to define orthodoxy even against the pope. Furthermore, most of the post-Tridentine bishops prosecuted for heresy belonged to a generation of bishops who had participated at the council, drawing from it the awareness of their role within the church; of humanist-educated churchmen that had formed themselves in the 1530s and 1540s, before the repressive turning of the 1550s estabilished new boundaries between what one could or could not write and reconfigured the limits of learned discussions. The book present them as the witnesses to a generational crisis despite a long tradition of studies mainly focused on them as the zealous pastors that implemented the decrees of the council of Trent in their dioceses.
The book offers new perspectives to the historical problem of the origins of the new religious or... more The book offers new perspectives to the historical problem of the origins of the new religious orders of the Counterreformation. Thanks to a broad research through archives all over Italy, books, correspondences and any sort of documents it offers new and substantial evidence to the astonishing tangle of heterodox religious ideas and practices through which, after severe inquisitorial repression, the early Barnabites developed their historical identity and were able to become one of the cornerstones of the post-Tridentine Catholic Church.
Il libro ricostruisce in modo nuovo un momento cruciale della storia italiana tracciando il quadr... more Il libro ricostruisce in modo nuovo un momento cruciale della storia italiana tracciando il quadro delle aspettative e delle speranze con le quali principi ed esponenti dei ceti dirigenti della penisola guardarono all’imperatore. Prende in considerazione i disegni elaborati dagli uomini di Carlo V in Italia e da gruppi di potere filoimperiali seguendo da vicino corrispondenze inedite e preziose di cardinali e principi. L’obbiettivo è portare in primo piano un’“Italia dell’imperatore” – tenacemente e assolutamente opposta all’“Italia del papa” – sinora poco studiata nella sua fisionomia complessiva e nel peso politico che rivestì durante gli anni trenta e quaranta del Cinquecento, in un quadro reso sempre più́ instabile e incerto dall’aggravarsi del conflitto tra Carlo V e il papa Paolo III.
This article sheds light on a political information channel between the Empire and Rome during th... more This article sheds light on a political information channel between the Empire and Rome during the Thirty Years' War. At its center stands the figure of the Rota Auditor Giovan Battista Remboldi, nephew of the Augsburg banker Markus Welser.
capi delle unità locali sono: Matteo Al Kalak (Modena e Reggio Emilia), Antonella Barzazi (Padova... more capi delle unità locali sono: Matteo Al Kalak (Modena e Reggio Emilia), Antonella Barzazi (Padova) e Dorit Raines (Venezia).
A vast international historiography has recently highlighted the existence of an early-modern mul... more A vast international historiography has recently highlighted the existence of an early-modern multidenominational Europe, which was the result of the religious pluralism triggered by the Protestant Reformation and the ‘religious peaces’. This Europe, marked by shifting confessional topographies densely interwoven with each other, is very different from the one that the theorists of Confessionalization and Social Disciplining have depicted during the last half-century.
Nevertheless, many questions arise if we approach multidenominational Europe from the perspective of the Church of Rome, a perspective that has been completely neglected in the above-mentioned studies: how did the Roman Curia act in this Europe, where 'heresy' was legalised and Catholicism had often become a minority? How did the Roman Church operate through its own men and its enormous resources in contexts where religious conflicts were judicially settled by competing ecclesiastical and civil authorities belonging to different confessions? This article suggests new research directions to answer these questions and explore the European dimension of the Counter-Reformation.
Quale Controriforma? Roma e l’Europa multiconfessionale
Negli ultimi anni una variegata storiografia internazionale ha messo in luce per la prima età moderna l’esistenza di un’Europa multiconfessionale, effetto dei processi di pluralizzazione religiosa innescati dalla Riforma protestante e dalle successive ‘paci di religione’. In altre parole, un’Europa marcata da topografie confessionali densamente intrecciate tra loro e mutevoli nel tempo, molto diversa da quella che hanno raccontato nell’ultimo mezzo secolo i teorici della confessionalizzazione e del disciplinamento.
