Revista de História (RH) is an evaluation journal QUALIS A1 (History/Interdisciplinary) that publishes articles in Portuguese, English, Spanish and French - unpublished or translated originals - reviews, interviews with historians and critical editions of documentary sources. It also publishes texts from other areas of humanities. It therefore intends to contribute to the qualified debate in the historiographical scope directed to a wider public, in addition to serving as a means of disseminating Brazilian university production.
Universidade de São Paulo. Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas
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Robert Darnton and the Anatomy of Literary Life in Enlightenment France
Review of: DARNTON, Robert. The Writer’s Lot: Culture and Revolution in Eighteenth-Century France. Cambridge, USA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2025, 240 pp.
Copyright (c) 2026 Carla Mary S. Oliveira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The Hellenistic World through the lens of the Esagila priests: the evolution of geographical referents in Babylonian historical texts (4th–2nd centuries BCE)
This article investigates how the integration of Babylon into the Hellenistic world reshaped the worldview of the learned priests of the Esagila temple, the city’s principal institution. Drawing on a Global History perspective and the concept of globality consciousness, it examines how geographical knowledge was articulated in the writings of these temple scholars. Methodologically, the study identifies and categorizes toponyms attested in the historical-literary texts produced within this scholarly milieu. The article is structured into four sections. The first outlines the political context of Hellenistic Babylon. The second discusses the theoretical and methodological framework as well as the sources. The third classifies the toponyms and analyzes their dynamics, with particular attention to the enigmatic reference to the land of Ḫana. The final section reconstructs the main channels of information that enabled such dynamics. The central argument is that Babylon’s incorporation into the Hellenistic world brought about both an expansion and a clearer definition of the priests’ geographical horizons, while the millennia-old toponyms of the local scholarly tradition continued to shape their understanding of Hellenistic geopolitics.
Copyright (c) 2025 Santiago Colombo Reghin https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The public dimension of reason of State. From Giovanni Botero to Paolo Sarpi and Ludovico Zuccolo (1589-1623)
This article will examine the connections that Paolo Sarpi and Ludovico Zuccolo established between reason of state and the public sphere through their writings produced over almost two decades. The public sphere will be examined from two distinct perspectives. Firstly, as a secular and autonomous institutional order, distinct from both ecclesiastical power and the private sphere or household administration. This entailed a critical reception and adaptation of Giovanni Botero’s Della Ragion di Stato (1589) to the legal and institutional reality of the Venetian Republic. Secondly, attention will be paid to the association between reason of state and arcana imperii, in relation to the need to disseminate news and government resolutions amidst the circulation of defamatory pamphlets that undermined the reputation of the Venetian republic in challenging international circumstances, such as the Interdict of 1606-7 and the Thirty Years’ War (1618-48). These circumstances prompt consideration of the potential advantages of mobilising wider sectors of the population excluded from the traditional mechanisms of political participation.
Copyright (c) 2025 Silvina Paula Vidal https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The Prelude of the Thornton Expedition to Brazil: the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the English Atlantic Experience (1574-1609)
This article seeks to elucidate the key elements that led to Robert Thornton’s expedition to Brazil. Organised by Robert Dudley, the expedition departed from the port of Livorno in 1608 and returned the following year, shortly after Grand Duke Ferdinando I de’ Medici’s (r. 1587–1609) death in February. It was the most significant colonial venture undertaken by the Tuscan state. The study aims to move beyond interpreting the expedition solely as a commercial or colonial endeavour of Ferdinando’s. Instead, it is contextualised within the broader political, social, and economic dynamics that had shaped Tuscany since the reign of his brother, Francesco I (r. 1574–1587). Furthermore, it singles out key diplomatic dimensions and the circulation of information, as well as the experiences of English individuals residing in the Grand Duchy – all of which are essential to understanding the expedition’s inception.
Copyright (c) 2025 João Gabriel Covolan Silva https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Plural Modernities, Global Histories:: ARAÚJO, André de Melo LIMA, Luís Filipe Silvério, DORÉ, Andréa, RIBEIRO MACHEL, Marília de Azambuja, RODRIGUES, Rui Luis (org.). A Época Moderna. Petrópolis: Vozes, 2024.
