Recent publications by Filippo de Vivo
Past and Present, 2023
This article studies the intertwined processes of popular protest and archival suppression in ear... more This article studies the intertwined processes of popular protest and archival suppression in early modern Venice. It concentrates on a cycle of contention extending over several months in 1569, including a labour protest that started among the workers of the state shipyard and turned into a large revolt, anonymous placards, and food riots. Such was the extent of the unrest that a major explosion in the shipyard raised suspicion of sabotage. Eventually, the government had to capitulate to the workers’ demands. This cycle of protests in Venice, a city normally renowned for peace and concord, has left minimal traces in the official records: the government tried to suppress the protests not only in practice but also on paper. It carried out convictions in secret, obliterated the revolt from its archives, buried any mention of protest under countless other records, and elided dissent from published histories. By using a variety of non-governmental sources, it is possible to investigate how contentious politics were written out of government records, and hence of history. Manipulating archives was always easier than subduing people: the more power was contested in the streets, the more it needed to be asserted in the archive. For the full article please visit https://academic.oup.com/past/advance-article/doi/10.1093/pastj/gtab040/6532405
Bruniana & Campanelliana, 2023
"Religious Coexistence, Cross-Confessional Alliances and (Un)Just War: Paolo Sarpi, Fulgenzio Mic... more "Religious Coexistence, Cross-Confessional Alliances and (Un)Just War: Paolo Sarpi, Fulgenzio Micanzio and the Trattato se sia lecito di maneggiar l’armi in servicio di Prencipe di diversa Religione". This article discusses a neglected text, the Italian Trattato se sia lecito di maneggiar l’armi in servicio di Prencipe di diversa Religione (1624), so far attributed to Paolo Sarpi and only known in the Latin translation by William Bedell published in 1630. The treatise is in fact the work of Fulgenzio Micanzio (1570-1654), who drew material from Sarpi’s Consulti but put it to original use and extended the argument in entirely new directions. The treatise comments on the case of a Catholic confessor who denied absolution to Italian soldiers serving the United Provinces in 1624. The text recalls both Machiavelli’s realism and Erasmus denunciation of warmongering, but it also points to Alberico Gentili and Hugo Grotius. The aim of the article is not just to rethink Micanzio, hitherto considered a secondary figure, but also to cast new light on the intellectual connections between Venice and the rest of Europe in the middle of the Thirty Years War.
Books by Filippo de Vivo
Tongues as sharp as blades and pens mightier than swords are amongst the most recurrent metaphors... more Tongues as sharp as blades and pens mightier than swords are amongst the most recurrent metaphors in Western culture. This book investigates the reality behind the image: the political uses of different forms of communication – oral, manuscript, and printed – in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Venice. From council debates to leaks and spies’ reports, from printed pamphlets to graffiti and rumours, political communication closely intertwined with the wider life and economic activities of this cosmopolitan and thickly populated capital of a large empire.
Today we take it for granted that communication and politics influence each other through spin-doctoring and media power. What, however, was the use of communication in an age when rulers recognised no political role for their subjects? And what access to political information did those excluded from government have? In answering, this book offers an original reinterpretation of early modern politics. While traditional political historians view events from the windows of government buildings, social historians have taught us to look at history from below. Neither perspective is sufficient in isolation, because even the most secretive oligarchs, ensconced in the Ducal Palace’s most restricted councils, were constantly preoccupied by their vociferous subjects in the squares below. In early modern Venice politics involved the patrician elite with the rest of the population, including women, in a thick web of continuous communication extending from government halls to the barbershops around Rialto.
