A Global Earth in the Classroom: New Voices in the History of Early Modern Education 9004680225, 9789004680227

Table of contents :
Half Title
Series Information
Title Page
Copyright Page
Contents
Notes on Contributors
Introduction: Educational Worlds in the First Globalization
Bibliography
Chapter 1 Credit and Courtesy: Educating the Merchant in Renaissance Milan
1 Basic and Specific Training
2 Cultural Education: Ethics and Aesthetics
3 Core Skills: Interpersonal and Political Skills
4 Conclusion: Civis and Mercator, Creditum and Curialitas between City Microcosm and Global Macrocosm
Bibliography
Chapter 2 Under the Musical Law: Teaching Music to Rule the Earth in Europe, xv–xvi Century
1 The Teaching of Music and the Place of Music in the Scholarship
2 Educating the Teacher: Cantores and Their Training in the Maîtrise
3 Higher Education: Music in University
4 The Court as a Musical Center
5 The Musical Law
6 Music as a Rhetoric Exercise
7 Conclusion
Bibliography
Chapter 3 Jesuit Education in Colonial Brazil, 1549–1759: An Overview
1 Preliminary Observations
2 Beginnings: Pedagogia Brasílica, Improvisation, Experiments, and Disputes
3 “For Mission Purposes”: Rationale for Jesuit Colleges in Colonial Brazil
4 The Consolidation of Jesuit Education in Colonial Brazil
5 Final Remarks
Bibliography
Chapter 4 “For These Parts of Infidels Great Learning Is Not Needed”: Jesuit Education and Pedagogical Responsibilities in the Early Modern Indian Subcontinent
1 Introduction: a General Jesuit View of Education
2 Language as Starting Point
3 Education in the Estado da India
4 Language Learning and Use
5 Educational Responsibilities
6 Race and Native Clergy
Bibliography
Chapter 5 Apology of Human Geography in Daniello Bartoli’s Work
1 Introduction
2 A Moral Reading of World Geography
3 A Geography of Humanity and Its History
4 Bartoli’s Geography in Historical Perspective
Bibliography
Chapter 6 From ‘La Sfera’ to the Atlas: Transformations in the Early Modern Geography Textbooks, 1400–1800
1 At the Origins of Geography Textbooks: ‘La Sfera’ Manuals in Humanist Italy
2 On the Edge of Epistemology: Geography Textbooks between Religion and Pedagogical Needs
3 The Eighteenth Century and the Rise of the Modern Atlas
4 Notes on the Evolution of Geographic and Ethnographic Concepts
5 Conclusion
Ancient Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

A Global Earth in the Classroom

History of Early Modern Educational Thought Editor-​in-​chief Cristiano Casalini (Boston College) Associate Editors Anne Régent-​Susini (Université Sorbonne-​Nouvelle) Christoph Sander (Technische Universität Berlin) Assistant Editors Laura Madella (University of Parma) Giovanni Patriarca (Universität Bayreuth) David Salomoni (University for Foreigners of Siena) Advisory Board Constance Blackwell† (University of London) –​Paul Richard Blum (Loyola University Maryland) –​Philippe Desan (University of Chicago) –​ Mordechai Feingold (California Institute of Technology) –​Paul Grendler (University of Toronto, emeritus) –​Maarten J.F.M. Hoenen (University of Basel, University of Freiburg/​Brsg.) –​Maryanne Horowitz (Occidental College) –​Howard Hotson (Oxford University) –​Richard Kagan (Johns Hopkins University, emeritus) –​Sachiko Kusukawa (Cambridge University) –​ Francesco Mattei (University of Rome iii) –​John W. O’Malley (Georgetown University, emeritus) –​Vladimir Urbánek (Czech Academy of Sciences)

volume 5

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/​hemet

A Global Earth in the Classroom New Voices in the History of Early Modern Education Edited by

David Salomoni

LEIDEN | BOSTON

Cover illustration: William Pemble, A Briefe introduction to geography, containing a description of the grounds, and general part thereof. Very necessary for young students in that science (Oxford, 1669), Marsh’s Library Exhibits, Courtesy of Marsh Library, Dublin, ie. https://​www​.marsh​libr​ary​.ie​/digi​/items​/show​/595​. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Salomoni, David, editor. Title: A global earth in the classroom: new voices in the history of early modern education / Edited by David Salomoni. Description: Leiden ; Boston : Brill, [2024] | Series: History of early modern educational thought, 2542-5536 ; Volume 5 | Includes index. Identifiers: LCCN 2024001579 (print) | LCCN 2024001580 (ebook) | ISBN 9789004680227 (hardback) | ISBN 9789004680234 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Education–History. | Education, Medieval. | Education–History–Europe. | Education and globalization–History. Classification: LCC LA91 .G56 2024 (print) | LCC LA91 (ebook) | DDC 370.9–dc23/eng/20240131 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2024001579 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2024001580

Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: “Brill”. See and download: brill.com/​brill-​typeface. issn 2542-​5 536 isbn 978-​9 0-​0 4-​6 8022-​7 (hardback) isbn 978-​9 0-​0 4-​6 8023-​4 (e-​book) doi 10.1163/​9 789004680234 Copyright 2024 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill nv incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Schöningh, Brill Fink, Brill mentis, Brill Wageningen Academic, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Böhlau and V&R unipress. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Requests for re-​use and/​or translations must be addressed to Koninklijke Brill nv via brill.com or copyright.com. This book is printed on acid-​free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.

Contents  Notes on Contributors vii  Introduction Educational Worlds in the First Globalization 1 David Salomoni 1  Credit and Courtesy Educating the Merchant in Renaissance Milan 10 Federico Piseri 2  Under the Musical Law Teaching Music to Rule the Earth in Europe, xv–​x vi Century 30 Jessica Ottelli 3  Jesuit Education in Colonial Brazil, 1549–​1759 An Overview 47 Carolina Vaz de Carvalho 4  “For These Parts of Infidels Great Learning Is Not Needed” Jesuit Education and Pedagogical Responsibilities in the Early Modern Indian Subcontinent 79 Bradley Blankemeyer 5  Apology of Human Geography in Daniello Bartoli’s Work 110 Laura Madella 6  From ‘La Sfera’ to the Atlas Transformations in the Early Modern Geography Textbooks, 1400–​1800 131 David Salomoni  Index 159

Notes on Contributors Bradley T. Blankemeyer was awarded a Ph.D. from Oxford University in 2020. He is a historian of early modern Europe and South Asia, specializing in religious and cultural history of the Portuguese Empire and the Society of Jesus during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. After a year of adjunct instruction at Belmont Abbey College he is currently teaching secondary-​level Ancient World History and World History at Charlotte Catholic High School, whilst continuing his research as an independent scholar. Laura Madella is an assistant professor in the History of Education at the University of Parma. She holds a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in Italian Literature from the same university and was awarded a Ph.D. in the History of Education from the University of Rome iii in 2018. In 2019 she was awarded a fellowship at the Boston College Institute of Advanced Jesuit Studies where she worked on the Jesuits’ triennial catalogs, which recorded information about every Jesuit since the sixteenth century. Her research concerns texts, documents, narratives of formative contexts and court cultures between sixteenth and seventeenth-​ century Italy, and eighteenth and nineteenth-​century Germany and Europe. Among her recent publications Sull’Alphabeto christiano di Juan de Valdés (2018). Jessica Ottelli is a Ph.D. candidate attending a joint doctoral program at the Universities of Padua, Verona, and Venice. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Cultural Heritage Sciences and a master’s degree in history, both obtained at the University of Milan. Her bachelor dissertation dealt with the musical chapel of the Duke of Milan, while the master’s dissertation was a comparative study on music as a political language in the musical chapels of the dukes of Burgundy and Milan in the second half of the fifteenth century. Her current project focuses on the social mobility of medieval church musicians during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Her research fields embrace cultural history and music history. Federico Piseri is an assistant professor in the History of Education at the University of Sassari, and holds a Ph.D. in Medieval History from the University of Milan. His main

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Notes on Contributors

fields of research are linked to Lombardy in the Sforza age: the Renaissance court as an educational environment, epistolography in the Italian Renaissance, the abacus school between the 15th and 16th centuries. More recently he has begun to investigate the school records in Sardinia in the contemporary age. Among his publications: La formazione del mercante. Scuole, libri, cultura economica a Milano nel Rinascimento (2021) with Giuseppe De Luca and Angela Nuovo, Autografie dell’età minore. Lettere di tre dinastie italiane tra Quattrocento e Cinquecento (2016) with Monica Ferrari and Isabella Lazzarini, Filius et servitor. Evolution of dynastic consciousness in the titles and subscriptions of the Sforza princes’ familiar letters (“The Court Historian,” 2017). David Salomoni is an assistant professor in the History of Education at the University for Foreigners of Siena. For three years (2020–​2023) he was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Lisbon in the framework of the erc project rutter: Making the Earth Global, with which he still collaborates. In 2022 he was awarded a Bernard Berenson Fellowship at the Harvard University Center for Renaissance Studies at Villa I Tatti. His research interests include, but are not limited to, the history of religious teaching orders, geographical literacy in early modern Europe, the impact of exploration on European cultures, and the history of women’s education. In the Brill Series History of Early Modern Educational Thought, he published Educating the Catholic People: Religious Orders and Their Schools in Early Modern Italy (2021). Carolina Vaz de Carvalho is a Ph.D. candidate in Social History at the University of São Paulo-​u sp, Brazil, investigating Early Modern collecting practices, the global circulation of objects, and the formation and uses of the Jesuit Roman College Museum curated by Fr. Athanasius Kircher, 1651–​1680. She received ba s in Museum Studies (2017) and Social Sciences (2011) from the Federal University of Minas Gerais –​ ufmg, Brazil, and is a member of rariorum –​Research Group on the History of Collections and Museums, ufmg, and gehim –​Study group in Iberian Modern History, usp. Since 2019 she has collaborated with the Gregorian Archives Texts Editing Project –​gate, developed by the Historical Archives of the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, Italy.

Introduction

Educational Worlds in the First Globalization David Salomoni The story of this collection of essays begins in Lisbon on February 24, 2022. On that date a seminar was held at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science in the University of Lisbon that brought together the voices of young European and American scholars, all experts in various fields of knowledge. The common denominator that united the speakers and defined the topic of the conference was the focus on the educational and scholastic dimension in the early modern age, which was intended to be approached from diverse perspectives. In this sense, the institutional setting in which the seminar was held is not irrelevant. The Department of History of Science in Lisbon is home to the erc Project Rutter: Making the Earth Global, the sponsor of the conference entitled A Global Earth in the Classroom.1 The focus of the project, led by Prof. Henrique Leitão, is the study of early modern nautical routes, understood as the oldest sources for the understanding and the making of a global history of the world. This introduction is not the proper setting to go into the details of an extremely complex and multifaceted historiographical debate about what is, and whether it is possible, to create a comprehensive and global approach to early modern history.2 This is not the purpose of this volume. Suffice it to say that since 1 The making of this book was supported by the erc-​funded project rutter: Making the Earth Global. I wish to express gratitude to all of those with whom we have had the pleasure to collaborate during this project, especially Prof. Henrique Leitão, whom I thank for his professional and human guidance. Each member of our research team has provided me extensive personal and professional help. The rutter project has received funding from the European Research Council (erc) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No. 833438). 2 The bibliography on this subject is vast. In this regard refer to: Bartolomé Yun-​Casalilla, Os Impérios Ibéricos e a Globalização da Europa (Séculos xv a xvii) (Lisbon: Temas e Debates-​ Circulo de Leitores, 2021); Ivonne del Valle, Anna More, Rachel Sarah O’Toole, eds., Iberian Empires and the Roots of Globalization (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2019); Bethany Aram, Bartolomé Yun-​Casalilla, eds., Global Goods and the Spanish Empire, 1492–​ 1824 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014); Serge Gruzinski, L’Aigle et le Dragon: Démesure européenne et mondialisation au xvie siècle (Paris: Fayard, 2012); Alison Games, The Web of Empire: English Cosmopolitans in an Age of Expansion 1560–​1660 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2024 | DOI:10.1163/9789004680234_002

2 Salomoni the beginning of the Portuguese and then Spanish explorations during the fifteenth century, steady and increasingly large flows of individuals were led along ocean voyages that, at one time, allowed for the experience of the globe as a single unit. For the first time in history people could see the world as an integrated system of natural elements (e.g. flora, fauna, sea currents, winds, and other atmospheric phenomena) as well as anthropic elements, such as the populations encountered on distant continents. In a span of about one century, the Euro-​Mediterranean world became the global world we know today, with regular ocean routes connecting all the known continents. In this context of emergent global consciousness, education played a key role. European explorations and the territorial and colonial expansion achieved by the Old-​World kingdoms led to a slow, but relentless, revolution in the ancient structures of knowledge.3 Within the process of such a rapid expansion of the epistemological categories which had been valid up to that time, the formal and informal structures of knowledge transmission also evolved accordingly, namely schools.4 This is the reason, broadly understood, for the fertility of pedagogical and educational experimentation that took place from the sixteenth century onward. Think of the emergence of the many religious teaching orders or the establishment of the pre-​university collegiate model, or even the rise of new educational literary genres as being also within in this particular historic context.5 Changes in education did not happen only in Europe. The educational programs and institutions that arose during that historical season were exported by missionaries to the far east and far west, namely to Asia and America. In some cases, the encounter with local educational models produced solutions and pedagogical innovations. That is what happened in the Jesuit college of Macau, where the European, Chinese, and Japanese mathematical traditions met.6 There were even schools, such as some Jesuit colleges, think of the College 3 On this topic, a recent a comprehensive essay is: Marco Sgarbi, “Aristotele e il Nuovo Mondo. L’epistemologia delle scoperte geografiche nell’aristotelismo rinascimentale,” Atti e Memorie dell’Accademia Galileiana di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti in Padova, 132 (2021): 61–​87. 4 Cf. Steven J. Harris, “Confession-​Building, Long-​Distance Networks, and the Organization of Jesuit Science,” Early Science and Medicine, Jesuits and the Knowledge of Nature, 1, 3, (1996): 287–​318. 5 Cf. David Salomoni, Educating the Catholic People: Religious Orders and their Schools in Early Modern Italy, 1500–​1800 (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2021). See also Id., and Henrique Leitão, “Schooling the Discoveries. Jesuit Education Between Science and Geographic Literacy in the Age of Iberian Expansion (15th–​18th c.)” [Part 1–​2], Educazione. Giornale di pedagogia critica, x, 1, 2 (2021): 7–​34, and 7–​32. 6 Cf. Ugo Baldini, “The Jesuit College in Macao as a Meeting Point of the European, Chinese and Japanese Mathematical Traditions. Some Remarks on the Present State of Research, Mainly