Molte sono le domande che si pongono se consideriamo questa Europa multiconfessionale in una prospettiva romana, del tutto trascurata negli studi sopra menzionati. Che cosa fece la macchina della curia romana in queste aree dove l’‘eresia’ era legalizzata e il cattolicesimo era diventato minoranza? Come operò per mezzo dei propri uomini e delle proprie poderose risorse entro realtà dove i conflitti religiosi erano risolti per via giudiziaria davanti ad autorità ecclesiastiche e civili appartenenti a confessioni diverse in competizione tra loro? Il saggio suggerisce nuove direzioni di ricerca utili a rispondere a questi interrogativi e a riflettere sulla dimensione europea della Controriforma.
Hétérodoxies croisées. Catholicismes pluriels entre France et Italie, XVIe-XVIIe siècles, 2015
Rivista Storica Italiana, 2013
Rivista Storica Italiana, 2008
The article widely discusses the recent monography by Stefan Bauer on the Augustinian historian a... more The article widely discusses the recent monography by Stefan Bauer on the Augustinian historian and erudite Onofrio Panvinio (1530-1568). The paper focuses on three main issues: it examines the historical context within which Panvinio’s intellectual experience took place during the transition to the Counter Reformation period; it illustrates a more appropriate method for analyzing Panvinio’s historical writing, even in relation to the groundbreaking changes occurred in the ecclesiastical history tradition; it tackles the problem of censorship (and self-censorship) with regard to Panvinio’s works.
A Cultural History of Peace by Ronald Edsforth vol. 3: A Cultural History of Peace in the Renaissance (1450 - 1648), ed. by Isabella Lazzarini, London, Bloosmbury, 2020, 67-83
There are various possible perspectives for thinking about how peace and religion interact in the... more There are various possible perspectives for thinking about how peace and religion interact in the early modern age. If we interpreted peace as union, we might start with the failed attempts of the Greek and Latin churches to unite in the decades leading up to the fall of Constantinople (1453). If we looked at the area of the Mediterranean where members of the three so-called “religions of the book” (Christians, Muslims, and Jews) had been living side-by-side for centuries, we might examine the cohabitation between Christians and “infidels” that developed despite conflicts and religious antagonism, dwelling on the peace treaties, trading agreements, and cross-cultural exchange with the Muslim empire. From there we might move on to the world of the pax Ottomana (“Ottoman peace”), which held together the mosaic of ethnic groups and juridical-religious communities in the huge domain of the sultan. If we shifted our attention to the role of the peacemakers, we might analyze the action of those transcultural go-betweens across the globe who were the missionaries – the Jesuits in particular.
Instead, in the following pages I shall be considering Europe, starting from Luther’s Reformation (1517), as that religious break radically changed how the old continent thought and lived, posing new problems. The European space then became the theatre of many practical attempts by various historical actors to build a religious peace and coexistence between different faiths that would enable the community, the state and society to survive.
«Studi storici», 60 (2019), IV, pp. 879-892
«Studi storici», 60 (2019), IV, pp. 875-877
A Cultural History of Peace, R. Edsforth gen. edr., 2020
The rich polysemy of the word peace was widely known in the Renaissance, and its nuances construc... more The rich polysemy of the word peace was widely known in the Renaissance, and its nuances constructed a family of discourse that came from many diverse traditions. In the Renaissance and the Reformation, the term ‘peace’ referred at the same time to a state and a notion; the first derived from events and treaties, while the second participated in a system of representations, that is an image that a specific society constructs about itself. In this second acceptation, the notion of peace crossed the path of some other crucial concepts like justice, freedom, the common good. Such political keywords not only played a pivotal role in daily social and political life but also represented the building blocks of the theoretical analysis of reality outlined by intellectuals such as Machiavelli, Erasmus, Vives, Vitoria, Montaigne, Gentili, Bodin, Grotius, who worked extensively on peace and its opposite – war – and on their crossings and reciprocal interferences. Although their distinctively political and European character, the two hundred years between c.1450 and c.1650 represent a culturally
recognizable framework: while they allow the historian to take a comprehensive look at a cultural history of peace from a Western perspective, they also offer him/her a chance to throw more than casual glances at the world beyond.