Viella, 2015
La raccolta di saggi proposta intende provare a rispondere ad una serie di quesiti incentrati sul... more La raccolta di saggi proposta intende provare a rispondere ad una serie di quesiti incentrati sul rapporto tra archivi e società negli stati italiani tra Medioevo ed Età moderna. Quale era il personale addetto alla produzione e alla cura delle carte? E in quale modo esso era suddiviso al proprio interno? Dai notai dei comuni italiani fino ai più organizzati archivi d’età moderna, diverse categorie di personale specializzato – quali notai, cancellieri, segretari, ma anche archivisti veri e propri, ecc. – hanno contribuito alle diverse fasi della costruzione ed accumulazione degli archivi? Quale ruolo avevano questi ufficiali nella società del tempo? Quale tipo di provenienza sociale? L’impiego in cancelleria garantiva una promozione sociale? E quale educazione ricevevano le diverse categorie di segretari ed archivisti? Da Firenze a Venezia, noti esempi di cancellieri umanisti dimostrano che alcuni di essi spiccavano per le loro qualità intellettuali e letterarie, e non solo strettamente professionali e tecniche. In entrambe queste repubbliche l’organizzazione degli addetti alla cancelleria era regolata da apposite norme interne, e a Venezia lo stato organizzava perfino la loro formazione. Qui una legislazione accurata determinava elementi come la durata dell’ufficio o la suddivisione del lavoro tra i diversi funzionari, ma non mancavano neppure interessi di carattere socio-politico, come ad esempio la parentela o l’appartenenza a certi gruppi di potere. Nelle signorie, al contrario la rilevanza data al ruolo dei segretari, favorì lo sviluppo di relazioni di carattere interpersonale tra principe e segretario stesso, scelto perciò anche per la sua appartenenza al gruppo dei suoi consiglieri più fidati, oltre che per le sue capacità politiche e amministrative.
Su di un piano prettamente sociale si possono comparare queste due realtà? E secondo quali termini? Quali sono, inoltre, le differenze tra il personale delle cancellerie e degli archivi dei regni dell’Italia meridionale, rispetto a quello delle coeve entità istituzionali dell’Italia comunale e delle signorie centro-settentrionali? Si è parlato molto della transizione da un modello nel quale il personale di cancelleria era composto prevalentemente da ufficiali dalla formazione notarile o umanistica, ad un altro caratterizzato piuttosto dalla necessità di trovare funzionari che rispondessero prima di tutto alla richiesta dei governi centrali di avere personale fidato e fedele. L’occasione di questo convegno sarà buona anche per fare il punto su questi temi.
D’altra parte, l’intenzione è quella di usare i documenti stessi per documentare la formazione culturale e gli interessi culturali dei cancellieri: componimenti poetici, piccoli ghirigori sbozzati da segretari annoiati sui margini o sulle carte di guardia dei registri rivelano l’inclinazione culturale e il mondo personale dell’autore.
Una selezione di oltre 300 documenti relativi a sette antichi stati italiani, dal 1271 alla fine ... more Una selezione di oltre 300 documenti relativi a sette antichi stati italiani, dal 1271 alla fine del Settecento. I documenti sono divisi in sei grandi capitoli tematici: Archivi e potere, Organizzazione e ordinamento, Aspetti materiali, Il personale, Archivi e società, Dalla consultazione alla storia. Il volume e ciascuno dei capitoli sono preceduti da ampie introduzioni, e ognuno dei documenti è accompagnato da indicazioni bibliografiche essenziali. Il volume è gratuitamente scaricabile dal sito della Direzione Generale Archivi, collana Fonti http://151.12.58.123/dgagaeta/pdf.php?file=Fonti/5815a7df0acdd.pdf
Journal Special Issues by Filippo de Vivo
Rivista storica italiana, 2018
In occasione dei quattrocento anni dallo scoppio della guerra dei Trent'Anni questa sezione temat... more In occasione dei quattrocento anni dallo scoppio della guerra dei Trent'Anni questa sezione tematica della "Rivista Storica Italiana" si propone di dare un contributo ad un filone di ricerca che è andato guadagnando spazio crescente nel dibattito storiografico attuale: quello attinente al rapporto tra guerra e circolazione dell’informazione. Le guerre d'Italia, l'impresa di Lepanto, le guerre civili di Francia, la rivolta delle Fiandre sono state riconsiderate come altrettanti laboratori per verificare in che misura e con quali effetti guerra e informazione politica si intrecciassero - con approcci nuovi, aperti alla considerazione della "multimedialità" e attenti alla dimensione della circolarità al di là delle barriere confessionali e politiche . Come in queste occasioni precedenti, anche la guerra dei Trent’Anni coincise con una notevole intensificazione e diffusione delle informazioni fino a essere, anche, un vero e proprio “evento mediatico”, addirittura secondo alcuni “il primo conflitto europeo a essere combattuto sotto i riflettori dei nuovi mezzi di informazione”. Ciononostante, il livello di correlazione tra gli eventi bellici e i mezzi di informazione è stato studiato meno che in altri conflitti, e se l’importanza del 1618-48 è stata spesso sollevata dagli storici dell’informazione, viceversa il ruolo di gazzette e libellistica è spesso confinato a poche pagine nelle grandi opere sulla guerra.
