Projects

Funding body: Ministry of Education, University and Research (MIUR)

National coordination: prof. Edoardo Barbieri (Catholic University of the Sacred Heart of Milan-Brescia)

 
"The Dawn of Italian Publishing. Technology, Texts and Books in Central and Northern Italy in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries" is a research project aimed at analyzing the history of book production from the 15th century to the beginning of the 16th century in central and northern Italy. The contribution provided by the major cultural centers, in particular Milan, Venice and Bologna, will be examined and analytically described, in addition to some smaller cities and regions, which in any case have played a role of considerable interest, such as Perugia and Umbria.

The study, however, aims to go beyond the conventional chronological limit of 1500 set for incunabula, including the entire production of Aldine's first edition (1494 / 95–1515) and his contribution to the birth of the modern book. The project will document and describe the spread of these early printed artefacts in terms of reading and erudition, without forgetting the significant role of the collector.

Particular attention will be given to the production of books in non-Latin alphabets, both as regards the types and the different languages ​​that are expressed through the Italian printers.

Four units involved in the project, belonging to as many Italian university poles:

Udine Unit, coordinator: prof. Neil Harris
Unit of Milan (Cattolica University, Milan), coordinator: prof. Edoardo Barbieri
Unit of Bologna, coordinator: prof. Paolo Tinti
Unit of Rome (ibera Università Maria Santissima Assunta, LUMSA), coordinator: Prof. Patrizia Bertini Malgarini


The Bolognese research unit, directed by prof. Paolo Tinti, is presented as follows:

Saverio Campanini (University of Bologna)
Federica Fabbri (University of Bologna)
Giacomo Nerozzi (Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna)
Chiara Reatti (University of Bologna)

The following external experts are also part of Bologna Unit:
Martina Bagnoli (Head of Gallerie Estensi)
Annalisa Battini, Grazia Maria De Rubeis (Biblioteca Estense Universitaria di Modena)
Patrizia Cremonini, Lorenza Iannacci (Modena State Archive)

The research group will deal with the study and analytical description of the incunabula printed in the city of Bologna and in other important centers of Emilia, such as Modena and Reggio; the book production of the Abbey of Nonantola and the territories of San Cesario sul Panaro and Scandiano will also be taken into consideration.

• Ministero dell'Istruzione, dell'Università e della Ricerca (PRIN2017, settore SH5)
• Dipartimento di Studi medioevali, umanistici e rinascimentali (Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan)
• Dipartimento di Studi umanistici e del patrimonio culturale (University of Udine)
• Dipartimento di Scienze umane - Comunicazione, Formazione e Pscicologia (Libera Università Maria Ss. Assunta, Roma)

Financing body: Benedictine Abbey of San Pietro, Modena; CERI - Italian Episcopal Conference

Coordinator: prof. Paolo Tinti (University of Bologna)
Library manager: Stefano De Pascalis OSB
Appointed person: Dr. Chiara Reatti (University of Bologna)

 

Established in the late Middle Ages, the library flourished from the modern age, as evidenced by the Vatican lists of the late sixteenth century (Vat. Lat. 11269 cc. 270r-286v).

In 1639, under the Abbot Leone Pavoni da Todi, the construction works of the new librarìa were started, completed by 1640. A few years later, however, the war vicissitudes of the Este Duchy caused economic difficulties for the monastery, which had to proceed to alienation of books. Between 1760 and 1765 the librarian Bruno Solaro edited the Bibliographia S. Petri Mutinensis (now preserved in the State Archives of Modena), a catalog that includes almost 5600 volumes. With the Napoleonic suppression of 1798 most of the books were transferred to the Academy of Fine Arts and the Estense and University libraries, while the doubles were placed on the antiques market. During the Restoration the library was reconstituted starting from the volumes which had survived the dispersions and increased with new acquisitions. The new suppressions decreed after the unification of Italy once again caused an impoverishment of the book heritage but in the course of the twentieth century a new nucleus was formed which recalled ancient editions, even from the sixteenth century.

The project for the opening and enhancement of the Library, launched in 2016 thanks to funding from the Italian Episcopal Conference which allowed the bibliographic cataloging and entry into the Opac SBN, aims to promote the knowledge and use of this library heritage and is part of the broader framework for enhancing the cultural heritage of the Monastery, and its impact on the urban and social fabric of Modena.

• Biblioteca del Monastero di San Pietro, Modena

Emilia-Romagna was an important land for Dante, in effect a second home. In the region "between the Po and the mountain and the marina and the Rhine", as he himself defined it in the 14th canto of the Purgatory, the Poet stayed on several occasions and spent the last years of his painful existence as an exile. Precious manuscripts of Dante's works and various other historical, documentary, literary and artistic testimonies of Dante proliferated rapidly starting from the time and places of the last exile of the Poet and still survive today in the libraries and archives of the cities along the ancient axis o on the edge of the Via Emilia, from Piacenza to Rimini, passing through Parma, Modena, Bologna, Imola, Ferrara, Ravenna, Forlì and Cesena.

To enhance this significant heritage, the Cultural Heritage Service of the Emilia-Romagna Region, in collaboration with the Italian Dante Society, on the occasion of the seventh centenary of Dante's death (1321-2021), has devised a widespread exhibition path, so that each conservation site it becomes an illustrative theater of heritage and of scientific and didactic initiatives.

Conceived by Alberto Casadei and curated by Gabriella Albanese, Sandro Bertelli and Paolo Pontari, the exhibition on 'Dante and the Divine Comedy in Emilia-Romagna' unfolds in a 'fil rouge' that unites all the events, consisting of the study of tradition , of reception and Dante contexts up to Humanism.

There are a total of 14 exhibitions that include the display of manuscripts, incunabula and sixteenth-century books of the Comedy and other Dante works, set up over a period of time that goes from Monday 2021 and extends until the first months of 2022.

To prof. Paolo Tinti has been entrusted with the scientific coordination of the filing of all the incunabula kept in the Region.

• Servizio Patrimonio culturale della Regione Emilia-Romagna
• For further information