Philip Gavitt
Book Review
Thomas F. Mayer,
The Roman Inquisition on the Stage of
Italy c. 1590-1640. University of Pennsylvania Press (Philadelphia, 2014),
361 pp. ISBN: 978-0-8122-4573-8
1>
This is the middle book of Thomas F. Mayer’s trilogy on the Roman Inquisition,
framed by an initial volume that sets out its structure, function, and
procedures as it developed after the Council of Trent, and a final volume,
published posthumously, that analyzes Galileo’s trial under the light of the
function and purpose of the Roman Inquisition. This middle volume serves as a
bridge between the first and third volumes by examining how the Roman
Inquisition applied its rules and procedures to a number of cases, both famous
and obscure, in three test areas: Naples, Venice, and Florence. Mayer’s main
argument is that even though the course of the Inquisition ran very differently
in each of these three areas, they were united by the overriding political
character of the institution, and in particular, the decreasing importance of
the popes’ own agents and locally-appointed inquisitors, and the increasing
reliance of the papacy on its diplomatic representative, the papal nuncio, to
negotiate the tensions between the papacy’s use of the Inquisition as an extension
of its political power and the interests of local officials in maintaining at
least some form of autonomy and local control.
2>
The argument thus forms a lightly worn apparatus that structures the chapters
and takes care to set out in each case the larger political context of the Inquisition’s
operations. Thus in Naples, the struggle between the papacy and “local”
authorities played out under the shadow of Pope Urban VIII’s (r. 1623-1644) desire
to lighten the heavy hand of Spanish dominion, in particular that of Cardinal
Borja, whom the pope made Archbishop of Seville in hopes that the Tridentine
decrees on episcopal residence would keep
him geographically distant. Although these specific hopes were not to be
realized, Urban VIII succeeded to a degree in excluding Borja and thwarting the
latter’s aims to give the Spanish crown control over the taxation of clergy,
and most importantly, to thwart the Viceroy’s plans to allow the Spanish rather
than the Roman Inquisition to operate in Naples. Urban VIII’s strategies
paradoxically involved strict adherence to rules of procedure while using means
well beyond the scope of the Inquisition itself to conquer the attempts of
local and Spanish authorities to protect and hide defendants and to assert
papal control over the Inquisition. The second chapter then more narrowly focuses
on the case of the natural philosopher, Tommaso Campanella, and in it Mayer
specifically argues that Clement VIII (r. 1592-1605), intent as he had been on
destroying Campanella and bringing him to trial, succeeded only in prolonging
Campanella’s imprisonment. Only when Urban VIII, two popes later, eventually
established much clearer boundaries and lines of authority over the Inquisition
through increasing reliance on the papal nuncio, could the trial of Campanella
finally proceed.
3>
Pope Paul V (r. 1605-1621), who ruled after Clement but before Urban, was more
concerned to establish the authority of the Inquisition in Venice than in
Naples, and the political context of his interactions with Venetian authorities
occurred with the Venetians’ far greater sense of autonomy and open defiance of
the Paul V’s attempts to bring the Inquisition under papal control after the
interdict. Paul V not only had to contend with the close ties among the laymen
who decided whether cases should be referred to the Inquisition, but also with
the independence of the Venetian press, an independence supported vigorously by the Venetian Senate.
