book publishing and the circulation of information 665
and economic context, it lost its publishing supremacy as well, in this case
to the dynamic expansion of milan.
Censorshipthe historiography of the last few decades has spilled much ink over the
argument of literary censorship as part of a more general interest in systems
of political and cultural control, and in defining church-state relations in
Catholic europe. moreover, in the last decade, the opening of the roman
archive of the Congregation for the doctrine of the faith, whose holdings
include the papers of the holy office and the Congregation of the index,
has given even greater stimulus to such studies.
the first move in this direction belongs to an important article by
antonio rotondò in the early 1970s, which first sketched the outlines of
the problem in modern terms and underlined the influence ecclesiastical
censorship had exerted on italian culture.33 in the same years, Paul f.
grendler published his important study on the roman inquisition and
the Venetian publishing industry in the 16th century, which was one of
the first analytical monographs on the relationship between rome and
Venice with regard to censorship.34 Previously, the prevailing notions had
been mythical constructions of Venetian liberty, with the constant nour-
ishment of a literary tradition going back to the 16th century, and with
such distinguished contributors as Bodin and Voltaire.35 this image was
countered by the contrastingly negative representation proposed during
the 19th century by the french historian Pierre daru in his Histoire de la
République de Venise, first published in 1817. the work took up themes
from the anti-Venetian press campaigns of the 17th century, portraying
the republic as a place of shadows and suspicion governed by an arrogant
and despotic oligarchy, a depiction which had had great influence on the
image of Venice’s history for the entire 19th century.36
33 antonio rotondò, “la censura ecclesiastica e la cultura,” in Storia d’Italia, vol. 5, “i
documenti” (turin, 1973), pp. 1397–1492.
34 grendler, The Roman Inquisition.
35 limiting the citations to a pair of famous exemplars, Jean Bodin celebrated Venetian
liberty in the Colloquium heptaplomeres. two centuries later, Voltaire defined the city
“refuge of liberty.” franco Venturi, “Venise, et par occasion de la liberté,” in alan ryan,
ed., The Idea of Freedom: Essays in Honor of Isaiah Berlin (oxford, 1978), pp. 196–209.
36 Claudio Povolo, “the Creation of Venetian historiography,” in J. martin and d.
romano, eds., Venice Reconsidered: The History and Civilization of an Italian City-State
1297–1797 (Baltimore/london, 2000), pp. 491–519; and mario infelise, “Venezia e il suo