European History Quarterly, 2016
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/toc/its/2016/19/1
Special issue of Storia della Storiografia, 68, 2015, Archives and the Writing of History. Table ... more Special issue of Storia della Storiografia, 68, 2015, Archives and the Writing of History. Table of contents, foreword, and introduction (nota: two separate files)
Italian Studies, 2011
Over the last generation, a revolution has changed the way in which we understand the transmissio... more Over the last generation, a revolution has changed the way in which we understand the transmission of culture in the early modern period, driven, on the one hand, by a historicist approach to the study of literary texts and, on the other, by the attention of cultural and political historians to the material means by which ideas circulated. Understanding how texts were reproduced and to which audiences they were primarily addressed has come to be seen as crucial to appreciating the intentions of their authors and the meanings of their texts, while understanding how those texts in fact circulated and were received can allow us to evaluate their influence in society. This trend originated with and built on the history of the printed book, but it has now moved on to show the continued importance of the manuscript medium well into the so-called 'age of Gutenberg'. Eminent representatives of book history now practise an inclusive approach. For example, Robert Darnton has proposed a move from the history of the book to the history of communication and, in his most recent studies, has explored the interactions between different kinds of media.
Articles by Filippo de Vivo
Paula Findlen and Suzanne Sutherland, eds., The Renaissance of Letters: Knowledge and Community in Italy, 1300-1650 (London and New York), pp. 293-317., 2020
Scholars trying to make sense of early modern letters of news – a growing genre in the sixteenth ... more Scholars trying to make sense of early modern letters of news – a growing genre in the sixteenth and seventeenth century – need to take seriously the ways in which letter-writers and recipients themselves made sense of the news at the time: the reasons why and the ways in which they selected, understood, presented or mis-represented information. Did they try to turn huge masses of detailed, ephemeral, specific reports into more enduring teachings and ideas? This article suggests a difference between personal letters of (public) news and professional newsletters, and it studies the case of Venetian friar Fulgenzio Micanzio’s letters to William Cavendish, second earl of Devonshire. Written over the period 1615-28, Micanzio’s letters were translated into English for circulation by Thomas Hobbes. Micanzio had extremely broad information covering much of Europe and ranging from the Ottoman Empire and the Middle East to Iberia, but he offered not just news but above all commentary. He elaborated on the events to highlight connections among distant war fronts and countries. He read news in light of classical knowledge and used ancient history to draw conclusions about present-day affairs. He sought to uncover the hidden intentions of actors behind the appearance of their actions. In turn, readers saw his comments as particularly valuable, as we know from marginal annotations, added notes, and possible borrowings from his letters. In particular, the correspondence was known to Francis Bacon and may have informed some of his thinking on European politics and religion at the time of the Thirty Years War.
