Archivio della Società romana di storia patria vol. 144 (2021) in formato E-BOOK

INDICE

Irene Fosi, Premessa

Stefano Del Lungo, Ambiente, cambiamenti climatici ed epidemie fra Etruria e Tuscia da Marco Aurelio a Gregorio Magno

Andrea Galletti, Echi della peste negli scritti di Gregorio Magno. Tra funzionalità politico-pastorale e costruzione della memoria

Nicole Demarchi, Il Dolor come cura contro la pestis inguinaria nella Vita Gregorii Magni di Paolo Diacono

Marco Ciocchetti, Conclavi ed epidemie a Roma nel XIII secolo

Emanuele Carletti, Un ordine religioso alla prova della grande peste: i frati Servi di Maria nell’Italia centrale nel corso del secondo Trecento

Biagio Nuciforo, «Deus custodiae nos sua pietate». La peste del 1485 a Roma e Milano

Anna Esposito, I notai di Roma e la peste del 1522-1523

Irene Fosi, Ricordare, celebrare: la peste e i Barberini (1629-1634)

Emanuele Atzori-Antonella Cesarini, «Gran spavento in questi giorni è in Roma». I fratelli Berlinsani durante la peste del 1656-1657

Renato Sansa, La città alla prova della peste. Misure di controllo e disgregazione del tessuto sociale (Roma 1656-57)

Marco Emanuele Omes, «Una principale mira de’ magistrati»? La vaccinazione antivaiolosa nello Stato pontificio (1801-1841)

Katalin Nagy-Giulio Merlani, Il “Cholera” degli anni Trenta dell’Ottocento a Ancona

Cronaca di un convegno

Periodici pervenuti alla Società, a cura di Francesca Pardini

Pubblicazioni pervenute alla Società a cura di Francesca Pardini

Atti della Società. Consiglio Direttivo (11 marzo, 24 marzo, 28 aprile, 6 ottobre, 2 dicembre 2021); Assemblea dei Soci (8 gennaio, 29 gennaio, 26 febbraio, 20 maggio, 2 dicembre 2021)

Cariche sociali

Summaries

 

Ambiente, cambiamenti climatici ed epidemie fra Etruria e Tuscia da Marco Aurelio a Gregorio Magno

Stefano del Lungo

This territorial scope allows us to range from the Tyrrhenian coast to the Tiber Valley, engaging with environmental and cultural contexts that anticipate the birth of the Maremma and that provide the first evidence of epidemic outbreaks in the inland areas. Across a wide period extending from the great plague of 165-167 A.D. to the epidemic that struck Rome in 590, the East is always described as the area of genesis. The myth of lands condemned to malaria, endemic since Alaric’s exploits with the rise of ‘fake news’, is here countered by a centuries-old ‘culture of marshes’, a more realistic evaluation of local outbreaks (prodigia and portenta) and an understanding of these phenomena in their relative scope and gravity. Only through a new analysis of literary and archaeological sources is it possible to debunk commonplaces about crises and abandonment and comprehend the real factors of transformation of the territory in the face of ongoing climate change.

 

Echi della peste negli scritti di Gregorio Magno. Tra funzionalità politico-pastorale e costruzione della memoria

Andrea Galletti

The aim of this paper is to reexamine the impact of the plague that broke out in Rome in 590 on the pastoral and political practice of Gregory the Great. Starting from the assumption that his narration of the events derives from a documentary tradition external to the Roman world and, in part, to papal writings, we will examine the process of positioning the epidemic in an eschatological framework parallel to other dramatic events such as the coeval Longobard devastation. Unlike more common historiographical approaches, this study will focus on the pope’s writings, in particular selected letters, homiletic commentaries and the Dialogues. This investigation will highlight the reuse of the memory of the epidemic, leading us to reconsider its importance during the early days of the pontificate of Gregory the Great.

 

Il Dolor come cura contro la pestis inguinaria nella Vita Gregorii Magni di Paolo Diacono

Nicole Demarchi

The main objective of the following contribution is to examine the representation in the Vita Gregorii Magni by Paul the Deacon (720 c. – 799 c.) of the pestis inguinaria of 590 A.D. in Rome, highlighting its historical-religious characteristics with particular attention to the therapeutic function of pain, tears and compunction. In narrating the episode, the author dwells in particular on the oration with which Gregory the Great invites the Roman people – guilty of having unleashed the divine wrath – to accept pain as a path to true conversion and at the same time to abandon themselves to tears with a contrite heart in order to obtain divine forgiveness and thereby put an end to the scourge. More specifically, this paper will highlight how, within the Gregorian oration contained in the Vita Gregorii Magni, Paul the Deacon takes up the words and theological reflections of the pontiff himself, underlining, first, the close link between illness, moral conduct and sin and, second, the role of pain, tears and compunction as “medicines” able to cure the soul afflicted by sin and, indirectly, the disease.