Introduction: Educational Worlds in the First Globalization

3

of Santo Antão in Lisbon, that were able to produce globality. In fact, all Jesuits heading to or returning from the vast Portuguese empire stopped at that college, where they taught or otherwise shared the vast wealth of knowledge with which they returned.7 However, Renaissance and early modern education, and particularly schooling and its various disciplines, is still little explored in relation to the dynamics of economic, territorial, and cultural expansion that fall under the historiographical label of ‘first’ or ‘early globalization’.8 The subject of the book, thus, will concern school education in Europe, Brazil, and India at the dawn of the first globalization. In this era, broadly conceived between Humanism and the Scientific Revolution, the institutional and intellectual structures responsible for transmitting and producing knowledge in Europe were shaken by profound political, cultural, religious, and economic transformations. During those centuries, the late medieval school world was mainly composed of city and country schools, which were mostly financed by municipal authorities.9 This educational system would be revolutionized in a few decades. In the aftermath of the Protestant Reformation, the Catholic world experienced the great pedagogical experiment carried out by the religious teaching orders, which built a new educational identity that soon spread to the four corners of the world. In the meanwhile, however, the Protestant

Concerning Sources (16th-​17th Centuries),” in The Jesuits, the Padroado and East Asian Science (1552–​1773), eds., Luis Saraiva and Catherine Jami, (London: Worlds Scientific, 2008), 33–​80. 7 On the college of Santo Antão see: Luís de Albuquerque, “A ‘Aula da Esfera’ do Colégio de Santo Antão no século xvii,” Anais da Academia Portuguesa de História, 21 (1972): 337–​391. More recently, in-​depth studies have been conducted by Ugo Baldini, “L’insegnamento della matematica nel Collegio di S. Antão a Lisbona, 1590–​1640,” in A Companhia de Jesus e a Missionação no Oriente (Lisboa, Brotéria, Fundação Oriente, 2000), 275–​310; Id., “As assistências ibéricas da Companhia de Jesus e a actividade científica nas missões asiáticas (1578–​1640): Alguns aspectos culturais e institucionais,” Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, 54 (1998): 195–​245. 8 On this topic see: Liz Jackson, ‘Globalization and Education,’ in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. Published online October 2016; and A. Giddens, The consequences of modernity (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1990); and John W. O’Malley, S.J., “Historical Perspectives on Jesuit Education and Globalization,” in The Jesuits and Globalization: Historical Legacies and Contemporary Challenges, edited by Thomas F. Banchoff and José Casanova (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2016), 147–​168. For recent publication on comparative history of early modern education see: Cristiano Casalini, Edward Choi, and Ayenachew A. Woldegiyorgis, eds., Models and Traditions before Modernities (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2021). 9 Cf. David Salomoni, Scuola maestri e scolari nelle comunità degli stati gonzagheschi e estensi tra il tardo medioevo e la prima età moderna (Rome: Anicia, 2017).

4 Salomoni front created new educational paradigms, too, with important consequences for Western history.10 Recent educational historiography has placed great emphasis on religion, politics, and their impact on the transformations of the sixteenth-​century European school system.11 However, equal attention has not been given to the mechanisms characterizing the first globalization taking place in those decades, whose first promoters were the kingdoms of Portugal and Castile. The European oceanic expansion, which began in the fifteenth century, contributed in a decisive way to redefining the educational importance of the ancient authorities inherited from the Middle Ages, and the encounters with unknown populations and cultures at the antipodes of the world fueled an equally profound anthropological revolution. In this context, the essays contained in this volume offer glimpses of the new educational realities which arose during the Renaissance and the early modern period, both from a geographical point of view and from the perspective of the continuities and ruptures in the teaching of certain disciplines. The volume is ideally divided into three parts, each consisting of two chapters. In the first part, two types of professional education are analyzed: mercantile education and musical education. In both cases, the social, political, and cultural functions of the two professions were representative of the social and cultural changes between the late Middle Ages and early modern times and can be observed. The second part of the books concerns the presence and the educational practices of the Society of Jesus in two vast areas that pertained to the Portuguese colonial empire: India and Brazil. The third and final part deals more in detail with issues of a pedagogical nature. One chapter analyzes the book of the Jesuit Daniello Bartoli: La geografia trasportata al morale, where a moral treatment of geography is combined with the reasons why it is important to learn it. The last chapter deals with the historical evolution of the geography textbook for school use from the late Middle Ages to the threshold of 10 11

Cf. Luana Salvarani, Nova schola. Temi e problemi di pedagogia protestante nei primi testi della Riforma (Rome: Anicia, 2018). A recent important publication on the subject is: Paul Grendler, Humanism, Universities, and Jesuit Education in Late Renaissance Italy (Boston and Leiden: Brill, 2022). More in general all the books and article written by Paul Grendler are significant and represent milestones in the history of early modern education. Among Grendler’s books see in particular: Schooling in Renaissance Italy. Literacy and Learning 1300–​1600 (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989); Id., The Universities of the Italian Renaissance (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002); Id. Renaissance Education Between Religion and Politics (Burlington: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2006).

Introduction: Educational Worlds in the First Globalization

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the contemporary times. The essay analyzes the cultural and epistemological changes of this type of literature. As mentioned above, this is how we are led into the business world of early sixteenth-​century Milan (Chapter 1), to closely observe the merchant’s education at a decisive moment in the history of the city and of Europe. Mercantile activity had long been one of the main factors of European expansion in the world, and the observation of the merchant’s education offers valuable insight into the mentality and civic role of one of the most representative professional categories of this era. This essay shows the reality of Milan, a city that would soon fall under definitive Spanish control. The following essay (Chapter 2), on the borders between the history of professional education, the history of science and the history of philosophy, takes us into the composite reality of music education. This chapter talks to the present time, too, since as we read in the text, even “today’s attempts to develop a ‘theory of everything’, are based on models that derive from metaphors and images reminiscent of the old model of Musica Universalis.” There is no shortage of studies on the subject, but the merit of this essay lies in showing the variety of applications and meanings that music education could take on in the late Middle Ages, both in the religious and secular spheres. The central part of the book (Chapters 3 and 4) places more direct emphasis on the global educational encounters made by Jesuit missionaries. The two geographical areas analyzed pertain to the Portuguese crown, namely Brazil and India. The authors offer broad views of Jesuit educational practices in these contexts, while highlighting crucial aspects. These include the complex relationship with local cultures, questions about the usefulness of schooling on the model of European education, language issues, and also the pedagogical experiments and cultural contaminations that these gave rise to, which enrich and diversify European educational practices. These two areas represented different but equally vital interests of the Portuguese imperial and expansionist project, while for the missionaries, they assumed different meanings.12 India was the cradle of an ancient civilization 12

The literature on the Portuguese Jesuit presence in Asia and Brazil is vast. A recent works is the book by Angelo Cattaneo, Tradurre il mondo. Le missioni, il portoghese e nuovi spazi di lingue connesse nella prima età moderna (Rome, Bulzoni, 2022). See also Liam Matthew Brockey, “Surpassing Sylvester. Jesuit Missionaries and Asian Rulers in the Early Modern Period,” in Encompassing the Globe: Portugal and the World in the 16th and 17th Centuries, eds., Jay A. Levenson, Diogo Ramada Curto, Jack Turner, (Washington D. C.: Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, 2007), 150–​167; Id., “Jesuit Missionaries on the Carreira da Índia in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries: A Selection of Contemporary Sources,” Itinerario, 31, 2 (2007): 111–​132; Id., “Largos caminhos

6 Salomoni which, like the Chinese one, exerted great fascination on the young Jesuits animated by missionary zeal but also by the intellectual fascination for the complex oriental cultures.13 America, in this case, Brazil, was the cradle of a virgin land where new multitudes of individuals, from the perspective of the missionaries, were waiting to receive the new religion. The new American Garden of Eden was seen by many Catholics as compensation for souls lost to the Protestant Reformation. For all these reasons, educational practices and the new center of the post-​Tridentine Catholic identity represented a fundamental tool for implementing the providential design of which the Jesuits felt they were bearers. The third and final part of the book includes chapters dedicated to literary works with educational purposes, both directly and indirectly. In this regard, the book La Geografia trasportata al morale (The Geography Morally Read) written by the Jesuit Daniello Bartoli (Chapter 5), marked a fundamental step for the Catholic baroque literary culture. This work can be considered at the origin of a moral reading of geography that would exert great influence in the modern understanding of the world, especially in the way of teaching geographical subjects in European schools. Bartoli’s Geography can be thus seen as the founding book of what is called today ‘geo-​history’, a concept that gained much favor especially in contemporary pre-​university school systems. The volume was first published in 1664, consisting of “30 chapters, each one devoted to a geographic environment –​be it a region, an island, a sea etc. –​in which the author identifies a physical or historical feature, making of this feature a metaphor of a moral human situation.”14 Although the author himself states that “One should not attempt to find a common thread in the way places are ordered,” the history of this book is a mirror of an evolving geographical culture and its spreading among wider segments of European societies. The moral value attributed to geographical places by Bartoli would be instrumental in the construction of a new worldview, particularly in the educational world. The book served as a geography textbook, since, as it is written, “studying

13 14

e vastos mares Jesuit Missionaries and the journey to China in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,” Bulletin of Portuguese-​Japanese Studies, 1 (2000): 45–​72; Manonmani Restif-​Filliozat, “The Jesuit Contribution to the Geographical Knowledge of India in the Eighteenth Century,” Journal of Jesuit Studies, 6 (2019): 71–​4; Dauril Alden, The Making of an Enterprise. The Society of Jesus in Portugal, Its Empire and Beyond, 1540–​1750 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996). See Liam Matthew Brockey, Journey to the East: The Jesuit Mission to China, 1579–​1724 (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007). The edition of Bartoli’s Geografia used in this chapter is: Daniello Bartoli, La geografia trasportata al morale (Milan: Malatesta, 1664).

Introduction: Educational Worlds in the First Globalization

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geography is equally useful for both the mind and soul, like an easily found and pleasant nourishment which we could take with no effort.”15 The volume concludes with an essay (Chapter 6) on the history of geography textbooks in the early modern age, spanning from the late fifteenth century to the threshold of the nineteenth. Geography textbooks are complex texts that reflect the worldview of a particular era. Within them, we can find feedback not only of a strictly geographical nature but also of an epistemological nature. Geography, as a scholastic discipline, was born from the ashes of the medieval Quadrivium, encompassing several disciplines: geometry, mathematics, astronomy, natural philosophy, and history. These studies, beginning in the sixteenth century, moved beyond the universities, and expanded to other educational institutions. The birth of geography, as an autonomous scholastic discipline, occurred in the aftermath of the first season of European maritime expansion as an intellectual tool that concentrated all the elements useful for understanding a rapidly changing world. These transformations are all contained in the geographic manuals that, from the fifteenth-​century texts on the Sphere based on the work of John Holywood, morphed into the modern methodical atlases and school manuals. This process, of course, spanned centuries, and for a long time, elements of ancient and medieval culture continued to merge with the new theoretical acquisitions.16 A final, but no less important aim of this volume, and of the conference from which it grew, is to unite the voices of young scholars on the topic of the history of education in the early modern age. The international historiographical landscape related to this field of study is vital but still small, and the goal of bringing together diverse opinions and perspectives is promising. This work cannot be called comparative in nature, except perhaps in its central part for the chapters on Jesuit education in Portuguese Brazil and India. However, this remains too narrow a base given the broad nature of the chapters. The perspectives offered by the contributors set up a heterogeneous and diverse panorama, opening new lines of inquiry. The texts help to understand the diversity and richness of the educational worlds of a decisive moment in world history: the moment when new encounters were being constructed and a new way of thinking about reality was being established.

15 See Chapter 5. 16 Cf. David Salomoni, “Il manuale di geografia dal Rinascimento all’età contemporanea. 1. Umanesimo e Riforma cattolica,” Nuova Secondaria, xl, 3 (2022): 66–​70.

8 Salomoni

Bibliography

Albuquerque, Luís de. “A ‘Aula da Esfera’ do Colégio de Santo Antão no século xvii.” Anais da Academia Portuguesa de História, 21 (1972): 337–​391. Alden, Dauril. The Making of an Enterprise. The Society of Jesus in Portugal, Its Empire and Beyond, 1540–​1750. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996. Aram, Bethany; Yun-​Casalilla, Bartolomé, eds. Global Goods and the Spanish Empire, 1492–​1824. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. Baldini, Ugo. “As assistências ibéricas da Companhia de Jesus e a actividade científica nas missões asiáticas (1578–​1640): Alguns aspectos culturais e institucionais.” Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, 54 (1998): 195–​245. Baldini, Ugo. “L’Insegnamento della matematica nel Collegio di S. Antão a Lisbona, 1590–​1640.” In A Companhia de Jesus e a Missionação no Oriente, 275–​310. Lisboa: Brotéria, Fundação Oriente, 2000. Baldini, Ugo. “The Jesuit College in Macao as a Meeting Point of the European, Chinese and Japanese Mathematical Traditions. Some Remarks on the Present State of Research, Mainly Concerning Sources (16th-​17th Centuries).” In The Jesuits, the Padroado and East Asian Science (1552–​1773), edited by Luis Saraiva and Catherine Jami, 33–​80. London: Worlds Scientific, 2008. Brockey, Liam Matthew. “Largos caminhos e vastos mares Jesuit Missionaries and the journey to China in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,” Bulletin of Portuguese-​ Japanese Studies, 1 (2000): 45–​72. Brockey, Liam Matthew. “Jesuit Missionaries on the Carreira da Índia in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries: A Selection of Contemporary Sources.” Itinerario, 31, 2 (2007): 111–​132. Brockey, Liam Matthew. “Surpassing Sylvester. Jesuit Missionaries and Asian Rulers in the Early Modern Period.” In Encompassing the Globe: Portugal and the World in the 16th and 17th Centuries, edited by Jay A. Levenson, Diogo Ramada Curto, Jack Turner, 150–​167. Washington D. C.: Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, 2007. Brockey, Liam Matthew. Journey to the East: The Jesuit Mission to China, 1579–​1724. Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007. Casalini, Cristiano; Choi, Edward; and Woldegiyorgis, Ayenachew A, eds. Education Beyond Europe: Models and Traditions before Modernities. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2021. Cattaneo, Angelo. Tradurre il mondo. Le missioni, il portoghese e nuovi spazi di lingue connesse nella prima età moderna. Rome, Bulzoni, 2022. Games, Alison. The Web of Empire: English Cosmopolitans in an Age of Expansion 1560–​ 1660. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Grendler, Paul. Humanism, Universities, and Jesuit Education in Late Renaissance Italy. Boston and Leiden: Brill, 2022.

