The Saint between Manuscript and Print: Italy 1400–1600 ed. by Alison K. Frazier (review)

This publication has been in the making for some time. It originates from a 2008 seminar at the American Academy in Rome; however, the result is a well thought-out, very coherent, exceedingly useful reference work on saints’ cults in Italy from 1400 to 1600—a period of changing, multiple media. A number of these essays should be recommended reading for undergraduate and graduate students, and not just for students and scholars of hagiography. Unlike many books with meaningless, wide-embracing titles, this volume offers more than the parts it sets out to explore.

This collection contains new evidence on the use of different media for the spread of the cults of St. Catherine of Siena, St. Alberto of Trapani, St. Filippo Benizzi, St. Nicholas of Tolentino, St. Bernardino of Siena, St. Vincent Ferrer, St. Lucy, St. Roch, Simon of Trent, Honoratus of Lérins, Girolamo Savonarola, St. Caterina Vigri, St. Veronica da Binasco, Arcangela Panigarola, and Blessed Lucia of Narni, as well as an exceptionally lucid approach to the study of printed martyrologies and a look at the market for inexpensive hagiographical prints. Above all, this is a methodologically important volume: some essays are exemplary for the study of the transmission of texts through different periods. The authors’ evidence encompasses manuscripts, prints, artworks, documents, texts, images, and bookseller inventories and prices—official and popular, true and believed to be. They have approached their sources systematically and have drawn solid, important conclusions.

The traditional contrasts between the supremacy of print and the continuous practice of manuscript, as well as between standardization and variation of the texts, are proven superficial and are set aside in favor of solid evidence, which, as ever, brings to light a more interesting, faceted, and inclusive reality. In the introduction Alison K. Frazier does her best to offer a picture of the transition to early printing that is up to date. The only partial success of the overview is due not to any lack of knowledge on the editor’s part but rather to the fact that it is premature to draw conclusions. We certainly need to revise what has been written in the past with far too little and too geographically limited evidence (and too many assumptions). But to succeed, much more work on the transmission and reception of our written heritage, in manuscript and in print, is needed of the kind outlined in this volume.

In addition to the editor, contributors include Roberto Cobianchi, Barbara Wisch, Pierre Bolle, Stephen Bowd, Giuseppe Antonio Guazzelli, Cécile Caby, Laura Ackerman Smoller, Stefano Dall’Aglio, Serena Spanò Martinelli, Irene Graziani, John Gagné, Gabriella Zarri, and Kevin M. Stevens. A bibliography follows each essay, and there are some good color and black-and-white reproductions.