The University of Leeds

Post-Doc, Italian

About

I was born in Rome, where in 2003 I completed my Ph.D. in the History of Early Modern Europe at "La Sapienza" University. Later I was a Fellow at Villa I Tatti, the Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies (Florence), at the Institut d’Histoire de la Réformation of Geneva, at the Newberry Library of Chicago, and at the Medici Archive Project (Florence). I taught Early Modern History at "La Sapienza" University. I am currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Leeds, where I work within the ERC project "Italian Voices" directed by Prof. Brian Richardson.

In the first years of my career I studied Savonarola and Savonarolism, and in general the circulation of the Savonarolan political and religious legacy in the sixteenth century. I first published the critical edition of "Vulnera diligentis" by Benedetto Luschino (Florence, 2002), a work written by a Dominican friar in the first half of the Cinquecento. In 2006 I published two books: the first one is "L'eremita e il sinodo. Paolo Giustiniani e l'offensiva medicea contro Girolamo Savonarola (1516-1517)" (Florence, 2006), on a Savonarolan controversy at the beginning of the sixteenth century based on unpublished documents. The second one is a revised and enlarged version of my Ph.D. thesis, a monograph entitled "Savonarola in Francia. Circolazione di un'eredità politico-religiosa nella Francia del Cinquecento" (Turin, 2006), published by the Istituto Nazionale di Studi sul Rinascimento. Finally I wrote a more general book, for students and general readers ("Savonarola e il savonarolismo", Bari, 2005), which can be considered to be the conclusion of a research trajectory focused on the figure of Savonarola and on his political and religious legacy. The book has recently been translated into English, and published in 2010 by the Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies of Toronto (Canada) with the title "Savonarola and Savonarolism".

In more recent years I have started working on the political opposition to Cosimo I de’ Medici's Duchy and on the Florentine Republican exiles of the sixteenth century, with particular attention to the different forms of anti-Medicean dissent and the use of politcal violence. My latest book has been published in Florence by Leo S. Olschki in 2011. Entitled "L'assassino del duca. Esilio e morte di Lorenzino de' Medici", it recounts the story of the life and death of Lorenzino de' Medici, the killer of the first Duke of Florence Alessandro de' Medici. Based on new archival documents, it reconstructs the context of political dissent that developed against the sixteenth-century Medici regime, and explores the thick web of international connections that led to Lorenzino's murder.

I have also published many essays and articles in books and journals such as Archivio Storico Italiano, Bibliothéque d'Humanisme et Renaissance, Bruniana & Campanelliana, Memorie Domenicane, Rivista Storica Italiana and La Bibliofilia. During these years, I have given papers in international conferences, including in Los Angeles, Rome, Lyon, Florence, Strasbourg, Venice, Chicago, Lille, Montreal and Valencia.

I am a member of the SISEM (Società Italiana per lo Studio dell’Età Moderna), of the SRS (Society for Renaissance Studies), of the RSA (Renaissance Society of America), and of the Advisory Board of the journal "Memorie Domenicane".

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