Introduction: Educational Worlds in the First Globalization

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Grendler, Paul. Renaissance Education Between Religion and Politics. Burlington: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2006. Grendler, Paul. Schooling in Renaissance Italy. Literacy and Learning 1300–​ 1600. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989. Grendler, Paul. The Universities of the Italian Renaissance. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002. Gruzinski, Serge. L’Aigle et le Dragon: Démesure européenne et mondialisation au xvie siècle. Paris: Fayard, 2012. Harris, Steven J. “Confession-​Building, Long-​Distance Networks, and the Organization of Jesuit Science.” Early Science and Medicine, Jesuits and the Knowledge of Nature, 1, 3, (1996): 287–​318. Leitão, Henrique and Salomoni, David. “Schooling the Discoveries. Jesuit Education Between Science and Geographic Literacy in the Age of Iberian Expansion (15th–​ 18th c.)” [Part 1]. Educazione. Giornale di pedagogia critica, x, 1 (2021): 7–​34. Leitão, Henrique and Salomoni, David. “Schooling the Discoveries. Jesuit Education Between Science and Geographic Literacy in the Age of Iberian Expansion (15th–​ 18th c.)” [Part 2], Educazione. Giornale di pedagogia critica, x, 2 (2021): 7–​32. O’Malley, John W. and Clooney, S.J. “Historical Perspectives on Jesuit Education and Globalization.” In The Jesuits and Globalization: Historical Legacies and Contemporary Challenges, edited by Thomas F. Banchoff and José Casanova, 147–​ 168. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2016. Restif-​Filliozat, Manonmani. “The Jesuit Contribution to the Geographical Knowledge of India in the Eighteenth Century.” Journal of Jesuit Studies, 6 (2019): 71–​4. Salomoni, David. “Il manuale di geografia dal Rinascimento all’età contemporanea. 1. Umanesimo e Riforma cattolica.” Nuova Secondaria, xl, 3 (2022): 66–​70. Salomoni, David. Educating the Catholic People: Religious Orders and their Schools in Early Modern Italy, 1500–​1800. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2021. Salomoni, David. Scuola maestri e scolari nelle comunità degli stati gonzagheschi e estensi tra il tardo medioevo e la prima età moderna. Rome: Anicia, 2017. Salvarani, Luana. Nova schola. Temi e problemi di pedagogia protestante nei primi testi della Riforma. Rome: Anicia, 2018. Sgarbi, Marco. “Aristotele e il Nuovo Mondo. L’epistemologia delle scoperte geografiche nell’aristotelismo rinascimentale.” Atti e Memorie dell’Accademia Galileiana di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti in Padova, 132 (2021): 61–​87. Valle, Ivonne del; More, Anna; O’Toole, Rachel Sarah, eds. Iberian Empires and the Roots of Globalization. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2019. Yun-​Casalilla, Bartolomé. Os Impérios Ibéricos e a Globalização da Europa (Séculos xv a xvii). Lisbon: Temas e Debates-​Circulo de Leitores, 2021.

­c hapter 1

Credit and Courtesy

Educating the Merchant in Renaissance Milan Federico Piseri The education of merchants/​bankers is the subject of a long historiographic tradition that started with Henri Pirenne,1 continued with Armando Spori,2 and is continued by the latest research which involves multidisciplinary perspectives.3 This is because in some areas of Europe, and particularly in northern and central Italy,4 the presence and activity of merchants, a fluid but well-​ established professional category, contributed deeply to shaping the social, political, and economic destinies of villages, municipalities, Signorie, and regional princely and republican states. The medieval and early modern mercator cannot be crystallized into a single social sphere. On the contrary, this profession offered opportunities for social mobility, both upwards and downwards.5 This mobility was made possible by the skills acquired through training during childhood and early youth and across an individual’s life and career. Indeed, the manuals written for merchants of the Renaissance Age encourage what we now call lifelong learning. This paper examines precisely the various skills needed to engage in trading 1 Henri Pirenne, “L’instruction des merchands au Moyen-​âge,” Annales d’histoire économiques et sociale, 1 (1929): 13–​28. 2 Armando Sapori, “La cultura del mercante medievale italiano,” in Gli orizzonti aperti. Profili del mercante medievale, ed. Gabriella Airaldi (Turin: Paravia, 1997), 139–​173, first published in 1937. 3 See Andrea Zanini, “Saperi mercantili e formazione degli operatori economici preindustriali nella recente storiografia,” Storia economica, 9 no. 2–​3 (2006). For an even more up-​to-​date bibliography covering a longer time-​span, see Matteo Morandi, ed., Formare alle professioni. Commercianti e contabili dalle scuole d’abaco ad oggi (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 2013). 4 For a general overview about schooling in Renaissance Italy see Paul F. Grendler, Schooling in Renaissance Italy: Literacy and Learning, 1300–​1600 (Baltimore-​London: John Hopkins University Press, 1989), in particular c­hapter 11, Learning Merchant Skills; about central Italy and the Florentine case, see Robert Black, Education and Society in Florentine Tuscany (Leiden-​Boston: Brill, 2007), in particular Chapter 5, Teachers, schools and pupils in Florence during the fifteenth century. 5 See Lorenzo Tanzini, Sergio Tognetti, eds., La mobilità sociale nel Medioevo. Competenze, conoscenze e saperi tra professioni e ruoli sociali (secc. xii–​x v) (Rome: Viella 2016), in particular the essays by Giuliani Pinto, Isabella Lazzarini and Maria Elena Soldani.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2024 | DOI:10.1163/9789004680234_003

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activity. It does so by focusing on several training manuals and some exemplary careers in the Milan area between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, while also considering broader cultural influences. The skills or competences can be grouped into three main categories: technical, cultural, and transversal. The main sources for this analysis are two texts written by Giovanni Battista and Alessandro Verini, members of a family of Florentine master calligraphers who moved to Milan in the first half of the sixteenth century. Giovanni Battista Verini is the author of Spechio del mercatante (The Merchant’s Mirror), a printed manual preserved in the Kunstbibliothek of the Staatliche Museen in Berlin. Alessandro Verini is the author of Il mercatante (The Merchant), a manuscript preserved in the Biblioteca Trivulziana in Milan (Trivulziana Manuscript 185).6 Other texts from Lombardy and beyond will be used to deepen the insights drawn from these two authors. These include Trivulziana Manuscript 219, which I have already discussed,7 and some reference texts of the time such as the treatise on practical mathematics contained in Pacioli’s Summa.8 The treatise on practical mathematics makes up the Distinctio Nona of Pacioli’s Summa (cc. 150r-​224v) which is “composed of twelve treatises that address all the topics useful for the training of the Renaissance merchant.”9 Trivulziana Manuscript 219, which can be dated to the last quarter of the fifteenth century, is a fairly high-​level algebra handbook, probably written for training by a family of abacus masters, who also owned a school financed by the municipality, the Pirovano.10 Trivulziana manuscript 185 is an interesting hybrid between a textbook and a notebook: it was intended for the study and direct practice of technical and other skills. It contains contributions by several authors’ hands between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries and is an interesting example for a mid-​level education. Its intended user already knows 6

7

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9 10

Both analyzed in Giuseppe De Luca, Angela Nuovo and Federico Piseri, La formazione del mercante. Scuole, libri, cultura economica a Milano nel Rinascimento (Milan: Delfino, 2021). The volume includes a complete edition of the Trivulziana Manuscript 185. For the sake of brevity, in the footnotes these two texts will be referred to simply as Spechio and Mercatante; for the latter manual, in addition to the manuscript folios, the pages of the transcription will be given. See Federico Piseri, “«Qui se incomenza a fare ogni raxone per la raxone de una cossa, zoè per Alcibra». Il percorso educativo di una dinastia di maestri d’abaco nel Manoscritto Trivulziano 219,” Annali di storia dell’educazione e delle istituzioni scolastiche, 24 (2017): 311–​324. Reference edition: Luca Pacioli, Summa de arithmetica, geometria, proportioni et proportionalità, anastatic reprint of the edition by Paganino de Paganini, Venice, 1494 (Parma: Guanda, 1970). For the sake of brevity, Pacioli’s work will be referred to simply as the Summa. Argante Ciocchi, Luca Pacioli e la matematizzazione del sapere nel Rinascimento (Bari: Cacucci, 2003), 220. Piseri, “«Qui se incomenza»,” 311–​324.

12 Piseri how to write, knows basic calculations and must learn the algorithms for solving the most common cases that arise in the trading profession. The Spechio, which preceded the Mercatante, is a more traditional printed textbook, written for a wide and diverse readership. It starts from the basic calculus notions and moves on to exercises linked to mercantile activity, and even some calculation-​ based magic tricks.11 Thus, in the following pages, we will observe through the treatises linked to the Verinis’ school the main steps in the training of the merchants of the time and the basic skills and the technical skills that were taught in greater depth. What is of special interest to us is the transversal competences (core skills) that those teachers wished to impart. Those skills required not only a good technical education but also the shaping of the individual’s demeanour so as to achieve the curialitas (decorum) that was essential to be fully involved in Milan’s social life and build political, friendship and business relations. In our investigation, the Spechio del mercatante by Giovanni Battista Verini, which predated Alessandro Verini’s manuscript by more than a decade, provides the theoretical basis. It is in fact a printed manual designed for self-​study to instruct its reader in absentia; it starts with the nomenclature of numbers and fractions. Alessandro’s manuscript, on the other hand, is more focused on teaching practice: the text is presented as a textbook but soon becomes a repertory of exercises, notes and exempla executed by a student in the mid-​ sixteenth century, then recovered and studied by a succession of owners until at least the mid-​eighteenth century. The first Verini to arrive in Milan from Florence was Giovanni Battista. In the Lombard city, the Tuscan “taught at the same time the abacus, writing and the Tuscan language at the Dogana (Customs Office), near the church of S. Satiro, where his printer, Gottardo dal Ponte, was based.”12 Thus, the teaching provided by Verini’s school was not restricted to the mathematical skills needed to practice trade. The teaching of calligraphy was not limited to the writing of business letters and documents but encompassed the composition of texts that also have aesthetic, and not merely functional, value. This is in a world where autography in letter communication acquires an emotional value beyond its contents.13 Thus, the students trained at this school were provided with the skills for success in the city’s life, starting with the financial profession. 11 12 13

This might be the first printed text about card tricks; see William Kalush, “The First Card Tricks in Print?,” 23 June 2021, accessed 15 February 2022, https://​conjur​inga​rts​.org​/2021​ /06​/the​-first​-card​-tri​cks​-in​-print​/​. De Luca, Nuovo and Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 29. In the letter-​writing culture of the Lombard courts of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, «the letter is a gift and as such must be pleasing to the eye and to reading; therefore it has

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Basic and Specific Training The businesses of the merchants of the 11th and 12th centuries are obviously too extensive to imagine them being run by simple illiterates. The circulation of goods and […] of the money they imply require […] the maintaining correspondence and accounting.14

This shows that at that point in time, reading, writing, and counting had already been essential skills for European merchants and bankers for several centuries. In Renaissance Milan, those skills were taught in both public and private schools. The provision of teaching was quite wide-​ranging and from the mid-​fifteenth century, it also included free teaching.15 Basic teaching, which nowadays we would call primary, was based on the same patterns across grammar schools, abacus schools, and the courts. Manuscripts and prints for princes, nobles, merchants, or clergymen shared a very similar teaching blueprint: the alphabet was given on the first page as a model to be learnt by heart.16 Next came the reading of syllables and last of whole words.17 To be able to use the stand-​alone textbooks and the lessons of the Verinis’ school, it was necessary to fully master reading and writing.

14

15 16

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a material value as well as a content-​related value»; Monica Ferrari, Isabella Lazzarini and Federico Piseri, Autografie dell’età minore. Lettere di tre dinastie italiane tra Quattrocento e Cinquecento (Rome: Viella, 2016), 122. Pirenne, “L’instruction,” 19. “Les affaires des merchands du xie et du xiie siècle sont évidemment trop étendues pour que l’on puisse le concevoir dirigées par de simples illettrés. La circulation des merchandises et […] de l’argent qu’elles supposent exigent […] la tenue d’une corrispondance et celle d’une contabilité.” See Marina Gazzini, “Scuola, libri e cultura nelle confraternite milanesi fra tardo Medioevo e prima Età moderna,” La Bibliofilia 103, no. 3 (2001): 215–​261. Compare, for example, folio 3r of the Liber Iesus written for Massimiliano Ercole Sforza (http://​grafi​chei​ncom​une​.com​une​.mil​ano​.it​/Grafi​cheI​nCom​une​/immag​ine​/Cod​.+​Triv​.+​ 2163,+​c​.+​3r) and folios 34r and 36r of Il mercatante by Alessandro Verini (De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 218–​219): the two documents have the same page arrangement, with the uppercase and lowercase alphabet before a text, which is the Lord’s prayer (Pater noster) in the first document and model letters in the second document. On these manuscripts, see also Monica Ferrari, Lo specchio, la pagina, le cose. Congegni pedagogici tra ieri e oggi (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 2011), 170–​173; Jonathan J.G. Alexander, ed., Grammatica del Donato e Liber Iesus. Due libri per l’educazione di Massimiliano Sforza (Modena: Panini, 2016). On this subject, see Piero Lucchi, “La Santacroce, il Salterio e il Babuino: libri per imparare a leggere nel primo secolo della stampa,” Quaderni storici 13 (1978): 593–​630; Piero Lucchi, “Leggere, scrivere e abaco: l’istruzione elementare agli inizi dell’età moderna,” in Scienze, credenze occulte, livelli di cultura (Florence: Olschki, 1982), 101–​119; Piero Lucchi, “Nuove ricerche sul Babuino: l’uso del sillabario per insegnare a leggere e scrivere a tutti in

14 Piseri The four basic arithmetic operations were already starting to characterise to a greater extent the training of merchants and bankers. In the Verinis’ manuals, these operations obviously occupied the first pages of the Spechio and the Mercatante. In the Mercatante, in line with its dual nature as a handbook and exercise book, Alessandro Verini did not explain the rules for performing the operations but set out addition and subtraction directly in large tables containing exercises already focused on the value relationships between different coins (ducats, lire, soldi, and denari). In this case, too, students were expected to already possess this knowledge. As to their practical execution, these operations were completed in a column by carrying the tens exactly as we do. The student, however, always had to pay attention to the value relationship between the coins, which, unlike today, did not follow the base of ten: one soldo was 12 denari, one lira 20 soldi. Different ways of performing multiplication were taught. In the Spechio del mercatante, we find three different methods:





–​ the in line method, which is equal to column multiplication;18 –​ chessboard (labelled with the Florentine expression per berriquocolo in the handbook): the multiplicand is multiplied by each digit of the multiplier, respecting the tens in the columns, and then resolved through a simpler addition;19 –​ cross-​multiplication: this is described as an inconvenient method that can only be used to multiply two two-​digit numbers.20

On the other hand, division is taught using two different methods:

18 19 20

–​ in column: this method is only useful if the divisor is a number from 2 to 12, you divide the digits of the dividend by the divisor, carrying the remainder as we do today. –​ galley division (per galea): this was the method used in the case of larger divisors, from the point of view of the calculation algorithm it is no different from the method we use, but its visual layout, elegant

lingua volgare (sec. xv–​x vi),” in Lesen und Schreiben in Europa, 1500–​1900: vergleichende Perspektiven, edited by Alfred Messerli, Roger Chartier (Basel: Schwabe & Co., 2000), 201–​34. Spechio, cc. 10v–​12r. Ibid, cc. 12v–​14v. Ibid, cc. 14v–​15r.

