Newsletter of the Centro

New Series, no. 12 - January-March 2006

Edited by Dario Manfredi and Rossana Piccioli

 

 

Activities of the Centro

ª  Mulazzo (Massa-Carrara)

On Saturday January 21 at the Centro Studi Malaspiniani the book Ricordi della Sprugola by Marcello Albani was launched. On this occasion, several projects for 2006 were announced, in particular the commemoration of the 7th centenary of Dante’s visit to Lunigiana and the 5th centenary of the death of Christopher Columbus. 

ª  Mulazzo.  Archive and Museum of the Malaspinas

Six new showcases intended to house temporary exhibitions are being installed in the auditorium of the Centro.

The first documentary exhibition will focus on relations between Europe and America five centuries after the death of Columbus.

 

 News of the World

 

ª  La Spezia

On Friday March 10 2006 at the Accademia Lunigianese di Scienze “G. Capellini,” the book Memorie in onore e ricordo di Cesare Augusto Ambrosi, with contributions from various authors, was launched. The bibliography on the Lunigianese researcher was compiled by Alma Ambrosi, Dario Manfredi and Rossana Piccioli.

 

ª  Australia

News has arrived of preparations for exhibitions celebrating the 4th centenary of the "discovery" (so-called, since the aborigines already knew their land) of Australia. If the Italian authorities had any sense they would ask for our country to be included in those celebrations, since Alexandro Malaspina was the first Italian to visit the Newest World and study it scientifically.

 

Coming Events                                                                                    

 

ª  Madrid – Spain

Next May 10 and 11 the Italian Institute of Culture will organize two study-days devoted to Alexandro Malaspina and Thaddeus Haenke. On this occasion the Italian translation of Alexandro Malaspina's essay on Cervantes' Don Quixote will be launched.  

It is anticipated that next June a volume of essays will be launched which is devoted to Lola Higueras, long-time and much-appreciated technical director of the Museo Naval in Madrid. More detailed news as soon as we know the definitive program. 

 

ª  Pontremoli-Mulazzo

In 1306 Dante Alighieri, exiled from Florence, was given refuge by the Malaspina marquises of Lunigiana. To celebrate the 7th centenary of this event, there will take place, from May 25 to 27, in Pontremoli and Mulazzo, the International Conference “La fama che la vostra casa onora.. La Lunigiana e i Malaspina nella biografia e nell’opera di Dante Alighieri a 700 anni dal soggiorno lunigianese [The fame that honours your house: Lunigiana and the Malaspinas in the life and works of Dante Alighieri 700 years after his visit to Lunigiana] (1306-2006),” organized by the Department of Italian Studies of the University of Verona. The session on May 26 will take place at the Centro di Studi Malaspiniani.

The conference will welcome participant scholars from University College Dublin, the University of Indiana at Bloomington and the Italian Universities of  Bergamo, Bologna, Chieti-Pescara, Milan (Bocconi), Roma (La Sapienza), Perugia, Pisa and Verona. On this occasion will be launched a book reprinting several essays from Vasco Bianchi’s Scritti danteschi e malaspiniani, published on the initiative of the Centro.

 

Publications Received by the Library of the Centro

 

Memorie in onore e ricordo di Cesare Augusto Ambrosi, Accademia Lunigianese di Scienze “Giovanni Capellini”, La Spezia, 2005, 412 pp.

We make particular mention of the pieces by G. Pistarino, Dal medioevo all’età moderna: il Grande Scisma d’Oriente, la caduta di Costantinopoli, la scoperta dell’America (pp. 153-172); A. Soddu, I Malaspina nella Sardegna aragonese e arborense (1323-1365) (pp. 207-228); and E. M. Vecchi, Legami consortili fra i Malaspina e Genova nell’età di Dante (pp. 229-252).

 

Poteri signorili ed enti ecclesiastici dalla Riviera di levante alla Lunigiana, monograph number of the “Giornale Storico della Lunigiana”, LIV (2003), 259 pp.

We make particular mention of the articles by L.J.Bononi, Sulla sepoltura di Spinetta Malaspina “il Grande” (pp.179-184); and A. Soddu, I Malaspina nella Sardegna dei giudici (XII-XIII secolo), pp. 185-208.

