Le risorse dei poveri. Carità e tutela della salute nel principato vescovile di Trento in età moderna (review)

This is an impressively researched book that describes the entire system of charity structures in the territory of the prince-bishops of Trent from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries. Garbellotti's contribution to the scholarship results more from the topic that she has documented (while charitable institutions have been studied in urban contexts, they have received little attention in rural settings) than from a new analytical perspective. Given the state of the sources, much of the story here comes from the city of Trent itself, but the city's small size and its situation outside of a major Italian state makes it an interesting case. It is a bit more difficult to identify whether and how, in the author's view, the practice of charity in the Trentino helps us understand practices elsewhere in Italy or Europe in a different way; that is, whether the author's evidence revises dominant interpretations in the literature on this topic, or provides a new one.

Chapters 1 through 3 examine the political, legal, and institutional structures relating to assistance for the poor and the ill in the Trentino between the later Middle Ages and the eighteenth century. A key theme here and elsewhere is that political divisions between the prince-bishop, the Trent city council, and other groups (especially the confraternities that ran the four hospitals in Trent during the entire Old Regime) prevented one group from either asserting unambiguous control over assistance practices or carrying out comprehensive reforms. Much attention is given to the work of the confraternity of the Zappatori Alemanni, whose house in the German quarter of Trent was dedicated to helping foreigners. In chapter 4 we find that the fifteenth-century innovations (distinguishing between the poor and the sick, growing involvement of civic authorities in administering assistance) that took place in much of urban Italy did not take root in Trent. We also learn that, due to the absence of a foundling home in Trent, abandoned children were regularly taken to the Casa di Pietà in Verona. The following three chapters examine how assistance to the poor and sick was effected in practical terms, using confraternity statutes, visitation records, accounts, and other sources to describe the daily experiences of hospital workers and patients. Chapter 7, one of the most interesting in the book, analyzes the Conservatorio delle orfane, which in the 1590s became a home for girls from Trent and neighboring communities. Chapters 8 and 9 discuss financial issues, such as the endowments of charitable institutions, the money-lending activities of their administrators, and the practices of making pious donations within communities (the rule here was leaving a gift that was distributed in strictly equal portions among community members, regardless of particular needs).

The author presents various themes at different points in her discussion, without tying them to a sustained argument. In fact, the book's organizational logic is not readily apparent, and the historical element is frequently lost as the narrative jumps from one century to another. Garbellotti does a good job of pointing to the different charitable structures in different parts of this territory, and of showing how they functioned as parts of an overall charitable system. She develops the theme that a communal ethos dominated the Trentino and resulted in charitable structures that privileged community members while frequently excluding outsiders (an exception was the German hospital). Perhaps the author wishes to oppose this [Alpine? Germanic?] communalism to an [urban Italian?] ideology of the patrician class linking charity, the sexual honor of unmarried women, and the city's prestige (concerns embodied by the Conservatorio delle orfane)—an interesting possibility that is not explicitly analyzed here.