Search Results

Italy in the early seventeenth century witnessed a revolution in the composition of instrumental music. Large, varied, and strikingly experimental in nature, this new repertoire constituted arguably the first significant body of independent, idiomatic instrumental music in the western tradition. In an age most widely known for its innovations in vocal music, Galileo Galilei explained that, in fact, it was instrumental music that was most effective as a means to “awaken the secret affetti of our soul.” In their new approach to instruments, musical composers were not alone. Instruments of all kinds stood at the center of changes in systems of knowledge in the early modern era. The telescope, the clock, the barometer, the pen—these were the tools of the natural philosopher, the collector, the patron, the early modern thinker. Scholars in the history of science have shown that in this period, the very notion of an instrument changed dramatically. No longer merely used to re-make an object, or to repeat a process already known, instruments were now increasingly seen as tools for open-ended inquiry that would lead to new knowledge. Although the instrumental music of this period has long been recognized as foundational to the Western tradition, the impulses that gave rise to it have never been adequately understood. This interdisciplinary study argues that the new instrumental music grew out of the early modern fascination with instruments of all kinds—scientific and artisanal tools that served as mediators between individuals and the world around them.

In Renaissance Rome, ancient ruins were preserved as often as they were mined for their materials. Although the question of what to preserve and how continued to be subject to debate, preservation acquired renewed force and urgency as the new papal capital rose upon the ruins of the ancient city. Preservation practices became more focused and effective in Renaissance Rome than ever before. This book offers a new interpretation of the ongoing life of ancient buildings within the expanding early modern city. While historians and archaeologists have long affirmed that early modern builders disregarded the protection of antiquity, this study provides the first systematic analysis of preservation problems as perceived by the Renaissance popes, the civic magistrates, and ordinary citizens. Drawing on new evidence, this compelling study explores how civic officials balanced the defense of specific sites against the pressing demands imposed by population growth, circulation, and notions of urban decorum. Above all, the preservation of antiquity remained an indispensable tool to advance competing political agendas in the papal capital. A broad range of preservation policies and practices are examined at the half-ruined Colosseum, the intact Pantheon, and the little-known but essential Renaissance bridge known as the Ponte Santa Maria. Rome has always incorporated change in light of its glorious past as well as in the more pragmatic context of contemporary development. This investigation not only reveals the complexity of preservation as a contested practice, but also challenges us to rethink the way people in the past understood history itself.

Mount Vesuvius has been famous ever since its eruption in 79 CE, when it destroyed and buried the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. But less well known is the role it played in the science and culture of early modern Italy, as this study reveals. Humanists began to make pilgrimages to Vesuvius during the early Renaissance to experience its beauty and study its history, but a new tradition of observation emerged in 1631 with the first great eruption of the modern period. Seeking to understand the volcano’s place in the larger system of nature, Neapolitans flocked to Vesuvius to examine volcanic phenomena and to collect floral and mineral specimens from the mountainside. This book argues that this investigation and engagement with Vesuvius was paramount to the development of modern volcanology. It then situates the native experience of Vesuvius in a larger intellectual, cultural, and political context and explains how later eighteenth-century representations of Naples—of its climate and character—grew out of this tradition of natural history. Painting a detailed portrait of Vesuvius and those living in its shadow, the author returns the historic volcano to its place in a broader European culture of science, travel, and appreciation of the natural world.

In the twilight of the Renaissance, the grand duke of Tuscany—a scion of the fabled Medici family of bankers—invited foreign merchants, artisans, and ship captains to settle in his port city of Livorno. The town quickly became one of the most bustling port cities in the Mediterranean, presenting a rich tableau of officials, merchants, mariners, and slaves. Nobody could have predicted in 1600 that their activities would contribute a chapter in the history of free trade. Yet by the late seventeenth century, the grand duke’s invitation had evolved into a general program of hospitality towards foreign visitors, the liberal treatment of goods, and a model for the elimination of customs duties. Livorno was the earliest and most successful example of a free port in Europe. The story of Livorno shows the seeds of liberalism emerging, not from the studies of philosophers such as Adam Smith, but out of the nexus between commerce, politics, and identity in the early modern Mediterranean.