This review critically examines the volume A Época Moderna, organized by André de Melo Araújo, Luís Filipe Silvério Lima, Andréa Doré, Marília de Azambuja Ribeiro Machel, and Rui Luis Rodrigues, published in 2024 by Editora Vozes. Resulting from the collective work of researchers affiliated with the Brazilian Network of Early Modern History Studies (h_moderna), the book offers a reinterpretation of the Early Modern Period (15th to 18th centuries) through a critical, global, and non-Eurocentric historiographical lens. Structured in four sections — structural aspects, global spaces and circulations, cultural transformations, and conflicts and revolutions — the collection connects classical historiographical themes with renewed approaches, incorporating historically marginalized subjects, transcontinental networks, and a plurality of historical experiences. The review highlights the book’s main strengths, especially its commitment to challenging teleological narratives and European centrality, as well as its emphasis on alternative practices and epistemologies. Particularly noteworthy are the chapters on Atlantic and Indian Ocean circulations, Islamic and Asian modernities, critiques of Renaissance humanism and the Enlightenment, and the Atlantic revolutions, all of which contribute significantly to renewing the field of Early Modern History in Brazil. Nonetheless, the review also points out relevant limitations, such as the recurring European focus in some sections, the lack of a more systematic intersectional approach, and uneven empirical and theoretical depth across chapters. Despite these issues, the collection proves to be a valuable resource for both higher education and teacher training, as it combines historiographical and methodological updates with pedagogical concerns. By challenging traditional foundations of modern historiography, A Época Moderna establishes itself as a key reference for rethinking the foundations and multiple expressions of modernity on a global scale.
Copyright (c) 2025 Fabiano Bracht https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
História dos conceitos e modernidade ibero-americana: mudanças, experiência e expectativas
Resenha do livro: FERNÁNDEZ SEBASTIÁN, Javier. História Conceitual no Atlântico Ibérico: linguagens, tempo e revoluções. Tradução Alessandra Gonzales de Carvalho Seixlack, Priscila Sobrinho de Oliveira. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. PUC- Rio; São Paulo: Editora Hucitec, 2023. O livro oferece uma síntese das principais problemáticas da história conceitual apresentando sua aplicação para o caso das sociedades ibero-americanas do final do século XVIII e início do XIX.
Copyright (c) 2025 Eduardo Teixeira de Carvalho Junior https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The memory of Crisis in the Middle Ages: an introduction
This introductory article to the dossier The Memory of Crises in the Middle Ages examines the concept of crisis, focusing on its historiographical and literary remembrance. It examines how crises, such as famines, epidemics and natural disasters, were recorded, interpreted and transmitted in medieval sources. The crisis is presented as an intellectual and historiographical construct, that evolved according to social and political contexts. The article also explores the memory of solutions to crises, and the role of visual and written sources in the shaping this memory. Finally, the article critiques the modern use of the concept of crisis in the analysis of medieval sources, emphasizing the need for an interdisciplinary approach.
Dossier: The memory of Crisis in the Middle Ages
Copyright (c) 2025 Marcelo Cândido, Alexis Wilkin, Pere Benito Monclús, Dominique Castex https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
How to name twenty-first century far right: historiography and politics of time
The electoral victories of Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro have sparked a broad debate on how to define the groups aligned with the right-wing spectrum in the 21st century. In this debate, the different concepts formulated to characterize the phenomenon are linked to a temporal dimension that marks the novelty or recurrence of right-wing behaviors and political positions. In this sense, based on a bibliographical analysis, this article aims to investigate how the concepts of populism, wannabe fascists, post-fascism, new right and extreme right 2.0, in understanding the right in the 21st century, produce certain politics of time. In doing so, we will demonstrate that, rather than delimiting an object, these debates also unfold in a definition of the limits of the present and the past.
Marcus Vinícius Furtado da Silva Oliveira
Copyright (c) 2026 Marcus Vinícius Furtado da Silva Oliveira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Behind the scenes of a workers' newspaper: the challenges of production and circulation of the anarchist press in São Paulo (1901-1935)
This article aims to examine some of the key anarchist periodicals published in the city of São Paulo between 1901 and 1935. The analysis focuses on three main aspects: graphic design (layout), administration (funding and printing), and circulation (distribution networks). Additionally, it explores the role of their creators—referred to here as worker-journalists—in the production of these print materials, highlighting the contentious relationship between these publications and the commercial press. Ultimately, the study seeks to demonstrate that São Paulo’s anarchist press succeeded in developing a unique journalistic framework, whose common features reflect the mobilization of libertarian sympathizers to share experiences and ideals—all driven by the pursuit of a more just, borderless, and egalitarian world.
