I documenti vaticani del processo di Galileo Galilei (1611–1741) (review)

Twenty-five years ago, Sergio Pagano and Antonio Luciani published the official edition of the major church documents related to the 1633 trial and condemnation of Galileo Galilei. The 1984 edition was one of the most tangible products of the Galileo Commission (1981–92) appointed by Pope John Paul II. Pagano's revised edition reflects two decades of subsequent scholarship. It is also a tribute to the importance of the Roman Catholic Church's decision to open the Archivio della Congregazione per la Dottrina della Fede (ACDF), which contains the historical archives of the Holy Office and the Congregation of the Index, to lay researchers in January 1998. There is now a considerable body of new research regarding not only the specifics of Galileo's trial but also the institutions of the post-Tridentine Church in general. Pagano's revised introduction offers a lengthy reflection on this new research. His revised account of Galileo's trial is especially indebted to the research of scholars such as Annibale Fantoli, Ugo Baldini, Franco Beretta, Michel-Pierre Lerner, Michele Camerota, Egidio Festa, and Massimo Bucciantini. Although Fantoli's major study provides Pagano with the basic narrative for his revised account of the events leading up to the trial, the work of Beretta establishes the framework for a more careful understanding of the mechanisms of the Roman Inquisition.

Pagano is also generous in acknowledging the efforts of other scholars in bringing to light new documentation. In 1984, he rushed to include a transcription of the famous G3 document (the anonymous accusation against the atomism of The Assayer), which Pietro Redondi made the centerpiece of his controversial and fascinating account of Galileo the atomist the year before. Twenty-five years ago, Pagano was highly critical of Redondi's identification of the author as the Jesuit Orazio Grassi and also eager to establish his own role in the document's discovery. Pagano now updates his analysis, resolving the mystery by invoking Rafael Martínez's identification of the author as a member of the circle of Cardinal Tiberio Muti, bishop of Viterbo. At the same time, he credits Redondi for reigniting interest in the complexities of the trial but remains unconvinced by Redondi's argument about the role of atomism in Galileo's trial.

More systematic research and better transcriptions have yielded a number of additional documents, including one minor item from the Galileo dossier in the Archivio Segreto Vaticano; seven documents from the papal nuncios in Florence and Vienna regarding Galileo's sentence and abjuration; and twenty items from the ACDF. The thirteen items from the Barberini Latini manuscripts in the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana included in the revised edition are less archival discoveries—most were previously published by Favaro but not included in the 1984 edition—than an acknowledgment that Cardinal Francesco Barberini's correspondence with Galileo, his pupil Benedetto Castelli, the Florentine nuncio, and one or two others is directly pertinent to a fuller documentation of the trial. There has also been further attention to the organization of the material. For example, Document G3 has now been placed in chronological order (in 1984 it was the final document in the volume). It is now accompanied by the publication of one of the important new documents to emerge in recent years: the Jesuit Melchior Inchofer's report on The Assayer for the Congregation of the Index, probably written at some point between 1628 and 1631.

Thanks to the archival work of many of the previously mentioned scholars, Pagano's new edition contains a more complete and satisfying record of the deliberations of the Roman Inquisition on Galileo's book. It also traces more systematically how news of his condemnation and abjuration traveled from Rome to other cities through Barberini's correspondence with regional inquisitors and papal nuncios. Finally, it brings to light a handful of surviving requests from...