FERRANT (Julien), GUILLABERT-MADINIER (Tiphaine) (dir.), Le Langage et la Foi dans l’Europe des Réformes. XVIe siècle, p. 215-224, 2019
RÉSUMÉ – L'extraordinaire voyage de l'évêque vénitien Commendone à travers l'Allemagne, la Bohême... more RÉSUMÉ – L'extraordinaire voyage de l'évêque vénitien Commendone à travers l'Allemagne, la Bohême et la Flandre visait à annoncer le concile et à renouer avec l'empereur un dialogue interrompu sous le pape inquisiteur Paul IV. Or Commendone et son entourage découvrirent une société redessinée par la paix d’Augsbourg. Quel langage ont-ils utilisé pour décrire à Rome les affrontements confessionnels et les expériences de coexistence légalisée ? À quels nouveaux concepts ont-ils eu recours pour accomplir leur mission ?
Francesco I di qua dalle Alpi nell’ultima fase delle guerre d’Italia: politica, immagini e linguaggi, in L'Italia e Francesco I. Scambi, influenze, diffidenze fra Medioevo e Rinascimento, Tornhout, Brepols, 2018, pp. 131-143, 2018
Il mio saggio si concentra sugli anni quaranta del Cinquecento, ultima fase delle guerre d'Italia... more Il mio saggio si concentra sugli anni quaranta del Cinquecento, ultima fase delle guerre d'Italia. In questo arco di tempo Francesco I non si affaccia mai al di qua delle Alpi: vista dalla penisola italiana, la sua è piuttosto la storia di un'assenza. Occorre domandarsi allora: qual è la cornice politica entro la quale questa assenza fisica prende significato? Dopo l'incoronazione imperiale a Bologna nel 1530, la stabilità in Italia è solo un'apparenza. Le sontuose cerimonie, nel corso delle quali principi e nobili sfilano solennemente davanti a Carlo V come tante particelle di un cosmo ordinato, producono l'illusione che lo spazio italiano sia finalmente libero da conflitti e tensioni, ma la realtà è molto diversa 1 . Solo cinque anni dopo, molti di quei principi accorreranno a Napoli dove la corte imperiale soggiorna al rientro da Tunisi, nel tentativo di affrontare e risolvere al cospetto dell'imperatore le tante questioni ancora aperte: il contrasto tra i fuoriusciti fiorentini e il duca Alessandro de' Medici, di lì a poco colpito dal pugnale del cugino Lorenzino; il destino dello stato di Milano dopo la morte di Francesco II Sforza; la sorte di Modena e Reggio che oppone il papa a Ercole II d'Este; il problema della devoluzione del feudo di Camerino appartenente ai Varano sul quale il pontefice e il duca d'Urbino avanzano diritti 2 .
En 1555 se concluyó la paz de Augsburgo y se eligió al Papa Paulo IV. La legalización del biconfe... more En 1555 se concluyó la paz de Augsburgo y se eligió al Papa Paulo IV. La legalización del biconfesionalismo convirtió a la sociedad europea en un espacio donde coexistían diferentes confesiones y los enviados papales tuvierion operar en un nuevo mundo conformado por "paces religiosas". ¿Cómo reaccionó el Papa Inquisidor a estas radicales transformaciones? ¿Cómo entendió este cambio de época, teniendo en cuenta que su prioridad fue el enjuiciamiento de herejes y a la rígida reforma de la Iglesia de arriba hacia abajo? ¿Cuáles fueron las relaciones entre el Papa y su red diplomática dentro del Sacro Imperio Romano y Polonia?
The article questions the return of such a controversial term as «Counter-Reformation» in the Eng... more The article questions the return of such a controversial term as «Counter-Reformation» in the English-speaking historiography. It retraces the genesis of approaches developed in the cultural studies and within a global perspective that, by focusing solely on religiuos practices and material devotions, have led the dominant «Counter-Reformation narrative» to the deletion of the political dimension. The contribution suggests some good reasons to reopen the lines of communication between the English-speaking and the Italian historiography. Moreover, it critically assess the current use in historical studies of concepts such as «negotiation» and «identity».