4> Chapter 4 takes up the three most prominent cases of the Venetian
Inquisition, those of Giordano Bruno, Cesare Cremonini, and Marcantonio De
Dominis. The Inquisition pursued all three cases with great intensity. Giordano
Bruno’s case was the most well-known, resulting in his being burned at the stake in 1600. Cremonini, the author
of a treatise on the soul, came under the scrutiny of the Inquisition for
denying the immortality of the soul. The Inquisition also was most interested
in whether De Coelo had made any
mention of Galileo. Meanwhile Marcantonio de Dominis attracted the attention of
the Roman Inquisition because of his association with Paolo Sarpi, the flight
to England of De Dominis (and subsequent wish to return to Rome, which was
granted), and for his work on the ecclesiastical republic that argued that
authority within the Church came not from papal monarchy but from the bishops
as representatives. It was Urban VIII who brought him speedily to trial, which
continued even after the defendant’s death. From these prominent cases, as well
as the cases involving Sarpi and the theologians associated with him, Mayer
concludes that the Venetians, through refusing requests for extradition and
losing critical paperwork, could protect its subjects from the Inquisition when
it was so motivated, but could equally give them up, as in the case of Bruno
and De Dominis, whose ideas not even the Venetians could defend, and “both [of whom] could be safely sacrificed in
order to gain the Venetians a little political currency in Rome” (151).
5>
By contrast, the grand dukes of Florence had showed early on their willingness
to cooperate with the Roman Inquisition with the trial and execution of Pietro
Carnesecchi in 1567. The documentary evidence for the overall Florentine
situation is more sparse, except for a very extensive set of documents for the
prosecution of the rulers of Castel del Rio, documents in the Biblioteca
Estense of Modena. These documents concern the prosecution of Rodrigo and
Mariano Alidosi. Although their heresies were quite modest (Rodrigo Alidosi was
said to have denied a belief in demons), the Roman Inquisition took an interest
in these men, who were well protected not only by the Tuscan grand dukes but
who also had connections to the emperor and to the king and queen of France. The
grand dukes succeeded also in prolonging the prosecution of the case, especially
under Pope Paul V, who was scrupulous about procedural legalities. Urban VIII,
once again, was more effective using the same strategy he had used elsewhere,
working through the nuncio on the diplomatic side rather than exclusively
through the use of the powers of the Holy Office. Mayer buttresses his argument
concerning the political nature of the Inquisition by showing that the Holy Office
reacted much more harshly to open defiance and contempt of the Inquisition than
they did to whatever minor heresies to which the Alidosi might have subscribed.
6>
Mayer warns his readers in the introduction that they would be well served to
read the first volume of the trilogy before tackling this second volume, and
certainly those who follow his advice will have a much easier time navigating the procedures and the cast of characters who served as prosecutors,
defendants, local officials, and papal agents. Moreover, there are times that
Mayer took for granted a detailed knowledge of the defendants of the Inquisition that not all readers, unless they are thoroughly immersed in the
field of Inquisition studies, will have.
7>
This slight weakness, however, can be more than forgiven, since not only in
this volume, but in the trilogy as a whole, readers will find the most
authoritative account of the Roman Inquisition available in any language. Mayer’s
immersion in the primary sources is as comprehensive as their survival allows
them to be, and he goes well beyond the recently published and eminently useful
four-volume collection and explication of sources by Leen Spruit and Ugo
Baldini. Moreover, despite the author’s self-described tendency to “go my own
way,” Mayer’s conclusions never stretch the evidence too thin. He is
scrupulously cautious and his narrative overflows with detail. The wry and
ironic wit by which we remember him in person also enliven a work that is
monumental and comprehensive by any standard.
_____
Philip Gavitt is
Professor and former Chair of the Department of History at Saint Louis
University. In 1992 he founded the Saint Louis University Center for Medieval
and Renaissance Studies, and is the author of Charity
and Children in Renaissance Florence: The Ospedale degli Innocenti,
1410-1536 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990) as well as Gender, Honor and Charity in Late
Renaissance Florence (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011). He
is co-editor (with Rebecca Messbarger and Christopher Johns) of Pope Benedict XIV: Art, Science,
Spirituality (Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 2016). He is also working on a
book-length project on religious orders and the early Catholic Reformation.
_____
APPOSITIONS:
Studies in
Renaissance / Early Modern Literature and Culture,
http://appositions.blogspot.com/, ISSN: 1946-1992,
Volume Nine
(2016): Texts & Contexts
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