Gli studi medievistici di Cornelio Desimoni, un 'pioniere' della storia del territorio

ITALIANO: L’articolo consiste in una rassegna critica dell’opera di Cornelio Desimoni, storico molto versatile, dedicata fra il 1859 e il 1896 al periodo medievale. Accanto a commenti puntuali e all’esegesi di singoli documenti, a recensioni di testi di vario argomento, alla compilazione dei ponderosi annali della propria cittadina natale (Gavi), Desimoni ha affrontato ripetutamente un tema importante di storia politico-territoriale, in cui hanno pesato le sue competenze nel campo del diritto, con risultati molto maturi per l’epoca: le marche e i loro sviluppi nell’Italia a partire dal secolo IX. / ENGLISH: This article is a critical survey of the work that Cornelio Desimoni, a very versatile historian, dedicated to the middle ages during the period between 1859 and 1896. Apart from proffering precise comments, analyses of single documents, reviews of texts on various subjects and compiling the ponderous annals of his birth town (Gavi), Desimoni repeatedly tackled an important theme in political-territorial history: the marches and their development in Italy as from the 9th century. This latter accomplishment, which produced mature results for the time, was favoured by his competence in jurisprudence

Chapter I Doria e la chiesa di San Matteo a Genova nella seconda metà del Duecento

The essay addresses the problem of the relationship between large aristocratic families and “noble parishes” in Genoa, by considering the case of the Doria and the church of San Matteo, founded in 1125 and whose reconstruction was planned in 1278. On the one hand, three qualifying aspects of the Doria kinship are examined in order to understand the role of the small church in enhancing the coordination of the group: i.e., positions of leadership and command in the maritime city and in its government; dispersion and presence outside Genoa; numerical strength, residence and leadership. On the other hand, the article considers the insertion of San Matteo in the monastic network (not only in Liguria) headed by the abbey of San Fruttuoso, and how its reconstruction allowed for the diversification of the large family internal and external relevance. The conclusion, thanks to the comparison with the experiences of other important urban families, shows the uniqueness of this case study and how broader and more systematic comparisons should be made, even outside the Genoese context

The Chemokine CCL2 Mediates the Seizure-enhancing Effects of Systemic Inflammation

Epilepsy is a chronic disorder characterized by spontaneous recurrent seizures. Brain inflammation is increasingly recognized as a critical factor for seizure precipitation, but the molecular mediators of such proconvulsant effects are only partly understood. The chemokine CCL2 is one of the most elevated inflammatory mediators in patients with pharmacoresistent epilepsy, but its contribution to seizure generation remains unexplored. Here, we show, for the first time, a crucial role for CCL2 and its receptor CCR2 in seizure control. We imposed a systemic inflammatory challenge via lipopolysaccharide (LPS) administration in mice with mesial temporal lobe epilepsy. We found that LPS dramatically increased seizure frequency and upregulated the expression of many inflammatory proteins, including CCL2. To test the proconvulsant role of CCL2, we administered systemically either a CCL2 transcription inhibitor (bindarit) or a selective antagonist of the CCR2 receptor (RS102895). We found that interference with CCL2 signaling potently suppressed LPS-induced seizures. Intracerebral administration of anti-CCL2 antibodies also abrogated LPS-mediated seizure enhancement in chronically epileptic animals. Our results reveal that CCL2 is a key mediator in the molecular pathways that link peripheral inflammation with neuronal hyperexcitability

Due monasteri femminili liguri e la loro gestione: Sant'Andrea della Porta a Genova e Santo Stefano a Millesimo fino alla fine del Duecento

ITALIANO: Prima della fine del secolo XIII, i due monasteri femminili liguri di cui è pervenuta documentazione manifestano in modo differenziato l’influenza che le famiglie d’origine delle religiose tendono a esercitare sulle due comunità monastiche. Questa influenza viene assorbita in un sistema di apparentemente pacifico bilanciamento tra monache genovesi e monache di altra provenienza nel monastero cistercense di Santo Stefano di Millesimo, fondato nell’entroterra del Ponente ligure nel secondo decennio del Duecento, forse vigilato dall’ordine cistercense cui appartiene. Nel caso del monastero che resta irriducibilmente benedettino (e insofferente alla clausura) di Sant’Andrea della Porta a Genova, non è chiaramente dimostrabile un’interferenza delle potenti famiglie cittadine che sistemano le proprie figlie nel monastero, che sembra disporre di un buon patrimonio senza essere particolarmente prospero. Specie negli ultimi anni in esame, si manifestano da un lato dei conflitti interni che forse riecheggiano quelli esterni tra famiglie dell’aristocrazia schierate in fazioni avverse, dall’altro una capacità di reclutamento nelle fasce emergenti del Popolo. / ENGLISH: Before the end of the thirteenth century, the two Ligurian female monasteries attested in the extant documentation show, albeit in different ways, the influence that the nuns’ natal families tended to exert on the two monastic communities. This influence was absorbed in a system of apparently peaceful balance between Genoese nuns and nuns of other origins in the Cistercian monastery of Santo Stefano di Millesimo, founded in the 1210s in the hinterland of western Liguria, perhaps supervised by the Cistercian order to which it belonged. In the case of the monastery, which remained staunchly Benedictine (and increasingly intolerant of claustration) of Sant’Andrea della Porta in Genoa – which seems to have had a sound but not particularly prosperous patrimony – an interference on the part of the powerful urban families who settled their daughters in the monastery. Especially in the concluding years of the thirteenth century, one notices internal conflicts perhaps echoing on the one hand the external factional struggles among aristocratic families, and on the other a capacity for recruiting from among the emerging segments of the Popolo

Gestione e devoluzione del patrimonio in ambito extraurbano ligure: le donne delle stirpi signorili nei secoli XII e XIII

ITALIANO: Tra il secolo XII e il XIII le donne delle stirpi signorili del contesto ligure appaiono impegnate, stando alla documentazione per lo più di impronta urbanocentrica pervenuta, quasi solo nella devoluzione del patrimonio familiare. Queste donne si trovano a contribuire alla gestione dell’inarrestabile declino politico delle proprie stirpi, in un décalage accelerato. In qualche caso riescono forse a inserirsi in città o a mediare rispetto ai funzionamenti di una presenza familiare bilocata tra territorio e città. / ENGLISH: Between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, women from several Ligurian aristocratic families appear to have been engaged, according to the documentation relative mostly to the urban context, almost only in the devolution of family property. These women eventually had to contribute to the management of the inevitable political decline of their lineages, in an accelerated décalage. In some cases, they were perhaps able to settle in the city or to mediate within families which were present in both territory and city

La storia dei "non genovesi" dall'anno 2000: il contributo dei medievisti attivi nel contesto extraitaliano agli studi sulla Liguria

The article provides a review of scholarly literature on medieval Genoa and Liguria elaborated – and published mostly in a language different from Italian – in non Italian academic contexts since 2000, also by focusing on the specific problem of the selection of sources