The Race to Write a History of Naples
The lifelong rivalry of two early modern Neapolitan printers was a battle of books, power, and, ultimately, fire.
Italy
‘The Graces’ by Breeze Barrington review
The Graces: The Extraordinary Untold Lives of Women at the Restoration Court by Breeze Barrington looks beyond the warming pan to the real Mary of Modena.
Italian Emigrant Soldiers in the First World War
Italy’s entry into the Great War in 1915 prompted 300,000 men to return to their homeland to join the fight. Were they Italian enough for Italy?
Renaissance Florence’s Missing Bronzes
The controversial outcome of a sculpture competition between Filippo Brunelleschi and Lorenzo Ghiberti changed the urban fabric of Renaissance Florence – or so the story goes.
Sex Workers and Salvation in the Renaissance
Renaissance Florence had a problem: it wanted female sex workers, but it also needed to offer them a way out. The solution was a new brothel district – and a nunnery for former prostitutes
Pompey’s Greatest Show on Earth
Rome’s first theatre was an enormous spectacle intended to glorify Pompey’s successes. Was it all bread and circuses?
The Birth of Giovanni Morelli
Giovanni Morell—later Morelli—was born in Verona on 25 February 1816 beginning a lifetime of dedication to the art of the connoisseur.
Curbing the Power of the Popes
The survival of the papacy has always been dependent on a precarious balancing act between the pope’s religious and secular powers.
‘The Grammar of Angels’ by Edward Wilson-Lee review
The Grammar of Angels: A Search for the Magical Powers of Language by Edward Wilson-Lee finds in Giovanni Pico della Mirandola a case for the Rennaissance as a triumph not of individuality, but of universal experience.
‘Naples 1343’ by Amedeo Feniello review
Naples 1343: The Unexpected Origins of the Mafia – Amedeo Feniello’s history of the Camorra – has this much in common with the case against them: it’s all about the evidence.