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but often confusing, and the tendency to “simplify” in many easier operations often leads to error. For teaching purposes, Alessandro’s Mercatante chose the methods that best fit each situation: the chessboard method for multiplication and the galley method for division. This knowledge was necessary to tackle the exercises (raxones, reasons) which had a narrative part reproducing for students’ lifelike trading situations. To solve these problems, one must always use the rule of three, i.e. be able to multiply and divide with ease. There is no real development in terms of complexity from the point of view of the solving algorithm or the rules applied. The difficulty increases in proportion to the value of the numbers and the complexity of the proposed situations: higher values imply greater difficulties in operations, particularly in divisions, when the narrative part of the exercise concerns the allocation of a company’s profits, the company structure (number of shareholders, shareholding quota) determines the degree of difficulty of the exercise. In the two Verinis’ manuals, we do not find exercises or lessons on advanced algebra, and we only find some basic elements of geometry in the margins of some folios.21 The only exercise that we can define as geometry in the Mercatante concerns the calculation of the surface area of a field and is introduced by the list that correlates land measurements to the Milanese usage.22 The approach to the subject is eminently practical. After all, more advanced algebra (e.g. the rules for solving second-​degree equations) and geometry taught through the study of theorems were not always covered in the handbooks for merchants. These handbooks typically focused on the skills needed to carry out the practical tasks of trade and finance. To better assess the limitations of the training offered by the Mercatante, we can compare it to a more advanced handbook written a few decades earlier, Trivulziana 219. This opens precisely with the rules for solving equations, those dealt with in the fifteenth and final book of Fibonacci’s Liber Abbaci: Rules on geometric proportions. Matters of algebra and almuchabala. While “the author of the Trivulziana 219 […] addressed a reader that intended to move beyond the boundaries of mathematics for merchants,”23 Verini had no such ambition; on the other hand, alongside a good knowledge of the algorithms for solving the most common 21

22 23

Mercatante, cc. 10v, 16v, and 23v, respectively: parallel and orthogonal lines; line, angles, and plane figures; point, line, angles, solids, area, and volume, without any explanation of how to calculate them; De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 170, 181–​ 182, 193. Mercatante, cc. 31v-​32r; De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 206–​208. Piseri, “«Qui se incomenza»,” 320.

16 Piseri problems, he provided models of letters, complete with a dictionary of abbreviations,24 and an anthology of poetic texts. Knowledge of writing was as essential as mathematical knowledge. In the third Libro di famiglia, dedicated to economic affairs, Leon Battista Alberti has Giannozzo declare: “Benedetto Alberti, who was very prudent about everything that matters on earth and in ruling the republic, but also very wise about private and public customs, used to say that it was a good thing for a merchant to always have ink-​dyed hands.”25 A trade-​based society had to produce a large amount of accounting, documentary records, epistolary and narrative documents. The distinctio nona of Pacioli’s Summa de arithmetica, geometria, proportioni et proportionalità devotes ample space to the production of documentary and non-​documentary writings related to the practice of trading: the diary, the journal and the ledger.26 These documents also needed to be authenticated,27 a procedure for which, in the last centuries of the Middle Ages, merchants/​ bankers gradually became independent of notaries. Public trust (Pubblica fides)28 was one aspect of a broader meaning of trust that characterised the figure of the merchant and was linked to his ability to grant and obtain credit. As Federico Melis notes, “the affirmation of trust had consequences for the operational practice” of merchants.29 Managing a company also required communication, and the exchange of letters was the most widely used and shared medium not only in the trading sphere. It was essential for a merchant to know how to adapt his writing according to the recipient and to maintain a dense network of correspondence. 24 25

Mercatante, cc. 32v–​33v; De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 208–​217. Leon Battista Alberti, I libri della famiglia, edited by Ruggiero Romano, Alberto Tenenti, Francesco Furlan (Torino: Einaudi, 1994), 218: «Dicea messer Benedetto Alberti, uomo non solo in maggiori cose della terra, in reggere la repubblica prudentissimo, ma in ogni uso civile e privato savissimo, ch’egli stava così bene al mercatante sempre avere le mani tinte d’inchiostro». 26 «Each type of document has different functions, methods and times of compilation, but all must contain the same information on the trade carried out, so as to enable accurate and rapid verification by means of a series of matching entries that make it possible to retrieve the items in each register»; Federico Piseri, “«Vol più ponti a fare uno mercatante che un dottore de leggi». La professionalizzazione del mercante-​rationator nel Rinascimento italiano,” La Scuola Classica di Cremona. Annuario dell’Associazione ex alunni del Liceo-​Ginnasio “D. Manin,” 20 (2012): 226. 27 Pacioli, Summa, c. 200v. 28 Marta Calleri and Dino Puncuh, “Il documento commerciale in area mediterranea,” in Libri, documenti, epigrafi medievali: possibilità di studi comparativi, (Spoleto: Centro Italiano di Studi sull’Alto Medioevo, 2002) 273–​376. 29 Federigo Melis, Documenti per la storia economica dei secoli xiii–​x vi (Firenze: Olschki, 1972), 24.

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Leon Battista Alberti provides a model in the figure of Adovardo Alberti: “You, Adovardo, […] I see you writing all day long, sending cards to Bruges, Barcelona, London, Avignon, Rhodes, Geneva, and receiving letters from countless places, and answering to countless persons over and over.”30 In the Summa, Pacioli also recalls that incoming letters must be preserved and, with outgoing ones, must be recorded in a special register and also explains how to organise the archive:31 “the order of the writings is thus transformed into the order of the work space, a space governed by a logic that the author wants to be rigorous and efficient.”32 A visual representation of this space is given by Matthäus Schwarz’s Libro dei costumi, in which the author depicts himself, together with Jakob Fugger, in a workspace having in the background a cabinet with drawers where documents were filed by city of origin, with an open ledger on the desk, and already registered documents on the floor.33 As will be seen below, being able to maintain a network of correspondence produced benefits outside the business world and, like every aspect of a training process, reverberated beyond the mere educational objective. 2

Cultural Education: Ethics and Aesthetics

One of the special features of Alessandro Verini’s Mercatante is his use of poems. Note in particular the poem on the rule of three to aid memorisation of the algorithm, which he borrowed from Giovanni Sfortunati da Siena’s Nuovo lume, one of the main sources for Niccolò Tartaglia’s General trattato di numeri et misure:34

30 Alberti, I libri della famiglia, 78: “Ma tu, Adovardo, […] tutto il dì ti veggo scrivere, mandare fanti a Bruggia, a Barzalona, a Londra, a Vignone, a Rodi, a Ginevra, e d’infiniti luoghi ricevere lettere, e ad infinite persone al continuo rispondere.” 31 Pacioli, Summa, c. 209. 32 Piseri, “«Vol più ponti a fare uno mercatante che un dottore de leggi»,” 230. 33 Matthäus Schwarz, Trachtenbuch, c. 17v: https://​gall​ica​.bnf​.fr​/ark:​/12148​/btv​1b10​0202​ 683​/f46​.item​.r=​Matth​aus%20Schw​arz​. 34 See Veronica Gavagna, “L’insegnamento dell’aritmetica nel “General trattato” di Niccolò Tartaglia,” in Atti della giornata di studio in memoria di Niccolò Tartaglia nel 450° anniversario della sua morte 13 dicembre 1557–​2007, edited by Pierluigi Pizzamiglio, Supplemento ai Commentari dell’Ateneo di Brescia (2007). More generally, see the chapter by Angela Nuovo, Editoria e matematica pratica: un percorso (1478–​1550), in De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 52–​111.

18 Piseri Soneto sopra la regula del 3

Sonnet about the Rule of the Three

Se chiaschuna ragion, vorai ben fare Per regula del tre così farai Imprimamente dei multiplicare Quello che voi sapere e non lo sai Per la cosa non simela dei notare Questa multiplication, poi partirai Per l’altra simile e questo avenimento Di quel che voi sapere è il valimento35

If you want to solve each exercise well You have to do it this way, with the Rule of the Three First you have to multiply What you want to know and you don’t For the different thing, you must then note This multiplication, then you will Divide the one alike for this result And this is the value of what you want to know

While poems have long been a standard in the teaching of mathematics, in this handbook we find, in between exercises, nonsense rhymes (frottole), octave rhymes, and sonnets. The presence of some widely circulated rhymes, intended to be set to music and printed in large print runs such as nonsense rhymes, shows that Verini was well aware of an important aspect: ensuring the pleasure of learning. Entertaining oneself with verse was a cultured game that gentlemen from any walk of life were expected to master. It was a cultured and elegant pastime, as the following amusing verses illustrate: Io non fallo e sono colpato Se falasi che saria Sole invidia e gilosia Me son sempre gonte a lato […] Se vo pian con gli ochi basi Detto vien che sono altiero, e se li alzi e frezo i pasi Dicen poi che son ligiero E se sto sopra pensiero Son da pazo diligiato36

I’m not wrong and I am guilty What if I’m wrong Only envy and jealousy Were always on my side […] If I walk shoegazing It is said that I’m haughty, and if I rise them and speed up it is said that I’m flippant And if I’m thoughtless I am mocked as mad

Among the prose models proposed by Alessandro in the last pages of the manuscript we find a short excerpt from Laura Terracina’s Discorso sopra i primi canti d’Orlando Furioso published by Gabriele Giolito in 1549: “the reference to the Furioso is significant because it indicates once again that the Verini project aims at a “courtly” education of the pupil.”37 Moreover, the octave rhyme, in 35 36 37

Mercatante, c. 15v; De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 179. Mercatante, c. 2v; De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 156. De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 123.

19

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which Orlando Furioso is composed, is the metre of most of the poems in the Mercatante. The works are by various authors but certainly the most cited is Giovanni Battista Verini. This is a strategy to reaffirm the value of the school’s educational project. Thus, Giovanni Battista became not only a master of calligraphy and the abacus, but also a poet and master of taste and courtly customs. Sonetto di Giovanbattista Verino

Sonnet38 by Giovanbattista Verino

S’io dissi donna mai contra il tuo honore Woman, if I ever said something against your honour Che a mille pezzi sia tutto tagliato Shall I be cut in a thousand pieces Si dissi mai che mi s’abruce il core E sia da lupi et cani devorato

If I ever said that my heart burns Shall it be eaten by wolves and dogs

S’el dissi mai che con ira e furore Sia come uno sasino vivo squartato

If I ever said something with anger and fury Shall I be quartered like an assassin

E s’io nol dissi che per la [m]‌ia gratia Faccia tua crudeltà mia voglia satia39

If I ever said something but for my grace Shall your cruelty satisfy my desire.

The inclusion of love poems or light-​hearted poems served not only to lighten the lesson. I believe, however, that it was not aimed specifically at literary education, but more generally at an education in polite manners that was expected of those participating in the social context, not necessarily that of the elite, of sixteenth-​century Milan. Indeed, merchants had long played a key role not only in the economic life but also in the political and administrative life of the Milan State under the Visconti,40 in the years of the Ambrosian Republic,41 in the Sforza era,42 and then in the Spanish era.43 It was indeed a banker, Pigello Portinari, who played

38 39 40

41 42 43

Mercatante, c. 5v; De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 162. It is actually an octava rima, not a sonnet. Patrizia Mainoni, “La politica economica di Filippo Maria Visconti: i traffici, l’Universitas mercatorum, le manifatture tessili e la moneta,” in Il ducato di Filippo Maria Visconti, 1412–​1447. Economia, politica, cultura, edited by Maria Nadia Covini and Federica Cengarle (Florence: Firenze University Press, 2015). Beatrice Del Bo, “Élite bancaria a Milano a metà del Quattrocento: prime note,” Quaderni/​ Cahiers del Centro studi sui Lombardi, sul credito e sulla banca, 1 (2007), 155–​187; Ead., Banca e politica a Milano a metà Quattrocento (Rome: Viella, 2010). Federico Piseri, Pro necessitatibus nostris. Lo Stato sforzesco, gli operatori economici delle città del dominio e i prestatori esterni (Pavia: Pavia University Press, 2016). Giuseppe De Luca, Commercio del denaro e crescita economica a Milano tra Cinque e Seicento (Milan: Il Polifilo, 1996).