Copyright (c) 2026 Lucas Thiago Rodarte Alvarenga https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Friedrich Wilhelm Marcellino (c.1830-75), the enslaved Brazilian who promoted the definitive abolition of slavery in Prussia in 1857
Marcellino, an enslaved Brazilian, played a crucial role in the definitive abolition of slavery in Prussia in 1857. When he and his then master, the physician Luiz Ritter, arrived in Berlin from Rio de Janeiro in 1854, the law still allowed a foreigner to retain ownership of an enslaved person during a temporary stay in Prussia. As soon as he arrived in Berlin, Marcellino abandoned his master and fought for his formal liberation in the courtroom. He lost the case in three instances but maintained his freedom. His sensational lawsuit sparked a public debate that, in 1857, resulted in a law that irreversibly abolished all forms of slavery in Prussia. This article addresses Marcellino’s cause célèbre in the historical context of the presence of Africans and people of African descent in German-speaking territories from the 17th to the 19th centuries.
Copyright (c) 2025 Gerhard Seibert https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Settlers, contractors, and partners in coffee farming in southwest Minas Gerais: labor organization in Guaxupé, Muzambinho, and Guaranésia (1869-1930)
From the final decades of the 19th century onward, there was a significant expansion of coffee plantations in the southwestern region of Minas Gerais. Properties that had previously been integrated into internal supply networks, producing food and raising livestock, quickly transformed into important coffee-growing hubs. In this article, we examine the labor systems employed in the productive units of the region—specifically in the municipalities of Guaxupé, Guaranésia, and Muzambinho—between 1869 and 1930. In the first part of the study, using notarized deeds related to the establishment and management of coffee plantations, we identify the labor arrangements implemented. In the second part, we narrow the scale of observation and analyze labor relations, particularly sharecropping, on one of the region’s main estates—Fazenda Nova Floresta.
Copyright (c) 2025 João Lucas Rodrigues, Marcelo Magalhães Godoy https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Between utopia and opposition to absolutism: Sparta’s presence on 17th century English and French literature and political thought
Sparta was a paradigm in both Antiquity and Modernity, exerting a powerful influence on Western thought and culture. In this article, we focus on the use, appropriation and instrumentalization that was made of ancient Sparta in literature and political thought in England and France in the 17th century, especially in England during the Republican period. We observe that, on the one hand, Sparta was invoked as a model and reference by opponents of monarchical absolutism; on the other hand, it served as inspiration for the construction of utopias, idyllic and timeless societies where equality and virtue prevailed among citizens.
Copyright (c) 2025 César Fornis https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Transatlantic flows: the role of Brazilian sugar in shaping Hamburg’s Portuguese-Jewish community, seventeenth century
This article portrays the development of the Portuguese-Jewish community in Hamburg from its origins at the end of the sixteenth century to its decline a century later. It argues that its cultural and religious life was closely linked to the trading cycles of sugar produced in Brazil. To examine the concrete personal and economic connections that existed between the Hanseatic city and northeastern Brazil, it uses biographical, notarial and customs sources. In dialogue with some of the most recent historiographical productions, it defends the contingent character of the economic success of the Portuguese Jews in the Atlantic diaspora.
Copyright (c) 2025 Jorun Poettering https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The worlds of Amerindian slavery and the multidirectional gradient of labor modalities in the Americas in the Early Modern Period
The article discusses the variety of forms of enslavement of Amerindian peoples in the Modern Period, emphasizing the analytical potential of their study to complexify the concept of slavery itself. With this objective, the authors propose the allegory of a multidirectional gradient of forms of slavery, which, in turn, both fits into and unfolds within a broader multidirectional gradient of labor modalities. Two particular phenomena (“de condição” and “a la usanza” slavery) – geographically distant, but both part of the same historical context (mid-seventeenth century southern Chile and Portuguese Amazonia respectively) – serve as a testing ground and demonstration of the proposal.