https://www.routledge.com/The-Renaissance-of-Letters-Knowledge-and-Community-in-Italy-1300-1650/Findlen-Sutherland/p/book/9781138367500
Past and Present, 2019
FREELY AVAILABLE ON P&P WEBSITE. Over the last generation, some of our time’s most momentous conc... more FREELY AVAILABLE ON P&P WEBSITE. Over the last generation, some of our time’s most momentous concerns have transformed the historical study of information in two seemingly opposite directions: the communicational practices that spread the news across specifically located societies; and the media that enabled it to travel at increasing speed over long distances and across continents. Like trade or migration, information is an essential element of global history, both a means and an effect of contacts among distant regions and peoples. Yet a macro approach struggles to explain how information worked on the ground. By contrast, microhistory maximizes the variety of our sources, to take into account both locality and large spaces; it enables us to study how the news travelled as far as it did, why it came to mutate in the process, thanks to whose agency, and with what impact. This article discusses microhistorical approaches to long-distance information, and experiments with one such approach, by analysing in detail one case of how the reports of one event – a naval battle in the Adriatic in 1617 – moved across distances that were vast in both geographical and cultural terms, in the Mediterranean and beyond. Microhistory shows that the movement of information was a transformational process compounded of intensely localized and socially defined activities, by a wide range of people who shaped the news as they relayed it through places that were at once specific and connected. Information was both global and local: its circulation made long distances small, but every small step could make for huge transformations.
Early modern diplomatic negotiation was conducted primarily through face-to-face encounters domin... more Early modern diplomatic negotiation was conducted primarily through face-to-face encounters dominated by the oral medium, generally known as audiences. Yet ambassadors were very keen to take written records of the words spoken by themselves and their counterparts. This article considers the role of oral exchange in diplomatic audiences and the reasons why participants were so interested in recording and filing reports of those exchanges. This article begins with an analysis of diplomatic dispatches, the genre that has attracted most scholarship so far, but then goes on to trace the recording of audiences on the part of hosting sovereigns and their chanceries and secretaries. The article compares three examples: the transcripts of ambassadors’ speeches by fifteenth-century Florentine chancellors, the diaries of papal masters of ceremonies in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and, the most detailed example of audience records, the Esposizioni archive of thousands of ambassadorial speeches, replies and subsequent conversation, assembled by secretaries of the Venetian republic from the mid-sixteenth century onwards. These examples enable us to perceive oral culture in unexpected settings. Moreover, the Venetian case constitutes a typical example of archival transformation: an increase in quantity accompanied by a substantial and conscious improvement in preservation methods and retrieval tools. In order to explain this transformation, this article traces the uses that were intended and made of the records at the time, not just to report on current, but to inform future negotiations.
LIKE BREATHING, WALKING IS AN UNCONSCIOUS ACT that we accomplish without consideration, at least ... more LIKE BREATHING, WALKING IS AN UNCONSCIOUS ACT that we accomplish without consideration, at least as long as we are free to move. We feel our muscles only when we trek a long way; otherwise we just advance one foot after the other, reflexively. Walking is also universal: humans have walked and learned to walk in much the same way since they became erect. And yet cultural critics, anthropologists, and geographers have shown how footwork has meanings and functions that change across space and time. 1 In the modern metropolis, walking has long been associated with intense sensual and intellectual stimulation. At the dawn of the twentieth century, Georg Simmel famously reflected on the psychological effects of crossing busy roads or encountering new environments around every street corner. 2 Later, Walter Benjamin and Michel de Certeau both described walking as a distinctive learning experience. 3 These thinkers have greatly influenced the cultural history of early modern cities, yet walking has attracted relatively little historiographical attention, despite
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/685830?mobileUi=0
Filippo De Vivo, 'La farmacia come luogo di cultura: le spezierie di medicina in Italia', in Mari... more Filippo De Vivo, 'La farmacia come luogo di cultura: le spezierie di medicina in Italia', in Maria Conforti, Andrea Carlino and Antonio Clericuzio, eds., Interpretare e curare. Medicina e salute nel Rinascimento (Roma: Carocci, 2013), pp. 129-42.
In recent years a new historiographical trend has focused on archives as not merely repositories ... more In recent years a new historiographical trend has focused on archives as not merely repositories of sources, but as objects of enquiry in their own right. Their evolving organization and management have been studied especially in so far as they reflect the political presuppositions of the institutions presiding over them. This article welcomes this archival turn and offers an illustration drawn from the famous case study of the Venetian chancery between the fourteenth and the seventeenth century, at a time of substantial developments in the management of archives. However, the article proposes a more inclusive and socially contextualised approach to show that archives were not just tools of power but also sites of economic, social and political conflict. Properly read, the very document at the heart of the institutional view of the Venetian archive as the “heart of the state”, shows that the patrician rulers worried about both the fragility of their archive and the reliability of the notaries in its charge. This perspective helps understanding the exalted late medieval and early modern representation of the archive – a representation that, taken at face value, has continued to inspire histories down to the present day – by throwing light on the practical difficulties of archival practice at the time. The history of archives emerges as a promising field of enquiry precisely in so far as it can shed light both on the history of the state and on the social context in which the state’s actions had to be negotiated.
Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales 68 (2013), pp. 699-728, Sep 2013
In recent years a new historiographical trend has focused on archives as not merely repositories ... more In recent years a new historiographical trend has focused on archives as not merely repositories of sources, but as objects of enquiry in their own right. Their evolving organization and management have been studied especially in so far as they reflect the political presuppositions of the institutions presiding over them. This article welcomes this archival turn and offers an illustration drawn from the famous case study of the Venetian chancery between the fourteenth and the seventeenth century, at a time of substantial developments in the management of archives. However, the article proposes a more inclusive and socially contextualised approach to show that archives were not just tools of power but also sites of economic, social and political conflict. Properly read, the very document at the heart of the institutional view of the Venetian archive as the “heart of the state”, shows that the patrician rulers worried about both the fragility of their archive and the reliability of the notaries in its charge. This perspective helps understanding the exalted late medieval and early modern representation of the archive – a representation that, taken at face value, has continued to inspire histories down to the present day – by throwing light on the practical difficulties of archival practice at the time. The history of archives emerges as a promising field of enquiry precisely in so far as it can shed light both on the history of the state and on the social context in which the state’s actions had to be negotiated.
Massimo Rospocher (ed.), Beyond the Public Sphere. Opinions, Publics, Spaces in Early Modern Europe, Annali dell'Istituto storico italo-germanico in Trento (Bologna and Berlin: Il Mulino and Duncker & Humblot, 2012): 115-36.
Berlin. Tutti i diritti sono riservati. Il fi le può essere utilizzato unicamente ad uso privato ... more Berlin. Tutti i diritti sono riservati. Il fi le può essere utilizzato unicamente ad uso privato e personale, nei termini previsti dalla legge che tutela il diritto d'autore e non può essere caricato in siti internet. BEYOND the public sphere : opinions, publics, spaces in early modern Europe / edited by Massimo Rospocher. -Bologna : Il mulino ; Berlin : Duncker & Humblot, 2012. -303 p., [8] c. di tav. ; 24 cm. -(Annali dell'Istituto storico italo-germanico in Trento. Contributi ; 27 = Jahrbuch des italienischdeutschen historischen Instituts in Trient. Beiträge ; 27) Scritti di vari. -Nell'occh. : Fondazione Bruno Kessler.
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Recent publications by Filippo de Vivo
Books by Filippo de Vivo
Today we take it for granted that communication and politics influence each other through spin-doctoring and media power. What, however, was the use of communication in an age when rulers recognised no political role for their subjects? And what access to political information did those excluded from government have? In answering, this book offers an original reinterpretation of early modern politics. While traditional political historians view events from the windows of government buildings, social historians have taught us to look at history from below. Neither perspective is sufficient in isolation, because even the most secretive oligarchs, ensconced in the Ducal Palace’s most restricted councils, were constantly preoccupied by their vociferous subjects in the squares below. In early modern Venice politics involved the patrician elite with the rest of the population, including women, in a thick web of continuous communication extending from government halls to the barbershops around Rialto.
Su di un piano prettamente sociale si possono comparare queste due realtà? E secondo quali termini? Quali sono, inoltre, le differenze tra il personale delle cancellerie e degli archivi dei regni dell’Italia meridionale, rispetto a quello delle coeve entità istituzionali dell’Italia comunale e delle signorie centro-settentrionali? Si è parlato molto della transizione da un modello nel quale il personale di cancelleria era composto prevalentemente da ufficiali dalla formazione notarile o umanistica, ad un altro caratterizzato piuttosto dalla necessità di trovare funzionari che rispondessero prima di tutto alla richiesta dei governi centrali di avere personale fidato e fedele. L’occasione di questo convegno sarà buona anche per fare il punto su questi temi.