20 Piseri a key role in consolidating Francesco Sforza’s power in the Duchy conquered in 1450. Portinari, as well as being a capable administrator, was a man of taste, as evidenced by the iconography of his funerary chapel in Sant’Eustorgio.44 During the Italian Renaissance, a banker aiming to reach prestigious positions in business and politics had to master a shared aesthetic “grammar” which had to be part of his education. The teaching of mathematics already partially incorporated this knowledge, according to Michael Baxandall: Quattrocento education laid exceptional value on certain mathematical skills, on gauging and the Rule of Three. These people did not know more mathematics than we do: most of them knew less than most of us. But they knew their specialized area absolutely, used it in important matters more often than we do, played games and jokes with it […] it was a relatively much larger part of their formal intellectual equipment. This specialization constituted a disposition to address visual experience, in or out of pictures, in special ways: to attend to the structure of complex forms as combinations of regular geometrical bodies and as intervals comprehensible in series. There is a continuity between the mathematical skills used by commercial people and those used by the painter to produce the pictorial proportion.45 The area of cultural education could also encompass professional ethics. In his Summa, Pacioli provided some main references on the permissibility of exchange in the Scholasticism of previous centuries: Now, all the exchanges of this kind are called minor or common exchange by the Sacred Doctors in their summae, as hostiense,46 Monaldo, 47

44 45 46 47

Joanne Gitlin Bernstein, “A Florentine Patron in Milan: Pigello and the Portinari Chapel,” Florence and Milan: Comparisons and Relations: Acts of Two Conferences at Villa I Tatti in 1982–​1984 edited by S. Bertelli, N. Rubinstein, C.H. Smyth, (Florence: La Nuova Italia, 1989). Michael Baxandall, Painting and Experience in Fifteenth Century Italy. A Primier in the Social History of Pictorial Style (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978), 101–​102. Enrico da Susa, known as “l’Ostiense” (1210–​1271), teacher of Canon Law in Paris and in England. Kenneth Pannington, “Enrico da Susa, detto l’Ostiense,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 42, ad vocem (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1993). Monaldo da Capodistria, 13th century Minorite canonist; cfr. Paolo Evangelisti, “Monaldo da Capodistria,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 75, ad vocem (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 2011).

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Raimondo,48 Astesano from Asti,49 the Florentine Archibishop50 in his 2nd and 3rd part, and Saint Thomas Aquinas in his 2nd in the 77th question, article 4th.51 And then our sacred doctor Richard Middleton52 in the 4th of the Sententiae: from them I deduce the following sentence. Discussing about the lawfulness of this exchange they conclude it is: especially when is common for those who keep a bank and work and have expanses to provide services. What they gain from the money they loan you is worth the struggle and the expenses, then it is lawful and permitted.53 Thus, professional ethics was not a secondary aspect, therefore, in the training of a merchant/​banker. As Raymond De Roover writes:

48

Raymond of Penyafort, Catalan Dominican friar of the 13th century, author of a Summa de casibus poenitentiae. 49 Astesano da Asti was a Franciscan theologian who lived between the 13th and 14th centuries, author of the Summa de casibus conscientiae, a work based on the model Summa by Raymond of Penyafort; see Roberto Abbondanza, “Astesano da Asti,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 4, ad vocem (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1962). 50 Antonino Pierozzi (1389–​1456), Dominican and Archbishop of Florence from 1456, author of a Summa Theologiae and a Summa confessionalis; Arnaldo D’Addario, “Antonino Pierozzi,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 3, ad vocem (Rome: Istituto dell’Enciclopedia Italiana, 1961). 51 The quoted passage is taken from the Summa theologiae; quaestio 77 of the secunda pars secundae partis introduces the discussion of fraud that can occur in trade, while the following quaestio directly addresses usury. In a passage in this section, the theologian explains how a contract between merchants, not involving the transfer of money, but only an investment, can allow lawful income for the lender: «ad quintum dicendum quod ille qui mutuat percuniam transfert dominium pecuniae in eum cui mutuat. Unde ille cui pecunia mutuatur sub suo periculo tenet eam, et tenetur integre restituere. Unde non debet amplius exigere ille qui mutuavit. Sed ille qui committit pecuniam suam vel mercatori vel artifici per modum societatis cuiusdam, non transfert dominium pecuniae suae in illum, sed remanet eius, ita quod cum periculo ipsius mercator de ea negotiatur vel artifex operatur. Et ideo licite potest partem lucri inde provenientis expetere, tanquam de re sua» (iia–​i iae q. 78 a. 2 ad 5). 52 Richard Middleton, a 13th-​century Franciscan theologian, studied at Oxford and in Paris, where he taught Theology in 1284 and 1287 before becoming Superior of the Province of France a few years later. 53 Pacioli, Summa, c. 168v: «E ancora el nostro sacro doctore Ricardo de Miedia villa nel quarto dele sententie: dali quali in substantia cavo la sentenza che qui diremo: Inquirendo questi de tal cambio s’el sia lecito o non, concludano che sì: maxime quando sia usitato per quelli che aciò sono usitati tenere el banco e che anno fatica e spessa per star al tuo servigio. E quel più che de loro prendano o veo meno che dele monete che danno li fia computato in suo sudore e spesa, sì che sia licito e permesso».

22 Piseri It would be erroneous to believe that the usury doctrine was simply disregarded and had scarcely any effect on banking practices: On the contrary, as the available evidence proves, it exerted an enormous influence. First of all, the need for evading the usury prohibition, by legitimate means if possible, affected the entire structure of medieval banking.54 Scattered in the Milanese treatises related to the abacus, we find some references to this spiritual need of the merchants’ world. For example, in a margin of the Trivulziana Manuscript 219, we find an explicit reference to Psalm 51 [50], Miserere: “Domine, labia mea aperies, et os meum annuntiabit laudem.”55 In Alessandro Verini’s Mercatante, on the other hand, we find a drawing depicting Adam, in sixteenth-​century dress, in the act of plucking the fruit from the tree of good and evil. A reference to a penitential psalm in an algebra textbook and a reference to original sin in the manuscript of the Verini school support De Roover’s assertion about the influence that the ethics of financial activity had on the lives of those involved. Obviously, knowledge of the laws of cities and states, as well as moral laws, must also be read from the perspective of circumventing them: “Florentine merchants falsified their books in order to evade the catasto.”56 As is well known, even the Medici, who had to remain, to safeguard their public image, the main taxpayers, hid part of their earnings from the catasto.57 The significant, at times pivotal, role that merchants acquired in the political, economic and cultural life of the great regional states of the Italian Renaissance meant that excelling in trade also required skills beyond those taught in school. These transversal skills could not be taught except through the transmission of an attitude, which however always started from the technical and basic knowledge taught in schools. 3

Core Skills: Interpersonal and Political Skills

The Verinis wanted their students to internalise certain ethical and aesthetic canons that would be essential for life in the city’s society. The set of values, 54 55 56 57

Raymond De Roover, The Rise and Decline of the Medici Bank. 1397–​1494 (Cambridge Ma., London: Harvard University Press, 1963), 10. Cod. Triv. 219, c. 4r; “Thou shalt open my lips, O Lord: and my mouth shall shew [show] Thy praise”; see Piseri, “«Qui se incomenza»,” 321. Piseri, “«Qui se incomenza»,” 25. Piseri, “«Qui se incomenza»,” 74.

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taste, customs, and behaviors that governed civilized living in the last centuries of the Middle Ages was known as courtesy. It was necessary for those wanting to excel in this context to be able to appreciate and understand art and literature on several levels. On the other hand, abacus training was not exclusive to the city’s merchants, “but open to the training of a wide range of citizens, including future clerks –​and officials not necessarily linked to the professions of commerce and finance.”58 According to Baxandall, mathematics was part of the social life of the Renaissance elites, so it was good for a gentleman to be able to impress with a game of mathematical skill. This type of game found its way into the Verinis’ manuals. Indeed, the fourth and last book of Giovanni Battista’s Spechio deals precisely with Giuochi di memoria colle carte per forza di numeri bellissimi et artifitiosi (Memory games with cards using beautiful and sophisticated numbers). The games proposed involved the practical application of the mathematical skills learned, as did the exercises simulating the allocation of a company’s profits in Alessandro Verini’s manuscript. However, these games concerned personal and not necessarily professional relations. In the Milan of the Sforza era, the heart of the social and political life of the duchy was the court of the dukes, a complex organism made up of various circles enjoying the rulers’ patronage.59 Even without the unifying presence of the duke, the network of relations between the nobility of blood, office and business is at the apex of a social system. Curialitas, the membership of such circles, should thus be considered not only from the perspective of shaping personal relations but also from that of political allegiances: “it looks like courtesy consists in civil acts, that is living together freely and gladly, and honouring each one according to the possibility.”60 A shared aesthetic went hand in hand with a shared communicative grammar, that is the exchanging of letters and shared tastes, these being the elements that contributed to moulding the city elite. Weaving a dense network of friendship and patronage, whether in the role of patron or client, meant having interpersonal skills covering a wider range than just business. These relations were based on the broad meaning of fides (trust) that goes beyond

58 59 60

De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 123. Maria Nadia Covini, “Tra patronage e ruolo politico: Bianca Maria Visconti (1450–​1468),” in Donne di potere nel Rinascimento, edited by Letizia Arcangeli and Susanna Peyronel (Rome: Viella, 2008), 247–​280. «Cortesia par che consista negli atti civili, cioè nel vivere insieme liberalmente e lietamente, e fare onore a tutti secondo la possibilità»; Giovanni Boccaccio, Il comento alla Divina Commedia e gli altri scritti intorno a Dante, edited by Domenico Guerri (Bari: Laterza, 1926), 222.

24 Piseri the public trust required for the authentication of documents. To be worthy of this broader fides, a merchant had to prove to be not only successful in his business but also able to handle exchanges of money and goods correctly and accurately, as well as the production of documents,61 and able to build an extensive network of relationships. Fides and creditum share the same semantic field and are directly proportional to each other. It is precisely fides that is one of the essential components of any credit transaction: “in the medieval world, the level of trust was closely linked to an individual’s reputation, i.e. to his being a good citizen or, on the contrary, to his being considered infamous.”62 This logical sequence shows how the training of the merchant in the Italian Renaissance was aimed at acquiring not only technical skills, but a broader range of skills, including curialitas as defined above. The relational business skills that a successful merchant/​banker applied in the European macrocosm, in the microcosm of the city, where the boundary between public and private was blurred, became personal and political relations: due to the “mercantile bases of many of the Italian urban elites”, “networks and mechanisms of trust, patronage and reciprocity born in a context of essentially economic-​financial origin” were transferred “into political management […] shaping with this language political relations within the city and on a larger scale.”63 The history of Milan in the Renaissance offers many examples of the permeability between the world of finance and that of administration and politics. The abacus masters of the Pirovano family, to whom Trivulziana Manuscript 219 is linked, were involved in the Mint office, where they had to correctly calculate the proportions of metals for the alloys used by the minters. City treasurers, until the suppression of this institution, came from the merchant elites, not only from Lombardy, including such families as Alamanni, Trecchi, da Govenzate, Arzoni.64 The most shining example is undoubtedly Pigello

61 62

63 64

Even to falsify them, as we have seen with the Medici. Luciano Palermo, La banca e il credito nel Medioevo (Milano: Bruno Mondadori, 2008), 88: « nel mondo medievale il livello della fiducia era strettamente collegato alla fama di un individuo, cioè al suo essere un buon cittadino o, al contrario al suo essere considerato con infamia.» Isabella Lazzarini, Amicizia e potere. Reti politiche e sociali nell’Italia medievale (Milan: Bruno Mondadori, 2010), 37. See Piseri, Pro necessitatibus nostris, 81–​144.

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Portinari, who facilitated Francesco Sforza’s power policy both within the borders, to consolidate his role, and outside, to consolidate the political system that arose from the Treaty of Lodi of 1454.65 The desire to introduce the reader to the world of Milan’s economic elite, and thus to the highest ranks of the city’s civil and political life, was behind Giovanni Battista Verini’s choice to dedicate Spechio to Giovanni Marino, brother of Tommaso, the banker of Emperor Charles V: During the Milanese government of Ferrante Gonzaga (1546–​54) and his immediate successors, Marino was undoubtedly the main point of reference for the Hispanic-​imperial financial needs, to the point of being appointed, in March 1552, as a member of the “cappa corta” (short robe) of the Senate, the highest judicial and administrative body of the State of Milan.66 In all likelihood, this dedication does not express a true closeness to the banker family member but is an incitement for readers wishing to become part of that environment. From a promotional viewpoint, the study of the manual was the first step towards achieving this goal: to be a protagonist of civic life in one’s own urban context. 4

Conclusion: Civis and Mercator, Creditum and Curialitas between City Microcosm and Global Macrocosm

The aim of this educational path was to prepare a civis ready for the social and political life of the city, in a way the same aim of the schools of the humanists, but following another route.67 These were different elites and therefore they had different educational needs in a society marked by the division into classes, and where the nobility of blood and the nobility of office tended to turn

65 66 67

See Piseri, Pro necessitatibus nostris, 145–​174. Giannini Massimo Giannini, “Marino, Tommaso,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 70 (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 2008). Federico Piseri, “L’educazione civile come problema pedagogico: il caso di Vittorino da Feltre tra continuità e innovazione,” in Maestri e pratiche educative in età umanistica (Italia settentrionale, xv secolo), edited by Monica Ferrari, Matteo Morandi and Federico Piseri (Brescia: Morcelliana, 2019), 53–​72.

26 Piseri to the humanist masters,68 while those who came from the business world and failed to enter the elite were more likely to go through the abacus schools. The two paths, as Machiavelli’s experience teaches, were not mutually exclusive.69 In the Milanese mercantile world, the urban microcosm was projected into a macrocosm that, in the transition between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, gradually expanded across the Peninsula, Europe, and the new continents. Indeed, Giovanni Battista’s Spechio opens with a portrait of Christopher Columbus “intent on drawing a course on the globe with his pen, behind him the nautical compass, and in the background a caravel.”70 Plotting sea routes required mathematical skills, “Columbus thus symbolised the geometrist, literally the person who measures the earth, able to redesign the globe thanks to his calculation skills”, and also symbolised the control over the fortunes of expeditions, and thus of business, exercised by those who had assimilated the contents of the manual. Finally, it indicated what the new global horizons of mercantile practice were. But, as Alessandro Verini recalls in a Sonnetto sopra l’abaco, an octave rhyme that borrows from the poem to the reader that opens Giovanni Battista’s manual, this will be achieved “provided that there is the will to learn.”71

68

69

70 71

A case in point is that of Giorgio Valagussa: Federico Piseri, “Dalla schola alla cattedra: Giorgio Valagussa allievo e maestro tra lo studium guariniano di Ferrara e la corte sforzesca di Milano,” Annali di storia dell’educazione e delle istituzioni scolastiche, 27 (2020): 60–​73. Bernardo Machiavelli, Libro di ricordi, edited by Cesare Olschki (Firenze, Le Monnier, 1954), 103: «I remember how on this day of 3 January 1479 I entrusted my son [Niccolò] to Piero Maria, the abacus master, to teach him the abacus, and the agreement was that I would pay him one florin as follows: a half florin at the start of teaching and the other half at the end of teaching» [ricordo come questo dì 3 di gennaio 1479 io allogai mio figliuolo [Niccolò] a Piero Maria maestro d’abaco che gl’insegnassi l’abaco, e d’acordo fumo gli dovessi dare per insegantura di tutto fiorini uno largo in questo modo, cioè: uno mezzo quando entrerà nelle librèttine, e uno altro mezo fornito gli arà d’insegnare] Cfr. Also Giorgio Inglese, “Machiavelli, Niccolò,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 67 (Roma, Istituto dell’Enciclopedia italiana, 2007). De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 105. Mercatante, c. 14v; De Luca, Nuovo, Piseri, La formazione del mercante, 177. See Giuseppe De Luca and Gaetano Sabatini, “Qui de più conti voglio ti mostrare /​Purché la volontà sia de imparare.” Formazione e cultura mercantile nella Milano spagnola, Cheiron, 1 (2016): 64–​86.

