LORENZO GERI

I appello di settembre 
The next exam will be held on September 8, 2025, according to the following schedule: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zHcTrXqM5TWRfILhvfPtQHmqNbZpuCG1/view?usp=sharing
   
 Programmi 2025/2026

10595491 ITALIAN RENAISSANCE [33537 Global Humanities - Studi umanistici globali L-42 R] - primo semestre
Writing the Self and Writing History in Renaissance Italy.

This course explores the way three eminent figures of the Italian Renaissance (Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, Niccolò Machiavelli, Francesco Guicciardini) wrote about their own life and political experiences in memoirs and historical works. Through the analysis of Piccolomini’s Commentaries, Machiavelli’s Prince and Guicciardini’s Counsels and Reflections the students will have the opportunity to study and discuss many relevant topics such as self-fashioning in the Renaissance, the development of historiography from late XV to early XVI century, the birth of modern political philosophy, the changing attitude towards religion from late Humanism to the first years of the Reformation. The history of cities like Florence and Rome and institutions such as the papacy will also be introduced.
The three masterpieces of the Italian Renaissance (the one by Machiavelli being a true world classic) whose pages will be closely read in class, are deeply connected with the very interesting lives of their authors. Enea Silvio Piccolomini (1405-1465), a trained humanist, became pope after a successful political career; Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) experienced both social rise and fall in the most turbulent years of the Republic of Florence; Francesco Guicciardini (1483-1540) led a significant role in the first phase of the Italian Wars. They all reflected on their own life and experience, adopting three different kinds of memoirs: the Commentaries being an adaptation of Caesar’s Commentarii, the Prince expressing Machiavelli’s ideals and the essence of his political know-how, Counsels and Reflections representing a collection of maxims related to the author’s own life.
These three peculiar memoirs, which were not meant to be published, are deeply connected with other historical works their authors wrote before and after them: Piccolomini’s Historia rerum Frederici III imperatoris and Historia Bohemica, Machiavelli’s Storie fiorentine, Guicciardini’s Storia d’Italia. The analysis of the difference between the way Piccolomini, Machiavelli, and Guicciardini wrote about their experience and about the history of their time will show how complex and fascinating writing the self and writing history could be in the Italian Renaissance.

Primary sources

1. an anthology of texts available on the Google Classroom page of the course (https://classroom.google.com/c/MjE2NTIxOTE5Mzla?cjc=jc5ounsw) and in my Sapienza web page;
2. a choice from Piccolomini’s Commentaries (edited by M. Meserve and M. Simonetta, Cambridge (Ma)-London, 2003-2007) available on the Google Classroom page of the course (https://classroom.google.com/c/MjE2NTIxOTE5Mzla?cjc=jc5ounsw) and in my Sapienza web page;
3. N. MACHIAVELLI, Niccolò, The Prince, with Related Documents. Translated and edited by W. J. Connell. New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2005; reprint 2016
4. F. GUICCIARDINI,  Maxims and reflections, translated by M. Domandi, introduction by N. Rubinstein, Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972 [available on the Google Classroom page of the course: https://classroom.google.com/c/MjE2NTIxOTE5Mzla?cjc=jc5ounsw]

Bibliography 

1. The Cambridge Companion to the Italian Renaissance, ed. by M. Wyatt, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014
2. a choice of essays available on the Google Classroom page of the course (https://classroom.google.com/c/MjE2NTIxOTE5Mzla?cjc=jc5ounsw) and in my Sapienza web page.

http://www.lettere.uniroma1.it/users/lorenzo-geri