D’altra parte, l’intenzione è quella di usare i documenti stessi per documentare la formazione culturale e gli interessi culturali dei cancellieri: componimenti poetici, piccoli ghirigori sbozzati da segretari annoiati sui margini o sulle carte di guardia dei registri rivelano l’inclinazione culturale e il mondo personale dell’autore.
Journal Special Issues by Filippo de Vivo
Articles by Filippo de Vivo
https://www.routledge.com/The-Renaissance-of-Letters-Knowledge-and-Community-in-Italy-1300-1650/Findlen-Sutherland/p/book/9781138367500
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/685830?mobileUi=0
Today we take it for granted that communication and politics influence each other through spin-doctoring and media power. What, however, was the use of communication in an age when rulers recognised no political role for their subjects? And what access to political information did those excluded from government have? In answering, this book offers an original reinterpretation of early modern politics. While traditional political historians view events from the windows of government buildings, social historians have taught us to look at history from below. Neither perspective is sufficient in isolation, because even the most secretive oligarchs, ensconced in the Ducal Palace’s most restricted councils, were constantly preoccupied by their vociferous subjects in the squares below. In early modern Venice politics involved the patrician elite with the rest of the population, including women, in a thick web of continuous communication extending from government halls to the barbershops around Rialto.
Su di un piano prettamente sociale si possono comparare queste due realtà? E secondo quali termini? Quali sono, inoltre, le differenze tra il personale delle cancellerie e degli archivi dei regni dell’Italia meridionale, rispetto a quello delle coeve entità istituzionali dell’Italia comunale e delle signorie centro-settentrionali? Si è parlato molto della transizione da un modello nel quale il personale di cancelleria era composto prevalentemente da ufficiali dalla formazione notarile o umanistica, ad un altro caratterizzato piuttosto dalla necessità di trovare funzionari che rispondessero prima di tutto alla richiesta dei governi centrali di avere personale fidato e fedele. L’occasione di questo convegno sarà buona anche per fare il punto su questi temi.
D’altra parte, l’intenzione è quella di usare i documenti stessi per documentare la formazione culturale e gli interessi culturali dei cancellieri: componimenti poetici, piccoli ghirigori sbozzati da segretari annoiati sui margini o sulle carte di guardia dei registri rivelano l’inclinazione culturale e il mondo personale dell’autore.
https://www.routledge.com/The-Renaissance-of-Letters-Knowledge-and-Community-in-Italy-1300-1650/Findlen-Sutherland/p/book/9781138367500
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/685830?mobileUi=0
Contents:
Pharmacies and the Inquisition
The Inquisitors of State and the Pharmacy at the Sign of the Sun
Well-Known Meeting Places
A Socially Diverse Clientele
Information and the Apothecaries’ Business"
We hope to uncover cases of unexpected encounters (in terms of participants and information) by using creatively the surviving evidence (e.g. graffiti, architecture, marginalia, sketches, books of secrets, ricordanze, archival records, etc.). In addition we aim to illuminate the ways in which the activities and vocabulary of different spaces permeated multiple disciplines and discourses (e.g. politics, poetry, philosophy, etc.), often generating new ideas.
nell’ambito dei Seminari del Centro di Storia Culturale, diretto dalla Prof. Carlotta Sorba,
Mario Infelise, Filippo De Vivo e Paola Molino discuteranno i due volumi di recente pubblicazione:
F. de Vivo, A. Guidi and A. Silvestri, (eds.), Fonti per la storia degli archivi degliantichi Stati italiani, Roma, 2016.
http://151.12.58.123/dgagaeta/pdf.php?file=Fonti/5815a7df0acdd.pdf
P. Molino, L’Impero di carta. Storia di una biblioteca e di un bibliotecario, Vienna 1575-1608, Roma, 2017.
https://www.viella.it/libro/9788867288885
Modera la discussione Carlotta Sorba