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Bibliography

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28 Piseri Gavagna, Veronica. “L’insegnamento dell’aritmetica nel ‘General trattato’ di Niccolò Tartaglia.” In Atti della giornata di studio in memoria di Niccolò Tartaglia nel 450° anniversario della sua morte 13 dicembre 1557–​2007, edited by Pierluigi Pizzamiglio. Supplemento ai Commentari dell’Ateneo di Brescia (2007): 101–​138. Gazzini, Marina. “Scuola, libri e cultura nelle confraternite milanesi fra tardo Medioevo e prima Età moderna.” La Bibliofilia 103, no. 3 (2001): 215–​261. Giannini, Massimo. “Marino, Tommaso.” In Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 70, ad vocem. Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 2008. Gitlin Bernstein, Joanne. “A Florentine Patron in Milan: Pigello and the Portinari Chapel.” In Florence and Milan: Comparisons and Relations: Acts of Two Conferences at Villa I Tatti in 1982–​1984, edited by S. Bertelli, N. Rubinstein, and C.H. Smyth, 171–​ 200. Florence: La Nuova Italia, 1989. Grendler, Paul F. Schooling in Renaissance Italy: Literacy and Learning, 1300–​1600. London: John Hopkins University Press, 1989. Inglese, Giorgio. “Machiavelli, Niccolò.” In Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 67, ad vocem. Rome: Istituto dell’Enciclopedia italiana, 2007. Lazzarini, Isabella. Amicizia e potere. Reti politiche e sociali nell’Italia medievale. Milan: Bruno Mondadori, 2010. Lucchi, Piero. “La Santacroce, il Salterio e il Babuino: libri per imparare a leggere nel primo secolo della stampa.” Quaderni storici, 13 (1978): 593–​630. Lucchi, Piero. “Leggere, scrivere e abaco: l’istruzione elementare agli inizi dell’età moderna.” In Scienze, credenze occulte, livelli di cultura, 102–​119. Florence: Olschki, 1982. Lucchi, Piero. “Nuove ricerche sul Babuino. The use of the syllabary to teach everyone to read and write in the vernacular (15th-​16th century).” In Lesen und Schreiben in Europa. 1500–​1900, edited by Alfred Messerli and Roger Chartier, 201–​ 234. Basel: Schwabe, 2000. Machiavelli, Bernardo. Libro di ricordi, edited by Cesare Olschki. Florence: Le Monnier, 1954. Mainoni, Patrizia. “La politica economica di Filippo Maria Visconti: i traffici, l’Universitas mercatorum, le manifatture tessili e la moneta.” In Il ducato di Filippo Maria Visconti, 1412–​1447. Economia, politica, cultura, edited by Maria Nadia Covini and Federica Cengarle, 167–​209. Florence: Firenze University Press, 2015. Melis, Federigo. Documenti per la storia economica dei secoli xiii–​x vi. Florence: Olschki, 1972. Morandi, Matteo, ed. Formare alle professioni. Commercianti e contabili dalle scuole d’abaco ad oggi. Milan: FrancoAngeli, 2013. Pacioli, Luca. Summa de arithmetica, geometria, proportioni et proportionalità, anastatic reprint of the edition by Paganino de Paganini, Venice, 1494. Parma: Guanda, 1970. Palermo, Luciano. La banca e il credito nel Medioevo. Milan: Bruno Mondadori, 2008.

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Pannington, Kenneth. “Enrico da Susa, detto l’Ostiense.” In Dizionario biografico degli italiani, vol. 42, ad vocem. Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, 1993. Pirenne, Henri. “L’instruction des merchands au Moyen-​ âge.” Annales d’histoire économiques et sociale, 1 (1929): 13–​28. Piseri, Federico. “«Qui se incomenza a fare ogni raxone per la raxone de una cossa, zoè per Alcibra». Il percorso educativo di una dinastia di maestri d’abaco nel Manoscritto Trivulziano 219.” Annali di storia dell’educazione e delle istituzioni scolastiche, 24 (2017): 311–​324. Piseri, Federico. “«Vol più ponti a fare uno mercatante che un dottore de leggi». La professionalizzazione del mercante-​rationator nel Rinascimento italiano.” La Scuola Classica di Cremona. Annuario dell’Associazione ex alunni del Liceo-​Ginnasio “D. Manin,” 20 (2012): 213–​233. Piseri, Federico. “Dalla schola alla cattedra: Giorgio Valagussa allievo e maestro tra lo studium guariniano di Ferrara e la corte sforzesca di Milano.” Annali di storia dell’educazione e delle istituzioni scolastiche, 27 (2020): 60–​73. Piseri, Federico. “L’educazione civile come problema pedagogico: il caso di Vittorino da Feltre tra continuità e innovazione.” In Maestri e pratiche educative in età umanistica (Italia settentrionale, xv secolo), edited by Monica Ferrari, Matteo Morandi and Federico Piseri, 53–​72. Brescia: Morcelliana, 2019. Piseri, Federico. Pro necessitatibus nostris. Lo Stato sforzesco, gli operatori economici delle città del dominio e i prestatori esterni. Pavia: Pavia University Press, 2016. Sapori, Armando. “La cultura del mercante medievale italiano.” In Gli orizzonti aperti. Profili del mercante medievale, edited by Gabriella Airaldi, 139–​ 173. Turin: Paravia, 1997. Tanzini, Lorenzo and Tognetti, Sergio, eds. La mobilità sociale nel Medioevo. Competenze, conoscenze e saperi tra professioni e ruoli sociali (secc. xii–​x v). Rome: Viella, 2016. Zanini, Andrea. “Saperi mercantili e formazione degli operatori economici preindustriali nella recente storiografia.” Storia economica, 9 no. 2–​3 (2006): 519–​537.

­c hapter 2

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Teaching Music to Rule the Earth in Europe, xv–​x vi Century Jessica Ottelli Twixt the students of Musica and the practicing singers there lies a great gulf: the latter sing, the former know what Musica consists of. For he who does what he doesn’t understand is no more or less than an animal.1

∵ This abstraction was necessary to move from the sensible to the intelligible, from sound to concept, from the particular to the universal. It enabled the understanding of the essential nature of music as an ordered and harmonious arrangement of sounds that could be comprehended through mathematical and philosophical principles. Nevertheless, as the quote from Guido of Arezzo suggests, this comprehension of music was not sufficient on its own.2 To genuinely appreciate and participate in music, one had to also engage in its practice. This meant to actually sing or play an instrument and experience the physical and emotional effects of music firsthand. The medieval view of music, as both theoretical and experiential, emphasizes the holistic nature of the art form. It was not solely a matter of intellectual contemplation or emotional expression

1 Original text: Musicorum et cantorum magna est distantia: Isti dicunt, illi sciunt, quae componit musica. Nam qui facit, quod non sapit, diffinitur bestia. The quote and the translation are given in Giulio Cattin and Alberto Gallo, Music of the Middle Ages: Volume 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), 157–​58. 2 Not only in Western culture. While illustrating his conception of music, also the Arab philosopher, Al-Farabi introduced the same distinction between scientia musicae activa and scientia musicae speculative. He distinguished two kinds of musica activa: one made per naturam (human voice) and one generated per artem (musical instruments). Francis Llewellyn Harrison, “Music at Oxford before 1500,” in The History of the University of Oxford: Volume ii: Late Medieval Oxford (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), 347–​68.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2024 | DOI:10.1163/9789004680234_004

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but rather a combination of both. To fully understand and engage with music, one had to approach it from both angles, as a theorist and a practitioner. This famous quotation is an excellent example of how theoretical and practical music were perceived in the Middle Ages. It emphasizes the inability of music to produce a tangible work like writing or painting, which in Hugh of Saint Victor’s terms can be described as the separation of music from its concrete and perceptible aspects.3 For a philosopher who intended to consider music in its concrete and perceptible aspects, the first operation to be carried out was the abstraction of the object, a process described by Jacques Maritain as one that “consists in extracting the intelligible type by which we separate what belongs to the essence or to the formal relationship of an object of knowledge from the contingent and material data.”4 In the Middle Ages, quadrivial music would never have been associated with pastimes such as music for games and banquets. Like astrology, music was regarded as a science capable of revealing the rational order in the cosmos. Therefore, it was thought to provide the fundamental principles of cosmic harmony as a science.5 The integration of music and science is embodied in the concept of the music of the spheres, which holds that the universe is consistently ordered according to the principles of musical harmony. This idea has a long history, originating from the teachings of Pythagoras and continuing through to Johannes Kepler in the seventeenth century.6 Even today, attempts to develop a “theory of everything” are based on models that derive from metaphors and images reminiscent of the old model of Musica Universalis.7 3 Hugo de Sancto Victore, Hugonis de Sancto Victore Didascalicon De Studio Legendi: A Critical Text, ed. Charles Henry Buttimer, vol. 2, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Latin Language and Literature (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1939). 4 According to Dyer, while Musica embraces all mathematical proportions, musica instrumentalis concerns exclusively musical ones. Musica instrumentalis is still not the domain of the ordinary performer –​cantor or secular instrumentalist –​but that of the mathematically skilled “musicus.” See Joseph Dyer, “The Place of Musica in Medieval Classifications of Knowledge,” The Journal of Musicology 24, no. 1 (2007): 19, https://​doi​.org​/10​.1525​/jm​.2007​ .24​.1​.3​. 5 See Andre Goddu, “Music, Philosophy, and Natural Science in the Middle Ages,” Chusei shiso kenkyu. Studies in medieval thought 40 (1958): 1–​18. 6 In 1619 Kepler published the Harmonices Mundi, a work in which he attempted to explain the harmony of the world. On the subject Jamie James, The Music of the Spheres: Music, Science, and the Natural Order of the Universe, Reprint edition (New York, NY: Copernicus Books, 1995). Suzannah Clark et al., Citation and Authority in Medieval and Renaissance Musical Culture: Learning from the Learned. Essays in Honour of Margaret Bent: 4 (Woodbridge UK; Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 2005) in particular the essays of Susan Rankin and Gilles Rico. 7 See the work of Jean-​Pierre Birat, “Musica Universalis or the Music of the Spheres,” Matériaux & Techniques 105, no. 5–​6 (2017): 1–​8, https://​doi​.org​/10​.1051​/matt​ech​/2018​015​.

32 Ottelli 1

The Teaching of Music and the Place of Music in the Scholarship

This essay aims to address the impact of music education on nobleman during the Renaissance. However, before doing so, it is necessary to provide a broader view of the role of music in the general teaching practices of the Middle Ages. As medieval knowledge relied on schemata passed down from the ancient world, modern scholars like Dyer have attempted to understand the place occupied by music in the art of the quadrivium and in the general classification of knowledge.8 The importance of this classification in the context of this essay lies in the fact that since the early Middle Ages, the seven liberal arts –​ trivium and quadrivium –​represented the sum of basic non-​theological learning, and as such, they formed the foundation of teaching. However, music rarely appears directly in the treatises compiled by classic authors. Boethius, as the only Latin author of Late Antiquity who wrote about music, set the model for any subsequent work.9 The modern literature on musical education suggests the ephemeral nature of the phenomenon. According to one of the most renowned scholars of Renaissance humanism, Paul Kristeller, the teaching of music must have been primarily of a practical nature, as there is almost no trace of musical instruction at universities until the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.10 Different forms of academic sources on music and learning are closely linked to ecclesiastical musical training. Musicological historiography on Medieval and Renaissance music is deeply concerned with the development of the musician’s profession. In a comprehensive book on choirboys, Susan Boynton has collected a wide range of essays on the education of young singers, one of which is particularly interesting.11 Andrew Kirkman’s chapter on the training of choirboys in a late-​ medieval maîtrise, specifically the collegiate church of Saint-​Omer in northern

8 9

10 11

James A. Weisheipl, “The Concept of Scientific Knowledge in Greek Philosophy,” in Mélanges à la mémoire de Charles de Koninck. (Québec: les Presses de l’Université Laval, 1968), 487–​507. Calvin Bower, “The Role of Boethius’ De Institutione Musica in the Speculative Tradition of Western Musical Thought,” in Boethius and the Liberal Arts. A Collection of Essays, ed. Michael Masi, Studies in Literature and Linguistics 18 (Bern: Peter Lang, 1981), 157–​74. For an example of a musical treaty concerning practical aspects, see the essay by Dolores Pesce, ‘Guido d’Arezzo, Ut Queant Laxis, and Musical Understanding’, in Music Education in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, ed. Russell E. Murray, Jr., Susan Forscher Weiss, and Cynthia J. Cyrus (Bloomington: Indiana University Press 2010), 25–​36. Paul Oskar Kristeller, “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance,” Journal of Renaissance and Baroque Music 1, no. 4 (1947): 255–​74. See Susan Boynton and Eric Rice, eds., Young Choristers, 650–​1700 (Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 2008).

