The BIFLOW-Toscana Bilingue Catalogue: A Digital Representation of the Socio-cultural History of Translation in the Tuscan Middle Ages (1260–1430)

This article aims at presenting the Biflow-Toscana Bilingue catalogue, the final out-come of the Biflow(Bilingualism in Florentine and Tuscan Works)ERC project, which investigates the forms and modes of the transmission of texts circulating in several languages in medieval Tuscany between the end of the thirteenth and the middle of the fifteenth century (translations of non-classical texts produced or realized in Tuscany between 1260 and 1430). The construction of a digital catalogue comprehends the theoretical framework and method-ological backgrounds of the many fields involved in the project; more crucially, this research focused on the tradition and translations of texts transmitted in manuscripts seeks to reshape humanistic methods and methodologies in order to find the best solutions for representing it with computational models

Microvascular alterations in hypertension and vascular aging

Hypertension and aging are characterized by vascular remodelling and stiffness as well as endothelial dysfunction. Endothelial function declines with age, since aging is associated with senescence of the endothelium due to increased rate of apoptosis and reduced regenerative capacity of the endothelium. Different phenotypes of hypertension have been described in younger and adult subjects with hypertension. In younger patients functional and structural alterations of resistance arteries occur as the earliest vascular alterations which have prognostic significance and may contribute to stiffness of large arteries through wave reflection. In individuals above age of 50 years as well as in subjects with long-lasting elevated blood pressure, vascular changes occur predominantly in conduit arteries which become stiffer. Activation of renin-angiotensin-aldosterone and endothelin systems plays a key role in endothelial dysfunction, vascular remodelling, and aging by inducing reactive oxygen species production, and promoting inflammation and cell growth

Maestri secolari, Frati mendicanti e autori volgari. Immaginario antimendicante ed ecclesiologia in vernacolare, da Rutebeuf a Boccaccio

The article is the first study on the anti-mendicant polemic in the imaginary of Italian medieval literature. It will argue that Italian authors inherited from French sources – especially Rutebeuf and Jean de Meun – an approach that sought to characterize friars from the mendicant orders as fundamentally invested in a project of domination over the wider societas christiana, a vision embodied by the character of Falsembiante, half-Dominican and half-Franciscan. This polemical paradigm brought medieval authors to reflect more widely upon the structure of the Church and its presence in society, and helped prompt the formation of a vernacular ecclesiology. The author then seeks to relate this ecclesiology to the broader religious and cultural context of the time. L’articolo è il primo studio complessivo sull’immaginario antimendicante nella letteratura italiana medivale. Gli autori italiani hanno ereditato dalle fonti francesi – in particolare Rutebeuf e Jean de Meun – un approccio che individuava nei frati mendicanti i protagonisti di un progetto di dominazione sulla societas christiana (impersonata da Falsembiante, metà francescano e metà domenicano). Questo paradigma ha indotto gli scrittori a riflettere sulla struttura della Chiesa e sulla sua presenza nella società, proponendo una ecclesiologia in volgare. L’autore studia questa ecclesiologia alla luce dei contesti religiosi e culturali dell’epoca

La linea Guittone-Monte e la nuova parola poetica

This paper traces the intellectual history of the Tuscan poetry of the thirteenth century. In particular, the analysis describes the cultural project derived from the works (poems and letters) and the biography (from politics to religious conversion) of Guittone d'Arezzo. This project was conceived in opposition to that of Brunetto Latini, in competition with the revolutions of the Popolo and in close relationship to the actions of the frati Gaudenti. The successive literary tradition engages critically with this legacy. While the contemporary rejection of Dante has been widely studied in the secondary literature, this paper privileges the responses of Monte Andrea (1270s-80s) and Florentine intellectuals in the 1290s

Italia senza nazione. Lingue, culture, conflitti tra Medioevo ed età contemporanea

«Dante che dovea essere il principio di tutta una letteratura, ne fula fine». La frase di De Sanctis riassume la contraddizione della tradizione letteraria italiana, caratterizzata da una vocazione alla supplenza politica e da una vera e propria ossessione istituzionale. Nonè un caso che la Storia della letteratura italiana del De Sanctis possa essere considerata il libro-manifesto dell’Italia come “comunità immaginata”. In questo volume, la letteratura e la cultura italiana, in una lunga durata che va dal Medioevo dei Comuni al dibattito sul New Italian Epic, sono il luogo in cui si sviluppa “l’estroflessione” caratteristica dell’Italian Thought, cioè di quella tendenza del pensiero italiano a esprimersi secondo modalità e tipologie non filosofiche proprio in ragione del particolare rapporto che esso intrattiene con le istituzioni e con la politica. I contributi qui riuniti dimostrano come questo produca un sistema simbolico-linguistico continuamente in tensione, che non costruisce un discorso identitario, ma anzi lo disfa e lo deterritorializza in continuazione, costruendo nuovi spazi di ospitalità culturale e politica