Copyright (c) 2025 Gustavo Velloso, Carlos Alberto de Moura Ribeiro Zeron https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
1945 - 1964: Democracy under constant dispute
The article presents an analysis that diverges from the prevailing interpretation of the democracy that existed during the Republic of 1946. By investigating the disputes within civil society and considering the political activity of sectors underrepresented in governmental institutions, the study demonstrates that the period was not characterized by the consolidation of the democratic regime, but rather by a constant struggle over the definition of the scope of democracy that should prevail in Brazil. In addition to addressing the link between the turbulent democratization process and the conflict that occurred during the period between dictatorships, the study engages in the debate on the causes of the 1964 coup, offering new arguments to complement the thesis that the Civil-Military Coup aimed to prevent the transition to a democracy with broader participation.
Copyright (c) 2025 David Ricardo Sousa Ribeiro https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Sobre a história, a antropologia e os legados do império em São Tomé e Príncipe
Resenha do livro: SEIBERT, Gerhard. The Wealth of History of the Small African Twin-Island State São Tomé and Príncipe. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2024.
Copyright (c) 2025 Matheus Serva Pereira, Iracema Dulley https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Hagiographies and the memory of crisis: the lifes of John of Réôme (6th century) and Benedict of Aniane (9th century) in comparative analysis
The Vita Iohannis abbatis Reomaensis, written by Jonas of Bobbio in the seventh century, and the Vita Benedicti Anianensis, written by Ardo Smaragdus in the ninth century, have a remarkable similarity in their descriptions of episodes of famine. Based on a comparative analysis of chapters 13 and 7 of the respective vitae, the objective of this article is to discuss the role played by periods of crisis in monastic hagiographic narratives of the Early Middle Ages. Specifically, I will seek to understand how these episodes were described by hagiographers, how they can be used to study periods of crisis, and whether it is possible to speak of a memory of crises in the hagiographic genre.
Copyright (c) 2025 José Francisco Sanches Fonseca https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Canids in Ancient Mesopotamia: new approaches to the study of animal representation in cuneiform sources (3rd- 1st millennium BCE)
This work shall focus on the representation of a specific group of animals, the canids family, in Sumerian and Assyro-Babylonian cuneiform sources. By doing so, I aim to demonstrate that those texts do not really seek to represent the animals themselves, but should be understood as a reflection of how human populations from Mesopotamia conceptualized their own interactions with those species. To such purpose, I shall mobilize different types of textual sources from a wide chronological range, from the end of the 3rd millennium BCE to the Neo-Babylonian period (626-539 BCE). The material shall be studied through a transversal approach, considering both physiological and behavioral characteristics from canids, thus evidencing, thanks to the support of disciplines such as zoology and ethology, how cuneiform texts reflect interactive patterns between those animals and humans populations.
Copyright (c) 2025 Andrea Vilela https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Dialetics of dependence in Antonio Candido's literary historiography (1970-1973)
In “Literatura e subdesenvolvimento” (Literature and Underdevelopment) (1970), Antonio Candido sought to understand, from the crisis of developmentalism, how the situation of “backwardness” in Latin American societies was reflected in the field of culture, especially in literature. Our hypothesis is that, in the essay, underdevelopment is seen as the singular condition of the periphery of capitalism, no longer as a transitory stage of socio-historical evolution based on a notion of linear, progressive and evolutionary time that precedes development. By noting that “backwardness” is not just a force that opposes progress, Candido outlines the dialectic of dependence that shapes the very formation of socio-political life in Latin America.
Copyright (c) 2025 Cairo de Souza Barbosa https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Um Brasil visto do mar? Quatro clássicos da historiografia e do pensamento social e diplomático em nova perspectiva
Lançado, em 2023, pela Topbooks Editora, Mar e Sertão: ensaio sobre o espaço no pensamento brasileiro, do diplomata Luiz Feldman, joga luzes, como já sugere o subtítulo, em uma dimensão pouco explorada da historiografia brasileira, do pensamento social e político, bem como do pensamento diplomático e internacional: a ênfase no espaço em detrimento de considerações estritamente ideológicas, que tradicionalmente marcam os estudos sobre os textos canônicos nos quais o autor instila novo fôlego.
