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This book brings together for the first time detailed analyses of Tridentine liturgical reform, Counter-Reformation sanctity and the late Renaissance 'revolution' in historical method. Thus it redraws traditional historical boundaries, and offers an original and challenging reappraisal of the relations between Rome and its local Italian churches during the 150 years after the closure of the Council of Trent in 1564. A fundamentally new context is also provided for the work of Cesare Baronio, 'father' of Counter-Reformation historical scholarship, and of his regional counterparts. The examination of the writings of one such local Baronio, Pietro Maria Campi of Piacenza (1569-1649), acts as a focus for this study, which also includes the fullest account yet published of Counter-Reformation canonisation procedure, as well as the first extended scholarly treatment of Ferdinando Ughelli's Italia sacra, together with that work's long-term implications for Italian national history writing. The book further provides a comprehensive survey of Italian local hagiography and ecclesiastical history writing of the period.
List of contents
List of illustrations; Acknowledgements; List of abbreviations; Maps; 1. Introduction; Part I. Liturgy: 2. Reform of liturgy and the reinvention of historia sacra; 3. Hagiography as liturgy in a local context: the ecclesia placentina riformanda; Part II. Sanctity: 4. Early Christian martyr; 5. Aristocratic hermit; 6. Well-born nun; 7. Lay helper of the urban poor; 8. Visionary shepherdess; 9. Saintly pontiff; Part III. History: 10. Historia sacra as redemptor ecclesiarum italicarum; 11. The ecclesiastical roots of national historiography: Ferdinando Ughelli's Italia sacra; Bibliography; Index.
Summary
This book offers a new interpretation of what the Catholic Reform meant at local diocesan level in the face of attempts by Rome to regularise worship c.1550–1700.