 

Conclavi ed epidemie a Roma nel XIII secolo

Marco Ciocchetti

Historiography has provided numerous contributions on disease treatment and medical studies at the thirteenth-century papal curia, in part dealing with a dangerous problem that afflicted Rome in the Middle Ages, namely the epidemics of malaria that frequently broke out in the summer months (PARAVICINI BAGLIANI, Il corpo del papa, Turin 1994; ID., Medicina e scienza della natura alla corte dei papi nel Duecento, Spoleto 1991). A recent hypothesis addresses the possible biological differences between indigenous and allogenic members of the curia with respect to these epidemiological phenomena (CAROCCI, Baroni di Roma. Dominazioni signorili e lignaggi aristocratici nel Duecento e nel primo Trecento, Rome 1993). However, there has been little focus on the conclaves that took place during these epidemics and how much disease may have affected these elective assemblies. The objective of this contribution is to better investigate this topic, by means of a detailed analysis of all evidence available from.

 

Un ordine religioso alla prova della grande peste: i frati Servi di Maria nell’Italia centrale nel corso del secondo Trecento

Emanuele Carletti

This contribution addresses the dynamics that characterized a regular religious order in the wake of of the great plague epidemic of the years 1347-1348 and its reappearances across the second half of the fourteenth century. Established mainly in the urban context of central and northern Italy during the later thirteenth and and earlier fourteenth centuries, the order of the Servants of Mary (Servites) had integrated itself within nu- merous sectors of the societas christiana, despite the fierce territorial competition offered by other religious orders, especially the mendicant ones. The advent of the Black Death – following the obvious initial blow that produced a net depopulation of convents and general identity and social crisis – paradoxically helped to consolidate and accelerate numerous processes that had marked the Servites since its beginnings. This article analyzes these phenomena in their local contexts, emphasizing the friars’ presence in the territories of the Patrimony of St. Peter.

 

«Deus custodiae nos sua pietate». La peste del 1485 a Roma e Milano

Biagio Nuciforo

As primary causes of mortality, infectious diseases have often marked the fate of human history. The plague, in particular, became a true pandemic in the fourteenth century and remained endemic in Europe in the following centuries. The subject of this article is one of the Renaissance plagues, that of 1485, which struck Italian cities including Milan and Rome. These two cases will be analyzed through the use of diplomatic sources belonging to the main Italian courts and cities, in order to study the strong effects this plague had not only on the population, but above all on the ambassadors  who witnessed it – ambassadors who were already occupied with informing their lords about another event of “national” and international interest, the Conspiracy of the Barons of the Kingdom of Naples against King Ferrante of Aragon, in which the Church was also involved.

 

I notai di Roma e la peste del 1522-1523

Anna Esposito

In this essay I examine the source that, in my opinion, best succeeds in providing us with a concrete image of the men and women who lived through the drama of the plague: notarial protocols. The perusal of a representative sample of registers, including those in the hands of notaries (Roman and foreign) and those linked to hospital and confraternal institutions, has produced a dossier of about 300 relevant acts, including testaments, donationes causa mortis, donationes inter vivos, etc. Additionally, the protocols occasionally conveyed personal events that the notaries themselves jotted down in their work registers, as well as their modus operandi during this dramatic situation. From the notarial material, together with other sources (in particular both diplomatic and private letters), I will try to reconstruct the behavior, the concerns, the devotional practices of the “Romans” during this epidemic, which coincided with the pontificate of Adrian VI.

 

Ricordare, celebrare: la peste e i Barberini (1629-1634)

Irene Fosi

The plague of 1630 did not affect the city of Rome. An enormous effort was made by the Congregazione di Sanità, which already existed, to guard borders by alerting, in particular, the legates of Ferrara, Bologna and Romagna, which were governed by men trusted by Urban VIII. In 1635, when the plague was defeated, Giovan Battista Spada wrote a report on the principles of diligence against contagion used in Rome, which he dedicated to his nephew Cardinal Francesco Barberini. The report takes on a precise political significance as it glorified the actions of the cardinal in this difficult circumstance and sang the praises of papal policy. In that tournant, the plague became a useful and effective propaganda tool in political contexts that presented challenges for the Papacy and for the Barberini family: the Thirty Years’ War, the attacks of Spain on the Pope, and the continuous (and unheeded) imperial request for substantial financial aid from Rome. The essay is accompanied by the publication of the Relazione (BAV, Barb. lat. 5626, cc.1-14r) in the appendix.

