Speranze, progetti e reti interconfessionali in Europa fra Sei e Settecento. Heinrich Wilhelm Ludolf e Francesco Bellisomi

The subject of the essay is a transnational and interconfessional network involving Germany, Italy and England. Its protagonists are men linked by epistolary correspondences, bonds of solidarity, exchanges of books and ideas, and shared projects in which religion, culture and politics are intertwined. In particular, the focus is on Heinrich Wilhelm Ludolf (1655-1712) and Francesco Bellisomi (1663-1741). Ludolf was an orientalist, diplomat and traveler, as well as a deeply religious man associated with Halle Pietism. Bellisomi was an abbot from Pavia who was arrested and tried by the Roman Inquisition in 1701, escaped from the inquisitorial jail after about ten years of imprisonment, and was long supported and sheltered in his wanderings across different European countries precisely by the Pietist networks connected to Halle. The interpretation of these interconfessional relationships is centered on the category of confessional “impartiality”: a notion that emerges in this historical period especially in the Pietist context, and which can be regarded as a criticism of confessional barriers, as a refusal to accept doctrinal and dogmatic distinctions, or even as an attempt to establish contact or dialogue between individuals and/or groups belonging to different confessions (or even outside them). The essay includes a documentary appendix: a hitherto unpublished Latin text about the origins of German Pietism which Ludolf addressed to Bellisomi in 1700

L'ostinata protesta di Maria Antonietta Lazzarini. Note su Francesco Selmin, La donna che uccise il principe

L’ostinata protesta di Maria Antonietta Lazzarini. Note su Francesco Selmin, La donna che uccise il principe L’intervento discute il libro di Francesco Selmin La donna che uccise il principe, Maria Antonietta Lazzarini e Luigi Alberico Trivulzio: la storia, le lettere (2018). Vengono evidenziate le caratteristiche del volume, basato sul racconto autobiografico che Lazzarini – mai processata per il delitto commesso e internata in manicomio per più di 15 anni – affidò a Selmin. Si tratta di un libro/documento/testimonianza che permette di leggere la storia di Lazzarini in prospettive diverse: come caso per la storia dell’internamento psichiatrico in epoca fascista e post-bellica, per la storia della categorizzazione del crimine e della malattia mentale, per la storia delle donne e dei rapporti di genere. Parole chiave: Maria Antonietta Lazzarin, città di Este, storia dell’internamento psichiatrico, storia delle donne, ego-documentiThe tenacious protest of Maria Antonietta Lazzarini. Notes on Francesco Selmin, La donna che uccise il principe Review article on Francesco Selmin La donna che uccise il principe, Maria Antonietta Lazzarini e Luigi Alberico Trivulzio: la storia, le lettere (2018). The article underlines the main features of the book, based on Lazzarini’s autobiographical account (ego-document) given to Selmin. The woman did not undergo a criminal trial and was interned in an asylum for 15 years. Selmin’s book can be considered as a source or a testimony, which can be analyzed as a case study for the history of women’s conviction in psychiatric asylums during the fascist and post-war era, for the history of the categorization of female crime and mental illness, for the history of women and gender relations

Le Genre des “âmes élues”. Labadie et ses lectrices, entre attaques polémiques et héritage spirituel

Les femmes ont lu Labadie, elles l ’ont écouté et suivi, elles ont constitué ce qu’on pourrait appeler le “noyau dur” du groupe spirituel. Cette étude éclaire la place des femmes dans les pratiques spirituelles de direction, dans les réseaux sociaux dans lesquels elles sont actives et dans la symbolique féminine qui entoure la question de l ’âme et des états de vie

Langages dissidents: performances et contestations religieuses à l’époque moderne

La longue histoire des « religions du Livre » pourrait se résumer à un débat sémantique sans fin sur l’usage, le sens des mots et des signes qui définissent les contenus religieux. À l’époque moderne et dans le contexte chrétien, les réformes protestantes appuyées sur l’essor de l’imprimerie focalisent les polémiques sur le terrain du langage religieux et de ses effets pratiques, liturgiques et sacramentels. La parole de Dieu, le langage des saints et des saintes et l’éloquence du théologien ..

The sound of silence. Spunti per un dialogo attraverso i secoli

The essay proposes a reflection on orality and the relationship between orality and writing in different types of sources from the early modern age and the ways in which they were produced. It also opens up suggestions and insights for a methodological discussion with scholars of other ages and, in particular, with those working with oral source

Ego-documents or ‘Plural Compositions’? Reflections on Women’s Obedient Scriptures in the Early Modern Catholic World

This article focuses on a common textual genre in early modern Catholic Europe conceived and produced in the context of a close spiritual director/penitent relationship, variously defined as ‘autobiografía por mandato’, ‘obedient writing’, or ‘autobiographical report’, and so on. Starting out from the large number of studies of this text type, a number of considerations are made on two themes: 1) their specificity and the social practices underpinning them 2) the modalities and ways of partial or integral publication in print of some of them. An attempt will be made to highlight to what extent and how the intricate question of authorship(s) can be addressed. Special attention will be devoted to the somewhat widespread category (in comparison with ‘autobiography’) of the ‘ego-document’, meaning, by this term, any type of text in which an author or authoress, deliberately or unintentionally writes about his/her acts, thoughts and feelings

Visconti, Giovanni

Biographical profile of the Pistoiese nobleman Giovanni Visconti, jurist, professor at the University of Pisa, priest, knight of Saint Stephen, author of mystical texts and spiritual director of nuns in Fermo, Pistoia, Pisa and Florence

The Hybrid Identity of Alvisa Zambelli, a.k.a Lea Gaon: Jewish convert, Christian Mystic and Demoniac

The article reconstructs the story of the Jewish convert Alvisa Zambelli a.k.a. Lea Gaon, questioned by the Holy Office in Venice in the eighteenth century because of suspicions of demonic possession and simulated sanctity. Relying on inquisitorial sources—containing reports by exorcists and confessors, a long and supposedly “autobiographical” account, and a kind of diary written in 1730 with detailed reports of visions and demonic battles—the author draws on the case of Alvisa Zambelli to address the relationship between ego-documents and hybrid identities. The neophyte’s Jewish identity, constantly obliterated yet continuously resurfacing in the life and in the “autobiographic” narrative of Alvisa/Lea, is presented as a defining trait of her religious culture and identity. The article focuses on the tension between a story which by its very nature strives for unity and reformulation, and a biographical experience characterized by the suffering brought about by conversion and the fragmentary nature of a multiple identity