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France, provides a detailed example of the traditional path a boy had to follow to become a cantor, or composer of church music.12 Aside from ecclesiastical sources, the biographies of well-​known composers also serve as important sources for understanding music education during the Renaissance. Many Renaissance music theorists, in fact, held the position of choirmasters at various churches or were connected with cathedral chapters in some other capacity.13 Cathedrals and other important churches were the places in which future music teachers learned their science, often before entering the university. This was also the case for Simon Aligret, who was a Canon in the Sainte Chappelle of Bourges. Simon was also the physician of the Duke of Berry and was appointed as the maître dès arts de l’Université de Paris in 1379, as well as subdeacon et maître régent of the medical faculty of Paris in 1387. All these achievements came after his training in a maîtrise, probably in Bourges, and testify that a choirboy could choose to pursue an academic career.14 Documentary sources about cantores not only offer examples of different forms of professions, but they also allow us to study their mobility and educational paths. Furthermore, they enable us to compare distinct aspects related to music and its function in the education of the Renaissance nobleman. 2

Educating the Teacher: Cantores and Their Training in the Maîtrise

In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, cathedrals were the centers of more or less wide areas of pastoral governance, namely the dioceses. Together with important collegiate churches, these ecclesiastical centers often maintained an active Maîtrise, recruiting and training choristers. In this regard, an important musical tradition can be found in Flanders and Burgundy, from which originated what in musicological terms is known as the Franco-​Flemish school.15 12 13 14

15

Andrew Kirkman, “The Seeds of Medieval Music: Choirboys and Musical Training in a Late-​Medieval Maîtrise,” in Young Choristers, 650–​1700, ed. Susan Boynton and Eric Rice (Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, 2008), 104–​22. Kristeller, “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance,” 263. “Aligret, Simon (… –​1415) · Prosopographie Des Chantres de La Renaissance,” accessed 24 May 2022, https://​ricer​car​.pcr​.cesr​.univ​-tours​.fr​/items​/show​/3808​. The proof of his degree is written in the supplications made by him for the obtainment of ecclesiastical benefices, where he appears as “in medicine et artium facultatis mag..” See Université de Paris, Rotuli Parisienses: supplications to the Pope from the University of Paris . Volume i. 1316–​ 1349, Education and society in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, ed. William J. Courtenay, (Leiden Boston: Brill, 2002), 591. Gustave Reese, Jan LaRue, and Martin Bernstein, eds., Aspects of Medieval and Renaissance Music: A Birthday Offering to Gustave Reese (New York: Norton & C, 1967). Jesse Rodin

34 Ottelli A prominent characteristic of this musical school, also known as the Netherlands school, was that the disciples would come under the influence of a master. Cathedrals and other main ecclesiastical institutions maintained a choirmaster who often had the responsibility of composing music for various occasions, as well as training and teaching the young singers of the choir.16 These musical schools often proved to be remarkably conservative institutions, maintaining long-​lasting traditions dating back in some cases to the high Middle Ages. Among their most enduring traditions, cathedrals generally welcomed among their ranks the second-​born of aristocratic families who were to be initiated into the ecclesiastical career. The age of entry was usually set at seven to eight years. A religious disposition and a legitimate state of birth were basic requirements for admission. We know, however, that in some cases dispensations were granted to those born sub defectu natali. Children had to audition in front of the choirmaster and the canons, to show that they had a good voice and, sometimes, they were assessed for a good reading ability. The importance of reading is visible even in the works of art depicting apprentice composers, and this is since the singers were required to perform the chant dou livre, namely the polyphony. Once admitted, the children were registered within the institution, where they had to stay for at least ten years while also receiving tonsure. However, collegiate churches provided the possibility of an early release. Students could choose whether to pursue a religious career or devote themselves to the care of family possessions, which was more often the case when older siblings died.17 The chapter had established rules for those who were selected, such as receiving a proper religious education, eating healthy food, and maintaining

16 17

and Anna Maria Busse Berger, eds., The Cambridge History of Fifteenth-​Century Music (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015). Several works have been written on specific musical institutions. See for example Otto Frederick Becker, “The Maitrise in Northern France and Burgundy During the Fifteenth Century” (Ph.D. Dissertation, Peabody College for Teachers (now Vanderbilt University), 1967); Alexandre Clerval, L’Ancienne Maîtrise de Notre-​Dame de Chartres de Ve Siècle à la Révolution: Avec Pièces, Documents Et Introduction sur l’Emploi des Enfants dans l’Office Divin aux Premiers Siècles (London: Forgotten Books, 2018); Andrew Kirkman, Music and Musicians at the Collegiate Church of St-​Omer: Crucible of Song, 1350–​1550 /​Andrew Kirkman, [1.] (Cambridge-​New York: Cambridge University Press, 2020). Kristeller, “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance,” 263. This piece of information can be found in Boynton and Rice, Young Choristers, 650–​1700, 126; Katie Ann-​Marie Bugyis, Andrew B. Kraebel, and Margot E. Fassler, Medieval Cantors and Their Craft: Music, Liturgy and the Shaping of History 800–​1500 (York: York Medieval Press, 2019).

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proper behavior even during leisure time.18 The Maîtrise of Cambrai is a somewhat peculiar case. As noted by Damien Lourned, the cathedral had a sort of studium. Canons in theology with a license to teach had the opportunity to give lectures to their colleagues and other members of the clergy, and the cathedral even offered those attending lectures a certificate of completion.19 More generally, the boys were required to sing at a specific moment of the day and to help in the liturgy. In return, they were taught Latin, grammar, basic arithmetic, and theology. Becoming a choirboy offered several benefits that could aid in upward social mobility. As members of influential ecclesiastical institutions, young singers were part of robust social networks that could provide them with undeniable advantages for their future.20 After completing their training at the Maîtrise, and after the final changes in their voice had taken place (which typically occurred between the ages of 15 and 17), choirboys were given the option to either remain in the church or continue their education. Some chose to stay and become part of the clergy, while the most talented ones could choose to pursue the artes in university. 3

Higher Education: Music in University

For Kristeller “The traditional place of music among the seven liberal arts may have led many students to give some time to musical theory, but the extant records of the schools and early universities in Italy show no evidence that music held a definite place in their curriculum, either as a separate field or even as an annex to the study of mathematics and astronomy.”21 At the university, grown-​up choirboys went to learn subjects other than music, or at least 18 19 20

21

Alejandro Enrique Planchart, “Choirboys in Cambrai in the Fifteenth Century,” in Young Choristers, 650–​1700, 126–​27. Damien Lourme, “Chanoines, Officiers et Dignitaires Du Chapitre Cathédral de Cambrai (1357–​1426). Étude Prosopographique et Institutionnelle” (PhD diss., Thèse de l’École des chartes de Paris, 1991), i:105–​6. Contributions regarding the social mobility of singers can be found in Christopher Reynolds, “Musical Careers, Ecclesiastical Benefices, and the Example of Johannes Brunet,” Journal of the American Musicological Society 37, no. 1 (1 April 1984): 49–​97. Kirkman, “The Seeds of Medieval Music,”; Martin Albrecht-​Hohmaier, “Mobile Musicians: Paths of Migration in Early Modern Europe,” Music Migrations, Music Migrations, European History Yearbook 16, (2015): 111–​29; Paula Higgins, “Tracing the Careers of Late Medieval Composers. The Case of Philippe Basiron of Bourges,” Acta Musicologica 62, no. 1 (1990): 1–​28. Kristeller, “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance,” 256.

36 Ottelli there is no trace of a chair dedicated to music. In Paris, there is evidence that musical instruction was available, and some colleges, such as the Collège de Cornuaille, required their students to learn plainchant.22 Even in the Italian peninsula, the educational landscape concerning musical education is somewhat fragmented. Despite a decree issued by Pope Nicholas V dating back to 1450, in which a chair of music was established for the University of Bologna, there is no sign that music was taught in Italian universities. Even one of the most important music theorists of the early fifteenth century, Prosdocimus de Beldemandis, who taught music during his classes at the University of Padua, was formally a lecturer of astronomy. The only case of a chair of music at any Italian university is that held by Franchino Gaffurio at Pavia between 1494 and 1499.23 Regarding practical aspects, it is known that cantores financed their education through the benefices of collegiate or cathedrals obtained during their training. Unlike their fellow students, who were known for their wandering, former choirboys did not seem to move and remained in the studium until they obtained a degree.24 If the aforementioned case of Simon Aligret could be taken as a model of the brilliant career a choirboy could expect, it is also true that he was not an exception. Men like Guillaume de Machaut (canon, royal secretary, and poet), Gilles Binchois (who served under the Duke of Burgundy and later became a trusted advisor), and Johannes Tinctoris (theorist, founder of a musical school, and chaplain for King Ferdinand of Aragon) followed the same path with different, yet admirable, results.25

22

23 24

25

Nan Cooke Carpenter, “The Study of Music at the University of Paris in the Middle Ages,” Journal of Research in Music Education 2, no. 2 (1954): 122. See also, Nan Cooke Carpenter, “Music in the Medieval Universities,” Journal of Research in Music Education 3, no. 2 (1955): 136–​44. Kristeller, “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance,” 261. Gaffurio is also known for his music treaties in which the music of the sphere is explained. Schuth reported, in his essay, the five types of students identified by Christoph Schwinges. By the classification, it can be stated that the bachelor student represented twenty percent of the student body, and that future cantores belonged in that range. Maximilian Schuh, “Student Mobilities and Masculinities: The Case of the Empire North of the Alps in the Fifteenth Century,” in Travels and Mobilities in the Middle Ages. From the Atlantic to the Black Sea, ed. Marianne O’Doherty and Felicitas Schmieder, International medieval research series /​21 (Thurnout: Brepols, 2015), 245–​263. Elizabeth Eva Leach, Guillaume de Machaut: Secretary, Poet, Musician (Cornell University Press, 2014); On these men and their lives, see Andrew Kirkman, Dennis Slavin, and Dit Binchois International Conference on Gilles de Bins, Binchois Studies (Oxford-​ New York: Oxford University Press, 2000); Ernest Closson, “L’origine de Gilles Binchois,” Revue de Musicologie 5, no. 12 (1924): 149–​51; Jeffrey Samuel Palenik, “The early career

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37

The Court as a Musical Center

Along with cathedrals, the most important Renaissance musical centers were the princely courts.26 The phenomenon of secular musical chapels began in the fourteenth century. These chapels were usually established by princes and nobles, following the model of their ecclesiastical counterparts.27 The art of vocal singing and instrumental accompaniment was in full bloom throughout Europe during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Although trained in religious schools, the singers performed sustained musical activities at courts, promoting a repertoire as required by the courts.28 The musicians of the time, thanks to the relatively developed means of travel, were well-​informed about the music performed in other cultural centers. As a result, the musicians themselves became missionaries of the new musical culture that originated in the Franco-​Flemish area. Court composers regularly contributed to various events and celebrations, such as daily entertainment, ecclesiastical ceremonies, and dynastic rites. Renaissance composers wrote masterpieces that were associated with important family events, such as marriages and births.29 Polyphony was indeed the

of Johannes Tinctoris: An examination of the music theorist’s northern education and development” (Ph.D. Dissertation, Duke University, 2008). 26 At a more general level, when we reach the later Renaissance, a new kind of institution begins to take its place in musical activities and instruction: the Academies. Kristeller, “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance,” 261. 27 On the general phenomenon see Franco Piperno, Gabriella Biagi Ravenni, and Andrea Chegai, eds., Cappelle Musicali Fra Corte, Stato e Chiesa Nell’Italia Del Rinascimento, Atti del Convegno internazionale (Camaiore, 21–​23 ottobre 2005) (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2005). Several works have been dedicated to specific musical institutions, for example Paul Merkley and Lora L. M. Merkley, Music and Patronage in the Sforza Court (Turnhout: Brepols, 1999); Jeanne Marix, Histoire de la musique et des musiciens de la cour de Bourgogne sous le règne de Philippe le Bon: 1420–​1467 (Genève: Minkoff reprint, 1972); Leeman L. Perkins, “Musical Patronage at the Royal Court of France under Charles vii and Louis xi (1422–​83),” Journal of the American Musicological Society 37, no. 3 (1984): 507–​66; Amédée Gastoué, Les primitifs de la musique française (Paris: Renouard-​Laurens, 1922); Allan W. Atlas, Music at the Aragonese Court of Naples, 1° edition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009); Richard Sherr, Music and Musicians in Renaissance Rome and Other Courts (London: Routledge, 2019). 28 Sean Gallagher, ed., Secular Renaissance Music: Forms and Functions (London: Routledge, 2017). 29 The Visconti family example perfectly illustrates how music can become a “memory book.” See Donatella Melini, “«O lume vostro, O in Italia felice Liguria!» Acrostici, senhal, fatti e misfatti di Luchino Visconti e Isabella Fieschi nascosti nei madrigali musicali del Trecento,” il Nome nel testo 1, no. 1 (30 November 2015): 309–​18.

38 Ottelli preferred musical style for special occasions, such as weddings and births, while plainchant was more commonly used for daily mass. As a result, the princes had daily exposure to music and a strong understanding and appreciation for it became a hallmark of their nobility. This is one of the reasons why music, as a liberal art, found a place among the interests that nobles cultivated as part of their cultural education. Private instruction in chant and instrumental playing was another career that a cantor could pursue, and the title of “professor” of music was apparently assumed by any more or less popular instructor. It seems to have been the case with Nicolas Burcius, who was an instructor of music for the Bolognese Bentivoglio family.30 Another, more concrete example of a cantor-​instructor could be found at the court of Ferrante of Aragon in Naples. As the royal choir master, Johannes Tinctoris of Nivelles, a learned man with a law degree from the University of Louvain, also acted as a music teacher for princess Beatrice and various young noblemen, to whom he dedicated his theoretical works. Among his works it must be recalled the Terminorum musicae diffinitorium, a musical dictionary written specifically for the education of the princess Beatrice d’Aragona.31 In Mantua, too, Vittorino da Feltre’s school listed music as one of the required subjects of study for the Gonzaga household.32 The ability to understand was the basis that justified and urged the princes to maintain expensive court chapels. Tinctoris himself explained the need for musical education in one of his treatises, stating that while music can bring joy to human beings, not everyone experiences the same level of enjoyment due to differences in their ability to understand it.33 It could be said that the higher minds were the only ones who could truly draw from music all the knowledge that it had to offer. 5

The Musical Law

Music was certainly suitable for moral training, as it could bring harmony to the troubled soul. However, at the same time, the pleasure derived from listening 30 31 32 33

Kristeller, “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance,” 262; François-​Joseph Fétis, Biographie universelle des musiciens et bibliographie générale de la musique par f.j. Fétis (Firmin Didot, 1861), 113. Johannes Tinctoris, Diffinitorium Musice: Un Dizionario Di Musica per Beatrice d’Aragona, ed. Cecilia Panti (Florence: sismel Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2004). Angelo Meriani, “Teoria e Storia Della Musica Greca Antica Alla Scuola Di Vittorino Da Feltre,” Rivista di cultura classica e medioevale 58, no. 2, (July-​December 2016): 311–​35. Rob C. Wegman, “‘Musical Understanding’ in the 15th Century,” Early Music 30, no. 1 (2002): 50–​51.

