Love and death in Italy of the Renaissance. Cohen T.

In Renaissance Italy, there were courts in which magistrates performed justice over vicious villains. In his book, Thomas Cohen talks about six episodes from the Italian life of the middle of the 16th century, when the Renaissance was retreating under the onslaught of Catholic counter-reformation: each of the chapters tells about the household drama, due to which the life of ordinary Romans suddenly changes. Stories about the forbidden love for the monk-orphan, about the brothers who extort the will from the dying sister, about the depraved papal prosecutor, which is indulging in numerous sins-they are all based on documentary evidence, and their study is based on a thorough analysis of judicial acts stored in the State Archive of Rome. By setting out each episode of his saga with wit and resourcefulness, Cohen at the same time demonstrates the significance of a micro -stroke approach for modern academic research.

In the monograph, the author sets the task that is relevant for today's humanitarian science: to evaluate the extent of the Roman society of the 16th century is regulated by the rules of traditional culture, to determine how the freedom of women from different estates was limited, and to what extent they were limited could resist these restrictions.

Thomas Cohen - historian, Honorary Professor of York University.