 

P. Giannantonio, Dante e la Lunigiana, an extract from Dante e le città dell’esilio, ed. under the aegis of the Centro di Studi Umanistici “Niccolò V” of Castiglione del Terziere, 2006, 46 pp.

 

G.J. Vernon (ed.), Dantis Alighieri legatio pro Franceschino Malaspina; facsimile reprint of the Pisa edition, 1847, under the aegis of the Centro di Studi Umanistici “Niccolò V” of Castiglione del Terziere, 2006, 12 pp.

 

G.L. Maffei (ed.), Ville della Lunigiana storica, Carrara, Cassa di Risparmio di Carrara, 2005, 289 pp.

 

L. Passeggia, Carrara e il mercato della scultura, Carrara, Cassa di Risparmio di Carrara, 2005, 312 pp.

             Contains interesting documentaiton on the sculptors whose works are preserved in France, the United States, Germany, Russia, Poland and Denmark.

 

L.J. Bononi (ed.), Il Convento e la Chiesa dei Padri Serviti della SS. Annunziata di Firenze a Castiglione del Terziere, Bagnone, Comune di Bagnone & al., 2005, 36 pp.

         A most valuaboe edition, as are all those by Bononi.

 

F. Baroni, Il libro murato, Lucca, Maria Pacini Fazzi, 2004, 240 pp. 

This is the second historical novel by this author, and like the first is set in Lunigiana. This time the story takes place in the time of Girolamo Savonarola.

 

U. Dotti, Petrarca a Parma, Edizioni Diabasis, Reggio Emilia 2006, 176 pp.

 

E. Soler Pascual, Algunos apuntes sobre viajeros, clima, catástrofes y enfermedades en el Alicante de los siglos XVIII y XIX, Estr. “Revista de Historia Moderna. Anales de la Universidad de Alicante”, 23 (2005), pp. 109-134.

 

R. Ciccarelli, Storia postale del Dipartimento degli Appennini (1805-1814), Bastogi , Foggia 2004, 136 pp.

 

 Periodicals

 

“Studi Lunigianesi”, XXXIX-XXXV (2004-2005).

Of interest to Malaspinistas is the note, Postilla sul villafranchese Francesco Rossi, by D. Manfredi; Rossi was, in fact, the mayordomo [steward] of the corvette Descubierta, commanded by Alexandro Malaspina.

 

“La Berio. Rivista semestrale di storia locale e di informazioni bibliografiche”, XLV (2005), n. 2.

We make particular mention ot the articles by N. Robotti, 500 anni di fisica nei libri in mostra (pp. 8-46); and S.G. Martelli, Un’antica raccolta di stemmi genovesi donata alla Biblioteca Berio. Divagazioni araldiche (pp. 60-64).

 

“Il Polo. Rivista dell’Istituto Geografico Polare Silvio Zavatti”, LX (2005), n. 3.

We make particular mention of the article by R. Friolo, La moderna veste sedimentologica e giuridica dell’Ultima Thule (pp. 53-65).

 

“Il Polo. Rivista dell’Istituto Geografico Polare Silvio Zavatti”, LX (2005), n. 4.

We make particular mention of the articles:

A. Grillo, Da Parigi alle Svalbard: l’avventura di Léonie d’Aunet (1820-1879) (pp. 29-42).

                   R. Tsubaki, Pehr Kalm e la Storia Naturale del Nord America (pp. 51-54).

 

“Il Cantastorie. Rivista di tradizioni pololari a cura dell’Associazione culturale ‘Il Treppo’”, XLIII (2005), n. 68.

                   Contains a review of the Interregional Festival of the Song of May organized at Montereggio.

 Pedant's Corner 

In this newsletter the Pedant has nothing to say: he lies buried under the snow which has fallen in copious amounts on Mulazzo and all Lunigiana …

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Centro di Studi Malaspiniani “Alessandro Malaspina”

 

Piazza Malaspina, 2  MULAZZO , Massa-Carrara, Italy

Tel. e fax +39.0187.439712

csmalaspiniani@interfree.it