Studi di storia ereticale del Cinquecento (review)

Before his death in 2007, Antonio Rotondò arranged for the republication of the essays included in his classic Studi e ricerche di storia ereticale italiana del Cinquecento (Florence, 1974), plus five other articles that originally appeared in journals or other published collections between 1962 and 1991. The volumes here under review have provided that republication. Rotondò deliberately planned no systematic bibliographic updating of the works, and hence changes to the original works are rare. The first volume opens, however, with a new, self-revelatory piece: a thirteen-page essay by Rotondò tracing the intellectual influences on his scholarly career, from his days in the liceo in Cosenza. His commitment to historical investigation emerged at the end of the 1940s, at perhaps the high point of the influence of Benedetto Croce, and was fed by the great teachers of the university at Florence: Giorgio Pasquali, Delio Cantimori, and Eugenio Garin. From them and others, Rotondò learned first the necessity of a synthetic approach to philology and history, and then the techniques required to pass on the importance of critical analysis of sources through teaching. He, like many others, praised especially the instruction of Cantimori, whose breathtaking erudition not only changed the character of Florentine studies on sixteenth-century religiosity but also enabled him to inspire students who came from widely varying cultural contexts in an age of extraordinary political and intellectual passion. Rotondò clearly admired the conviction held by both Cantimori and Garin that great teaching is as much about showing students what to avoid as it is about what must be imparted. They led him, he asserted, to make a contribution to the “profoundly new history of Europe” they were writing, one that emphasized the repression that emerged late in the age of humanism as the opposite of its earlier civility (p. xxvi).

From this appealing intellectual autobiography, there follow thirteen articles, varying widely in length and theme. These demonstrate that Rotondò indeed made a remarkable contribution to that new history. Simple reiteration of the individual titles, with a quick indication of theme and scope, would consume more space than is allotted for this review. Rest assured that all students of sixteenth-century religiosity, particularly those interested in considering the connection between that subject and the development of Enlightenment thought—which also fascinated Rotondò—will be delighted with the collection. And make no mistake: his history of religion is a history of opposition to conformity and dogmatism, one often marked by tragic endings. His excellent works on antipapal propaganda, Italian anti-Trinitarians, and Guillaume Postel are all here. Rotondò also included thirteen appendices, which consist of edited primary documents created between 1549 and 1582 directly relating to the republished essays. The original documents are scattered in libraries and archives across Europe. Hence, the collection ends with a practical application of one idea emphasized at the very beginning: placing the sources at the center of our attempt to get our historical stories straight. These volumes are a fitting monument to the work of a great scholar who widened our view of the early-modern past. An English translation would be a wonderful service but is unlikely to find a sympathetic publisher in our budget-cutting present.