Copyright (c) 2025 Dalton Sanches https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The États Généraux of 1593 and the uncertainties of catholic political semantics
The article analyzes the political debate surrounding the États Généraux of 1593, convened by the Catholic League to elect a Catholic king for France in opposition to the “heretical” Henry of Bourbon. The assembly was held under the pressure of Philip II of Spain, who aspired to crown his daughter, Isabella Clara Eugenia, as queen of France. The examination of the correspondence of the ambassadors sent to Paris makes it possible to identify both the expectations and the practical difficulties of the Spanish project. This corpus is compared with other types of discourses circulating in that context—both oral and written—produced by the intense dispute that followed the sessions. We conclude that the ideological disputes concerning the États Généraux did not stem from dualistic confrontations—French versus Spanish or politiques versus ultracatholics—but rather emerged from a much more complex and ambiguous intellectual framework, expressing the uncertainties of Catholic political semantics in the face of politico-confessional challenges. This explains not only the failure of the assembly, but also its outcome contrary to expectations: the conversion of Bourbon, his coronation as Henry IV, and the subsequent conquest of Paris on March 22, 1594.
Copyright (c) 2025 Marcella Miranda https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The role of public opinion in Juan de Mariana's doctrine of the right of resistance
In his treatise De rege et regis institutione (1599), the Jesuit Juan de Mariana (1536-1624) introduces his doctrine concerning the right of resistance against tyrannical authority. While the appearance of the concept of public opinion in this work has been noted, this study aims to examine to what extent it is possible to speak of such a concept in his writings. This is because the Scholastic author seems to employ the term in a somewhat ambiguous manner. At times, it refers to the opinion of the citizens; on other occasions, it is confused with prestige, admiration, or respect toward the prince; and finally, it is identified with the opinion of a distinguished group of men composed of the clergy and the nobility. To approach the topic, this paper will analyze how Mariana understands what he himself refers to as public opinion in his political treatise De rege et regis institutione and will finally conclude with some discussion regarding whether the concept of public opinion can be said to exist in the work of the author.
Copyright (c) 2025 Lucas Barletti https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Ornamental horticulture in the 19th century: a symbolic language of social distinction in the context of European imperialism
This article aims to elucidate the way in which ornamental horticulture gained centrality in the 19th century among the nobility and wealthy bourgeoisie in European countries that sought to expand their empires overseas, acting as a powerful symbolic language of social distinction. The acquisition of plants considered rare and exotic, mainly from the tropics, combined with the ideals of Romanticism, opened space for the rooting of tastes, behaviors and sensibilities, initially among elite groups who spent veritable fortunes on the purchase and cultivation of species that began to appear in collections, many of which were kept in heated glasshouses on properties located in the countryside or in the city. In this scenario, horticulturists, particularly English, French and Belgian, played a prominent role, because, in addition to financing plant collectors on expeditions to tropical regions overseas and becoming owners of successful commercial establishments, they edited and published specialized magazines that pointed out preferences and celebrated species that were thus sold as highly valued goods.
Copyright (c) 2025 Alessandra El Far https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Women's lives in the medical debate in nineteenth-century Brazil
This article examines the medical theses produced in the Medical Schools of nineteenth-century Brazil that deal with the issue of complicated births and debate which existence should have priority, that of the pregnant woman or the fetus. This debate followed the strategies of power and social prestige of its graduates and the institutionalization of medical practice. The objective is to reflect on the construction of male knowledge about the female body, the basis of which consisted of the definition of sexual differences and the consequent framing of the latter in terms of reproductive capacity and the exercise of motherhood.
Copyright (c) 2025 Luiz Lima Vailati, Karina Aparecida de Lourdes Ferreira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Ambassador mirrors: an iberian comparation, Vera y Figueroa e Silva e Sousa
This article deals with two “ambassador mirrors”, a textual genre common during the modern period, especially during the 17th century. Their general objective was to instruct the king and his ministers on the best form of diplomatic action for the ambassadors. The two chosen texts, published in 1620 and 1656, written by a Spanish and a Portuguese ambassador, respectively, mark a long process of synthesis of the diplomatic knowledge of the period and its uses of the so-called Reason of State. Moving from Christian prudence to the diplomat’s orality, D. Antônio de Vera y Figueroa and D. Antônio da Silva e Sousa were agents of their kings with extensive diplomatic experience both as ambassadors, as well as paths of ascension within the framework of their respective monarchies. And the comparison of his works is a synthesis effort on modern diplomatic knowledge, understanding that the works and the comparison of this article are only a small portion of all knowledge accumulated by modernity.