La Corte En Europa Politica Y Religion Vol 2 2012 Isbn 978 84 96813 67 0 Pag 771, 2012
Fu convocato a Mantova nel 1536, poi a Vicenza e nel 1542 a Trento, città dell'Impero al di qua d... more Fu convocato a Mantova nel 1536, poi a Vicenza e nel 1542 a Trento, città dell'Impero al di qua della Alpi sottoposta all'autorità del principe-vescovo, e quindi luogo adatto alla mediazione con i protestanti, ma fu subito sospeso a causa della guerra tra Carlo V e il re di Francia. Dopo tanti rinvii, indetto nuovamente da Paolo III Farnese con la bolla Laetare Jerusalem nel novembre 1544, fu solennemente aperto il 13 dicembre 1545 a Trento. Di qui nel marzo del 1547 fu trasferito a Bologna, città pontificia. La traslazione, motivata da Roma con il diffondersi di un'epidemia, provocò la protesta ufficiale di Carlo V. Mentre i vescovi filoimperiali restavano a Trento e tra gli osservatori contemporanei si diffondeva il timore dello scisma, la sguarnita assemblea conciliare si prolungò stentatamente a Bologna sino alla morte del papa nel novembre 1549 (prima fase). Riaperto a Trento da Giulio III Del Monte nel maggio 1551 e nuovamente sospeso un anno dopo per la ripresa delle ostilità franco-asburgiche (seconda fase), il concilio non fu riconvocato durante il pontificato dell'intransigente Paolo IV Carafa, impegnato in una rovinosa politica anti-imperiale e anti-spagnola. Fu riaperto a Trento solo il 18 gennaio 1562 sotto il successore, il milanese Pio IV Medici, e portato a termine a tappe forzate il 4 dicembre 1563 (terza fase).
La congregazione cardinalizia dell'I. o Sant'Ufficio fu istituita da papa Paolo III Farnese il 21... more La congregazione cardinalizia dell'I. o Sant'Ufficio fu istituita da papa Paolo III Farnese il 21 luglio 1542 con la bolla Licet ab initio. La bolla affidava la lotta contro l'eresia a un gruppo di cardinali nominati dal pontefice (in quell'occasione furono sei, ma il numero variò a seconda dei papi) attribuendo loro poteri giudiziari dirompenti per una società come quella di antico regime basata sulla diseguaglianza giuridica.
La crisi della modernità Studi in onore di Gianvittorio Signorotto a cura di Matteo Al Kalak, Lor... more La crisi della modernità Studi in onore di Gianvittorio Signorotto a cura di Matteo Al Kalak, Lorenzo Ferrari, Elena Fumagalli Storico curioso dai molteplici interessi, Gianvittorio Signorotto ha saputo riflettere, nel corso della sua attività di studioso, su molte questioni: le vicende religiose dell'Italia moderna, la Lombardia spagnola e borromaica, la magnificenza delle corti
Antal Molnár (Accademia Ungherese delle Scienze) Tutti gli uomini del papa. Vescovi, missionari e... more Antal Molnár (Accademia Ungherese delle Scienze) Tutti gli uomini del papa. Vescovi, missionari e agenti delle missioni cattoliche nei Balcani nel Seicento
One of the most interesting aspects in the international historiographical landscape in the last ... more One of the most interesting aspects in the international historiographical landscape in the last two decades is the emergence of a multi-denominational Europe, resulting from the processes of religious pluralization triggered by the Protestant Reformation. How did the great machinery of the Roman Curia operate in this multi-denominational Europe, where Catholicism often became a minority religion, and where ‘heresy’ was legalized? The conference aims to shed light on the different actors involved as mediators between Rome and the multi-confessional spaces; to trace the experience and intelligence of that political, religious, social and cultural complexity which lied beyond the Alps; and finally, to analyse the Roman policies that were constructed on the basis of this knowledge.