This thesis examines the censorship of philosophy in Italy in the period 1450-1600, seeking to establish how the scrutiny of ideas was affected by the religious crisis of the sixteenth century. One of the primary aims of this thesis is to revise older accounts of censorship, dominant in the literature of both the history of science and Italian intellectual history traditions. These historiographies suggest that the Counter- Reformation triggered the emergence of a new and repressive attitude towards the censorship of philosophy, which grievously affected Italian intellectual and scientific culture in the seventeenth century. My thesis challenges this received view by drawing upon the insights produced by historians working in other disciplines, especially institutional historians of the Inquisition and the Index of Forbidden Books, and historians of the Church who have challenged the older monolithic view of the „Counter-Reformation Church‟. It seeks to show that while there were indeed significant changes to the apparatus of censorship during the sixteenth century, notably the re-organisation of the Inquisition and creation of the Index, they did not signal an entirely new approach towards the censorship of philosophy, nor did it have the cataclysmic impact suggested by earlier historians. I argue that the attitudes towards philosophy maintained within these institutions represent a specific formulation of the relationship between philosophy and revealed faith, which was in fact consistent with ideas elaborated within the mendicant orders during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. I argue that the implementation of these ideas as the basis for censorship can only be understood by understanding complex power struggles within the Church.

This thesis explores Baglione's contributions to art and to the history of art by examining the nature of his artistic and critical originality and the significant influences thereon. In the work for which he is best known, Le Vite ... (1642), Baglione was an interesting and generous critic who was unusually receptive to pictorial effects, even when in architecture and sculpture. He assesses Caravaggio's accomplishments with well chosen observations thereby breaking his restriction to discuss only accessible works of art. A broad view of his paintings and drawings shows Baglione's complex, original and thoughtful voyage of discovery assisted by the intelligence with which he absorbed artistic influences, particularly from Raphael and the Cavalier d'Arpino. His refined style of drawing distances him from Caravaggio. In paintings from the first decade, light and shadow give form to graceful figures enveloped in voluminous garments. After 1610 the compositions become more inventive and increasingly Baroque. Baglione's attempt to make a synthesis out of ideal generalization and naturalistic description and to explore new subject matter constituted a search for a "maniera propria" that combined stylistic originality with a penchant for unusual iconography. The most important trends in Baglione's draughtsmanship are the tendency towards a broader, freer handling and the versatility with which he handles the technical means at his disposal. Though he often crosses over the line into the Baroque, the idealism of his Tusco-Roman formation and fondness for angular lines constrain him from fully yielding to a dynamic disposition. His very personal style can be seen in a number of drawings from the 1620s and 1630s that attain a remarkable pictorial aspect and a Baroque quality of sensual presence. His sophisticated use of the three chalk technique prefigures the form dissolving effects to be popularized by Watteau. At the same time, the defining contour line that emphasizes integrity is not abandoned.

The author's Habilitationsschrift--Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn. / Summary in Italian. Includes indexes. Includes bibliographical references (p. 201-214).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1970. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

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This dissertation studies the diplomatic and political communication between Florence, the Byzantine and the Ottoman empires in the fifteenth century (1439-1481). The first chapter is introductory to the thesis and reconstructs the contacts between Florence and Byzantium. The second chapter and the third chapter examine the privileges granted by John VIII to Florence; the chapters present the contents and contextualise the privileges within the humanist environment. The fourth chapter studies the Florentine-Byzantine contacts after the Council (1439-1453), focusing on why Florence abandoned Byzantium. The fifth chapter analyses the beginning of Florentine-Ottoman relations and reconstructs the commercial privileges given by the sultan to Florence. The sixth and seventh chapters investigate Florence’s diplomacy during the Ottoman-Venetian war (1463-1479) and Otranto (1480-1481) until Mehmet II’s death. The thesis is accompanied by three appendices including a number of unpublished documents, a prosopography of the Florentines involved in the Levant, and selected Byzantine charters used for the analysis in chapter two. I aim to demonstrate that the relations between the eastern and the western part of the Mediterranean in the fifteenth century were determined by political and economic considerations rather than faith. These considerations guided Florence’s diplomacy to achieve commercial superiority in Constantinople.

Lawyers have widely been recognized as playing a role in the transition from the medieval to the modem state. Their presence in Renaissance Venetian politics, however, remains largely unexplored. Relying primarily on a prosopographical analysis, the thesis explores the various roles played by lawyers, dividing those roles into three main categories: diplomats, territorial governors, and domestic legislators. What emerges is a clear pattern of significant involvement by legally trained patricians in the Venetian political system. Noble lawyers were most often ambassadors, serving in many of the principal courts inside and outside of Italy as Venice was extending her influence on the Italian peninsula. They also served as administrators of Venetian rule throughout the Venetian terraferma (mainland) state. Lastly, their domestic political officeholding further confirms their continuing participation, as they held many of the most important domestic offices throughout the Quattrocento. The thesis ends with short biographies of each of the nearly three-dozen lawyers who make up this study, as well as chronologies of the offices they held. These chronologies include archival references for each office.

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In the small town of Assisi in Italy, there is a chapel dedicated to Mary Magdalen. This well known figure from the New Testament Gospels is an anomaly. To many she is the prostitute turned disciple: to others she is a key witness to the resurrection. The frescoes show this Magdalen, but they also show her in strange scenes not found in the Bible. The Gospels tell us that Mary Magdalen was with Jesus in his ministry, at the crucifixion and at the resurrection. Early church fathers picked up on this and linked her with other unnamed women in the Gospels to develop an ideal model of discipleship. From there, legends developed this conflated Magdalen into the embodiment of chastity, penitence and devotion. As such, she became the focus of one of the greatest cult followings of the Middle Ages and her relics where at the heart of the fourth most visited pilgrimage site in Christendom. In the thirteenth century, a young man, Francis of Assisi helped to revolutionise and revive the life of the Church by his personal example of poverty, benevolence and pure devotion; virtues embodied by the Magdalen. It is then understandable that a chapel dedicated to her should be found in the basilica built to honour Francis. However, the reasons behind the chapel's existence and location also have a great deal to do with the power and influence of the secular (Angevin) and religious establishment of the time as well as the controversies burgeoning within the Franciscan Order including the roles of second order women and the influence of the two factions of Franciscanism, Spirituals and Conventuals. Finally, it must not be forgotten that the Magdalen chapel, a means of theological and political dogma, was also a very tangible and real visual sermon to the masses of pilgrims who flocked to visit the shrine of Francis. This project is an attempt to uncover the identity of the woman in and the meaning of the Magdalen Chapel in the Lower Church of the Basilica of St Francis in Assisi.