 

«Gran spavento in questi giorni è in Roma». I fratelli Berlinsani durante la peste del 1656-1657

Emanuele Atzori-Antonella Cesarini

Rome, 1656-1657. Three of the sons of Vincenzo Berlinsani, a doctor from Lucca, were in Rome working in the rioni of Campitelli, S. Eustachio and the Quirinale. Ludovico, also a doctor and future successor of Paolo Manfredi as chair of medicine at La Sapienza, was entrusted by the Congregazione di Santià with control of the rioni Colonna and S. Eustachio. Cosimo, a member of the Clerics of the Mother of God in the parish of S. Maria in Campitelli, contracted the plague while administering the sacraments to the dying and spent a brief period in the Lazaretto of S. Eusebio. Giovanni lived in the Ospedale dei Lucchesi, near the church of S. Croce, and exercised the profession of “nurse”, welcoming and helping fellow citizens who had remained in the city. The documentary sources in the State Archive of Lucca and in various archives in Rome (State Archives, Archives of the Clerics of the Mother of God, Archives of the Oblates of the Child Jesus, Vicariate Archives) allow us to reconstruct the lives of these three brothers, obtaining data on the community of Lucca in Rome during the plague and, more generally, to document the reactions of the population to the epidemic.

 

La città alla prova della peste. Misure di controllo e disgregazione del tessuto sociale (Roma 1656-57)

Renato Sansa

Plagues have often represented social and political ruptures of the established order, with strong repercussions for the pre-existing economic balance. Across the modern era cities have experimented with methods of controlling contagion. The common denominator of measures to contain the plague (quarantine, lazarettos, sanitary cordons, licences or bills of health) was the isolation of the infected. In cities affected by the disease, prophylaxis included the “confinement” of those suspected of having contracted the disease in their homes and of the visibly sick in lazarettos. These measures exacerbated social differences and contributed to the disintegration of the urban fabric. The exaggeration of the binary healthy/diseased triggered mechanisms of exclusion that were particularly noticeable with regard to the poor, foreigners and other marginal groups. This article examines the case of the management of the plague in Rome in 1656-57 in order to ascertain how sanitary measures ordered by the authorities set in motion a series of tight controls of social exchanges, up to the suspension of normal activities and relationships typical of urban life.

 

«Una principale mira de’ magistrati»? La vaccinazione antivaiolosa nello Stato pontificio (1801-1841)

Marco Emanuele Omes

This study reconstructs the history of smallpox vaccination in the Papal States from 1801, when the first inoculations were delivered, to 1841, when a Notificazione definitively established severe consequences for those who refused to be vaccinated, although vaccination remained officially optional. This contribution demonstrates that only a multi-scalar approach, focusing both on state institutions and on local actors (municipalities, doctors, members of the ruling classes), permits an understanding of the geographical variety and political contradictions that characterized the health policies of the Papal States in the first half of the nineteenth century. Vaccination campaigns did not depend only on state law or on the attitude of the pontiffs towards inoculation on the basis of the work of Edward Jenner; on the contrary, they often represented a more circumscribed response to local epidemiological threats. There- fore, we seek to highlight the role of those autonomous and “peripheral” agencies that did not hesitate to interpret the decisions of the papal government in various ways, including anticipating or even opposing them.

 

Il “Cholera” degli anni Trenta dell’Ottocento a Ancona

 Katalin Nagy-Giulio Merlani

 The Apostolic Archive and Library preserve important documents regarding the wave of cholera which spread through the Italian peninsula and into the Papal States between 1835 and 1840, starting from the territory of Marche. The analysis of these sources and their comparison with previous historiographical arguments regarding the cholera epidemic of the 1830s allows us both to highlight the multiple socio-cultural, political-economic and religious effects of the spread of the disease and to identify the limits of intervention in the society of the time, including social inequalities connected to the spread of the disease and the resurfacing of ancient superstitions. In this regard, the Vatican documents and others preserved in the State Archives of Ancona offer significant witness to how the population and the institutions of Ancona experienced changes in daily life due to cholera, as well as to the inner and spiritual dimensions of living with the disease.

 

Archivio

maggio 2022, pp. 370