Giving his literary works as gifts at the time of the Sack of Rome (1527)

Presentation of a research project as part of the "Jeudis de la Maison Suger", a residents' research seminar.

This session will feature Laura Ciffolillo, who will show how Bembo, Castiglione, and Aretino used their literary works to strengthen their social position and intellectual networks in the context of the Italian Wars and the Sack of Rome in 1527. She will highlight the emergence of a European cultural circulation based on exchange and reciprocity.

The seminar will be held in French.

For 16th-century Italian writers, shaken by the ravages of the “Italian Wars” and the Franco-Habsburg conflict, the use of the paradigm of the gift reflected a desire for ethical and aesthetic renewal in European civilization, following the example of the most eminent classical models (Cicero and Seneca).

The study visit to Maison Suger and research conducted on sources at the BnF made it possible to map the literary gifts of three Italian authors—Bembo, Castiglione, and Aretino—during this period of socio-political tension, particularly in the wake of the tragic events of the Sack of Rome in 1527. For these authors, the material offering of their literary works – in manuscript or printed form – seems to circumvent the difficulties of the ongoing conflicts and, as a tool for self-promotion and social affirmation of the donor, obeys specific social imperatives depending on the social, cultural, and political status of the recipient of the gift and the addressee of the accompanying letter. 

The presentation is structured around three case studies – drawn from the correspondence of each author – which show the initial results of a study on the emergence of an early form of cultural globalization through the offering of literary works and its obligations of reciprocity, as well as the representation of the intellectual networks within which these same exchange practices took place.

Laura Ciffolillo is a doctoral student under contract between Aix-Marseille University and the University of Rome-La Sapienza, co-supervised by the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.

As part of the inter-university program “CIVIS – European Renaissance,” her thesis project focuses on the literary representation of the act of giving in 16th-century literature, based on a selection of case studies from the correspondence and books of letters of three Italian authors of European renown (notably Pietro Bembo, Baldassarre Castiglione, and Pierre l'Arétin).