Chronicling history : chroniclers and historians in medieval and Renaissance Italy / edited by Sharon Dale, Alison Williams Lewin, and Duane J. Osheim.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Dale, Sharon, 1951-

Lewin, Alison Williams, 1957-

Osheim, Duane J.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Historiography.

History.

Italy--History--476-1268--Sources.

Italy.

Italy--History--1268-1492--Sources.

Historiography--Italy--History--To 1500.

Physical Description:

xix, 332 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

University Park, Pa. : Pennsylvania State University Press, [2007]

Summary:

Literally thousands of annals, chronicles, and histories were produced in Italy during the Middle Ages, ranging from fragments to polished humanist treatises. This book is composed of a set of case studies exploring the kinds of historical writing most characteristic of the period. We might expect a typical medieval chronicler to be a monk or cleric, but the chroniclers of communal and Renaissance Italy were overwhelmingly secular. Many were jurists or notaries whose professions granted them access to political institutions and public debate. The mix of the anecdotal and the cosmic, of portents and politics, makes these writers so engaging to read. While chroniclers may have had different reasons to write and often very different points of view, they shared the belief that knowing the past might explain the present. Moreover, their audiences usually shared the worldview and civic identity of the historians, so these texts are glimpses into deeper cultural and intellectual contexts.

Contents:

1 Lombard City Annals and the Social and Cultural History of Northern Italy / Edward Coleman 1

2 History Writing in the Twelfth-Century Kingdom of Sicily / Graham A. Loud 29

3 The Genoese Civic Annals: Caffaro and His Continuators / John Dotson 55

4 Salimbene de Adam and the Franciscan Chronicle / Alison Williams Lewin 87

5 The Villani Chronicles / Paula Clarke 113

6 Chronicles and Civic Life in Giovanni Sercambi's Lucca / Duane J. Osheim 145

7 Fourteenth-Century Lombard Chronicles / Sharon Dale 171

8 Venetian History and Patrician Chroniclers / John Melville-Jones 197

9 Chronicles into Legends and Lives: Two Humanist Accounts of the Carrara Dynasty in Padua / Benjamin G. Kohl 223

10 Challenging Chronicles: Leonardo Bruni's History of the Florentine People / Gary Ianziti 249

11 From the Roman Empire to Christian Imperialism: The Work of Flavio Biondo / Nicoletta Pellegrino 273.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [299]-312) and index.

ISBN:

9780271032252

0271032251

OCLC:

124539030