Copyright (c) 2025 Luciano Cesar da Costa https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Measure and excess. Epidemic impact, memory and images of the Middle Ages
In order to give a description of medieval pathologies, historians have to rely on sources whose records vary greatly according to their type and destination. Their information is rarely linked exclusively to health concerns. How can their impact be assessed in an era in which there are no statistics? The debate begins with two emblematic ‘scourges’ of medieval societies, the plague and the ergotism (holy fire or burning sickness). The analysis of the different documentary forms that may have preserved traces (chronicles, literary, iconographic or artistic works, practical acts, medical, religious or hagiographic texts, accounts of miracles, treatment sites, archaeological data) and their interactions or disjunctions intersects with the question of the representation and memory of epidemics.
Copyright (c) 2025 François-Olivier Touati https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
"The Age of Revolutions," by Fareed Zakaria - A Trick at the Expense of the Living and the Dead
"The Age of Revolutions," by Fareed Zakaria, published in 2024, focuses on the connection between past revolutions (in the Netherlands, England, the United States, and France) and current transformations, which he describes as revolutionary. The author divides history into two traditions: a Dutch and Anglo-Saxon revolutionary tradition that led to liberalism, and another rooted in the French Revolution, which resulted in authoritarian "illiberal" or populist regimes. According to Zakaria, France represents a sort of original sin, whose consequences have shaped contemporary "revolutions." The "birthmark" of French illiberalism is evident in scenarios as diverse as Lenin's Russia, Trump's United States, and contemporary China. The review criticizes the book for its superficiality and omissions – notably the complete disregard of the impact of Caribbean and South American revolutions – and for the dishonest use of historiography referenced throughout the book.
Copyright (c) 2025 Daniel Gomes de Carvalho https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
On the periphery of the Cultural Cold War: the sociological turn of the Congress for Freedom of Culture in Latin America during 1960s
This article analyzes the interaction between the Congress for Cultural Freedom and the community of Latin American sociologists in the 1960s, highlighting the role of the Latin American Institute of International Relations (ILARI), directed by the Belgian Louis Mercier Vega. The text explains why and how ILARI employed “scientific sociology” as a tool to promote its “anti-totalitarian” agenda, and the intellectual outputs of this operation. The article analyzes the correspondence between Mercier, his associates, and sociologists in the region to argue that ILARI’s “sociological turn” relied on the collective work of Latin American sociologists, which promoted the circulation of peripheral intellectual agendas that did not fit into the liberal-conservative model of the CCF.
Copyright (c) 2025 João Marcelo Ehlert Maia https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The register of epidemics in the narrative sources of the Crown of Aragon (later 13th century to end of 16th century)
This article examines a provisional compilation of diverse narrative sources from the western territories of the Crown of Aragon – namely Catalonia, Aragon, Valencia, and Majorca – with the aim of tracing records of epidemics from the late 13th to the 16th century. It analyzes how these episodes are described, specific events are highlighted, and whether there was a deliberate effort to construct a historical memory of plague outbreaks and other diseases.
Copyright (c) 2025 Albert Reixach Sala https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
The narrative of memory as a response to the crisis. The chronicle of Giovanni Villani and the flood of Florence in 1333
In 1333, Florence was flooded by the Arno River. The city experienced days of acute crisis that found in the chronicler Giovanni Villani its main testimony. In the debate surrounding the causes, a rhetorical resource built on two concrete pieces of evidence made irrefutable the general perception that the commune administration had responsibility for the disaster. We intend to analyze the way in which Giovanni Villani records this reaction to the crisis and how his exposition can be understood as a testimony to the conditions for the reaction to the crisis in the city of Florence. In this way, we will discuss how the reaction to the crisis and the risk of crisis is shaped by the tension between present facts, political context and social memory.
Copyright (c) 2025 Neri de Barros Almeida https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0