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This chapter investigates the received wisdom that Tuscan thought was eclectic and that the undoubted inclination of Tuscan political economists towards physiocracy was merely a somewhat opportunistic echo of Peter Leopold's own preferences. It traces Tuscan economic thought back to the beginning of the century and shows its close relation with French thought that was a source of later physiocratic thinking. It notes that by the time the ideas of the physiocrats reached the grand duchy, it will be argued, they must have been perceived as almost genuinely Tuscan; their teachings also seemed especially relevant to Tuscany's agricultural economy.

This chapter examines the early life, education, and theological foundations of Scipione de’ Ricci (1741–1810) up to the eve of the Synod of Pistoia, in 1786. It explains the reformist milieu Ricci experienced as a young student in Rome and in his early career in Florence. The importance of the late eighteenth-century convergence of Habsburg Erastian reform, international Jansenism with its focal point in Utrecht, philo-Jansenism and anti-Jesuitism in Italy, and the legacy of Muratori is profiled. Then, the reform agenda Ricci sought to implement as the bishop of Pistoia-Prato (1780–91) is described: an anti-ultramontane and synodal ecclesiology (buttressed by Erastianism and, particularly, Grand Duke Peter Leopold’s fifty-seven Punti ecclesiastici), the importance of Ricci’s international (especially Francophone) Jansenist contacts, his propaganda campaign, and the Riccian drive to reform the liturgy and devotional life in his diocese, including an encouragement of vernacular Bible reading.

This chapter offers an introduction to Jewish life in Livorno while investigating the close bonds connecting Livornese Jews with the Tuscan state and culture. It first discusses the Livornina charter (1593), which lay the ground for Jewish life in the Tuscan port, and the exceptional status of Livorno. It then moves to analyzing the interconnection between the governance structures of the nazione ebrea and the Tuscan administration, an arrangement that distinguishes Livorno from other contemporary Sephardi centers. Finally, it emphasizes the importance of the Tuscan Enlightenment in the study of Livornese Jewish history. Under the rule of Francis Stephen of Lorraine and Peter Leopold of Habsburg-Lorraine Tuscan culture and policies were defined by attention to economic, social, and cultural reform. This reforming vocation provides a vantage point to study the Livornese Jewish encounter with outside culture as well as the ways in which Livornese Jews engaged with Enlightenment policies.

This chapter examines in detail the Synod of Pistoia (18–28 September 1786) and the Acts and Decrees it promulgated. It follows a topical approach, and considers the reforms that the Jansenist-inspired synod attempted alongside the papal condemnations in the bull Auctorem fidei (1794). The Acts and Decrees were permeated by a Jansenist view of church history that blamed Molinism, the papacy, and the friars for “obscuring” the truth. The chapter then explores Pistoian ecclesiology, and its potent combination of Erastianism, episcopalism, and Richerism. Next, it examines the Synod’s inchoate vision of religious liberty. The last two sections investigate liturgical and devotional reforms that strikingly foreshadow Vatican II. These parallels include simplifying the liturgy and encouraging lay participation in it, pronouncing the Eucharistic canon out loud, promoting the vernacular, encouraging the reception of communion, focusing worship on the altar, contextualizing devotions Christocentrically, and asserting the centrality of lay vernacular Bible reading.