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to music could cause a certain degree of embarrassment. While music helped with catharsis, its status as a techné was seen as unsettling.34 On the one hand, music was seen as a valuable art form that could elevate the soul and impart moral lessons. On the other hand, its association with pleasure and sensuality made some people uneasy. In some circles, it was seen as a potentially dangerous influence, capable of leading people astray from virtuous behavior. This tension between the moral and sensual aspects of music is reflected in the writings of many Renaissance thinkers, including Tinctoris. Only during the Middle Ages did the discussion of music become infused with Christian morality, as the prince –​the organizer of orderly pleasures such as feasts and tournaments –​was expected to learn the ability to achieve harmony. This state of harmony, achievable through thinking, was the only way to reach the perfect concord of the soul, an indispensable means for exercising power.35 This is how passages on the importance of music in the works of the thirteenth century encyclopedists can be interpreted. The final cause of music was not merely pleasure, but the modification of behavior, a principle that had already been enunciated by Boethius: “music is not only used for speculation, but is connected with morality.”36 They were considering a moral music, capable of bringing harmony to the troubled soul, a subject to be learned, according to Giles of Rome, “so that they know how to rule themselves and others.”37 Regarding the act of hearing, the first skill that princes learned, the main aesthetic criterion in the fifteenth century was the effectiveness of performance in terms of the occasion’s requirements. For instance, music could be praised as ‘triumphant’ in a festive procession, ‘solemn’ at Mass, ‘sad’ at a service for the dead, or ‘joyful’ at a banquet. There was rarely any self-​consciousness about such aesthetic assessments; the music was considered good when it suited

34

Jasmin Boulay, “Le rôle de la musique dans l’éducation,” Laval théologique et philosophique 17, no. 2 (1961): 274. Liana Lomiento, “Riflessioni critiche cul concetto di ‘Appropriatezza’ Nel De Musica Dello Ps. Plutarco (De Mus. 32–36).” Quaderni Urbinati Di Cultura Classica 99, no. 3 (2011): 135–​52. 35 Martine Clouzot, “Musique, Savoirs et Pouvoir à La Cour Du Prince Aux Xive et Xve Siècles,” in La Place de La Musique Dans La Culture Médiévale, vol. 7, Rencontres Médiévales Européennes 7 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2007), 121; David Fiala, “Prince Au Miroir Des Musiques Politiques Des xive et xve Siècles,” in Le Prince Au Miroir de La Littérature Politique de l’Antiquité Aux Lumières, eds., Frédérique Lachaud and Lydwine Scordia (Rouen: Publications des Universités de Rouen et du Havre, 2007), 319–​350: 320. 36 “musica non solum speculationi deservit, set moralitati coniuncta est” in Dyer, “The Place of Musica in Medieval Classifications of Knowledge,” 50. 37 Egidio Romano, Il Livro del governamento dei re e dei principi: secondo il codice bncf 2.4.129., ed. Fiammetta Papi, vol. i (Pisa: ets, 2016), 442.

40 Ottelli the purpose at hand.38 However, it was never required for any prince to really learn how to read or play music –​although examples of princes’ musicians are known –​but only to understand the beauty and harmony of sound. It was only in the second half of the fifteenth century that playing an instrument became a common practice for courtiers. Indeed, in his Book of the Courtier (Il libro del Cortegiano), probably the most known courtesy book of his times, Castiglione pointed precisely at the new common practice when writes: “Gentlemen, he said, you have to know that I am not content with the courtier; and if he is not yet a musician and if, besides understanding and being sure by book, he does not know of various instruments.”39 Starting with the ability to read musical scores (Cantar a libro) and followed by singing with musical accompaniment (viola singing), this activity has often been associated with the recitation of a poetic text (in the forms of the “motet” or the “frottola”, short poems with various meters and schemes). All these perfectly represent the radical change that occurred at the beginning of the sixteenth century. As noted by Haar, this page of Castiglione’s text emphasizes the legitimacy and progressive elevation of musical education within the European courts. The author’s insistence on the “professionalism of music” does not exclude its performative aspect, thus combining both theoretical knowledge and practical aspects of music education, science, and practice, allowing music to assume its role within the “humanistic” cultural program.40 Alongside the new dignity of practical music, as stated by Rob Wegman, a significant change also happened in the way music was heard, a change that seems to have occurred after 1480 and that had something to do with musical understanding and consonant sound evaluation.41 6

Music as a Rhetoric Exercise

Despite the redefined meaning of music, the most common association used to justify its teaching to rulers remained its connection to the art of rhetoric. 38 39

40 41

Wegman, “‘Musical Understanding’ in the 15th Century,” 50–​51. Original text: “Signori, disse, avete a sapere ch’io non mi contento del cortegiano; e s’egli non è ancor musico e se, oltre allo intendere ed esser sicuro a libro, non sa di varii instrumenti.” Cf. Baldesar Castiglione, Il Libro Del Cortegiano Del Conte Baldesar Castiglione, Venezia 1528, 65, accessed 25 March 2020, https://​arch​ive​.org​/deta​ils​/ita​-bnc​-ald​-00000​335​-001​. James Haar, “The Courtier as Musician: Castiglione’s View of the Science and Art of Music,” in Castiglione. The Ideal and the Real in Renaissance Culture, eds., Robert W. Hanning and David Rosand (New Haven, CT: Yale University press, 1983), 165–​89. Wegman, “Musical Understanding in the 15th Century,” 50–​51.

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In this sense, music could be traced back to the discourses of specula principis. The importance of the art of speaking is attested to, for example, at the Burgundian court, in treatises such as L’art de parler e de se taire, a translation of the text by Albertanus from Brescia.42 The intersection of rhetoric and music at the point of pronunciatio came about through a shared knowledge of writers such as Quintilian. It was during the fifteenth century that rhetoric became linked with the art of music, based on the association between writing and performance. This relationship was theorized in order to elevate music to the same level as rhetoric.43 Music has a lot to do with the act of public speaking, as demonstrated by the rhetorical commentaries on music that continued to be written even after the fifteenth century. Theorists who published important works around the mid-​sixteenth century described a way of composing affective music that they saw as closely related to pronunciation.44 If a preacher’s pronunciation did not match the subject of his oration, he would be out of tune. Matching vocal gesture with the intended effect was of prime importance.45 That is why princes needed to learn this skill. Public speaking and performative speeches were of primary importance for acquiring the funds necessary for military campaigns, as well as for reassuring their subjects. Certainly, a prince’s humanistic training was not equivalent to that of a man of letters. Teachers had to select those aspects, such as rhetorical expressiveness, that were useful to the prince. It is interesting to note that, unlike what happened in Burgundy, some Italian noblemen were called to speak always in the first person, perhaps to increase their reputation as cultured men devoted to humanae litterae. A comparison of the educational models of Charles, Duke of Valois and Duke Galeazzo Maria Sforza has highlighted two different modes of performance when it comes to public speeches. In the Burgundian case, 42 43

44 45

Georges Doutrepont, La Littérature française à la cour des ducs de Bourgogne Philippe le Hardi, Jean sans Peur, Philippe le Bon, Charles le Téméraire (Paris: Champion, 1909), 293. Mary J. Carruthers, ed., Rhetoric beyond Words: Delight and Persuasion in the Arts of the Middle Ages, Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature (Cambridge, UK ; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010); Margaret Bent, “Performative Rhetoric and Rhetoric as Validation,” Nottingham Medieval Studies 56, (January 2012): 43–​62, https: //​doi​.org​/10​.1484​/J​.NMS​.1​.102​751​. Todd Borgerding, “Preachers, ‘Pronunciatio’, and Music: Hearing Rhetoric in Renaissance Sacred Polyphony,” The Musical Quarterly 82, no. 3/​4 (1998): 586–​98. The Spanish court preacher Francisco Terrones del Cañio (1551–​1613) proposed in his Instrucción de predicadores that the rhythm and melody of the voice had to be matched with both the subject matter and the context of the sermon because: “The trumpeter does not, of course, play the same notes and rhythms for a bullfight as he does for a procession of penitents” Borgerding, “Preachers, ‘Pronunciatio’, and Music,” 589.

42 Ottelli the duke was expected to demonstrate a sort of Byzantine fixity, and the breaking of this rule caused what can be called a collapse of majesty. In Milan, however, from an early age, rulers were asked to welcome dignitaries and to speak to their people.46 Not surprisingly, both dukes maintained costly court chapels and constantly struggled to elevate their status. 7

Conclusion

Renaissance music teaching was, of course, a complex phenomenon, more differentiated and widespread than the categories described here may suggest. However, these specific examples from different social groups provide insight into the teaching patterns of music and the motivations behind learning it. Wegman’s change in musical understanding, supported by the reconstruction of what learning music meant, provides us with a clear context from which to distinguish between what motivated humble men to become cantores and the purposes of music education for noblemen. Academic or ecclesiastical music learning mirrored social ranks in Renaissance society and functioned as a contemporary way of dealing with a peculiar quadrivial art and its problematic status. For choirboys, the mobility that came thanks to their musical skills was the key to social advancement. Gifted cantores could and did travel to famous institutions that paid them well and made them famous. Mobility, along with the connection with ecclesiastical institutions, increased their chances of making influential connections with the same patrons to whom they later taught music. For noblemen, music was a means of social distinction. Playing, but above all understanding music, meant possessing the skills to achieve harmony, which meant being able to rule effectively. Consequently, the notion of theoretical music as one exclusive community only partially reflects what music meant in Renaissance society. The control of music was essential since it was linked to ecclesiastical authority, and every power sought predominance on the subject. While this discussion has focused primarily on the upper class and the theoretical aspects of music, 46

On the different ways of understanding public discourse, see for Burgundy: Elodie Lecuppre-​Desjardin, “‘Et Le Prince Respondit de Par Sa Bouche’: Monarchal Speech Habits in Late Medieval Europe,” in Mystifying the Monarch, ed. Jeroen Deploige and Gita Deneckere (Amsterdam University Press, 2006), 55–​64, https://​www​.jstor​.org​/sta​ble​/j​ .ctt46m​z50​.7​. For the case Milan see: Monica Ferrari, ‘Per non manchare in tuto del debito mio’: l’ educazione dei bambini Sforza nel Quattrocento (Milano: FrancoAngeli, 2000).

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it is important to note that medieval society appreciated music at all levels. Minstrels and lay musicians played a part in creating a sense of community and were utilized in the rites and ceremonies performed by cities and nobles in order to foster a harmonious community.

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44 Ottelli Cattin, Giulio, and Gallo, F. Alberto. Music of the Middle Ages: Volume 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984. Clark, Suzannah, Elizabeth Leach, Eva Alice V. Clark, Andrew Wathey, Barbara Haggh, Bonnie Blackburn, Christian Leitmeir. Citation and Authority in Medieval and Renaissance Musical Culture: Learning from the Learned. Essays in Honour of Margaret Bent: 4. Woodbridge UK-​Rochester, NY: Boydell Press, 2005. Clerval, Alexandre. L’Ancienne Maîtrise de Notre-​Dame de Chartres de Ve Siècle à la Révolution: Avec Pièces, Documents Et Introduction sur l’Emploi des Enfants dans l’Office Divin aux Premiers Siècles. London: Forgotten Books, 2018. Closson, Ernest. “L’origine de Gilles Binchois.” Revue de Musicologie 5, no. 12 (1924): 149–​51. Clouzot, Martine. “Musique, Savoirs et Pouvoir à La Cour Du Prince Aux xive et xve Siècles.” In La Place de La Musique Dans La Culture Médiévale, 7:115–​37. Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 2007. Doutrepont, Georges. La Littérature française à la cour des ducs de Bourgogne Philippe le Hardi, Jean sans Peur, Philippe le Bon, Charles le Téméraire. Paris: Champion, 1909. Dyer, Joseph. “The Place of Musica in Medieval Classifications of Knowledge.” The Journal of Musicology 24, no. 1 (2007): 3–​71. Ferrari, Monica. ‘Per non manchare in tuto del debito mio’: l’ educazione dei bambini Sforza nel Quattrocento. Milan: FrancoAngeli, 2000. Fétis, François-​Joseph. Biographie universelle des musiciens et bibliographie générale de la musique par f.j. Fétis. Paris: Firmin Didot, 1861. Fiala, David. “Le Prince Au Miroir Des Musiques Politiques des xive et xve Siècles.” In Le Prince Au Miroir de La Littérature Politique de l’Antiquité Aux Lumières, edited by Frédérique Lachaud and Lydwine Scordia, 319–​50. (Rouen: Publications des Universités de Rouen et du Havre, 2007). Gallagher, Sean, ed. Secular Renaissance Music: Forms and Functions. London: Routledge, 2017. Gastoué, Amédée. Les primitifs de la musique française. Paris: Renouard-​Laurens, 1922. Goddu, Andre. “Music, Philosophy, and Natural Science in the Middle Ages.” Studies in medieval thought 40, (1958): 1–​18. Haar, James. “The Courtier as Musician: Castiglione’s View of the Science and Art of Music.” In Castiglione. The Ideal and the Real in Renaissance Culture, edited by Robert W. Hanning and David Rosand, 165–​89. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1983. Harrison, Francis Llewellyn. “Music at Oxford before 1500.” In The History of the University of Oxford: Volume ii: Late Medieval Oxford, 347–​68. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Higgins, Paula. “Tracing the Careers of Late Medieval Composers. The Case of Philippe Basiron of Bourges.” Acta Musicologica 62, no. 1 (1990): 1–​28.

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James, Jamie. The Music of the Spheres: Music, Science, and the Natural Order of the Universe. New York, NY: Copernicus Books, 1995. Kirkman, Andrew, Dennis Slavin, and Dit Binchois. International Conference on Gilles de Bins. Binchois Studies. Oxford-​New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Kirkman, Andrew. “The Seeds of Medieval Music: Choirboys and Musical Training in a Late-​Medieval Maîtrise.” In Young Choristers, 650–​1700, edited by Susan Boynton and Eric Rice, 104–​22. Rochester, NY: Boydell & Brewer, 2008. Kirkman, Andrew. Music and Musicians at the Collegiate Church of St-​Omer: Crucible of Song, 1350–​1550. Cambridge-​New York: Cambridge University Press, 2020. Koninck, Charles de. Mélanges à la mémoire de Charles de Koninck. Québec: les Presses de l’Université Laval, 1968. Kristeller, Paul Oskar. “Music and Learning in the Early Italian Renaissance.” Journal of Renaissance and Baroque Music 1, no. 4 (1947): 255–​74. Leach, Elizabeth Eva. Guillaume de Machaut: Secretary, Poet, Musician. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2014. Lecuppre-​Desjardin, Elodie. “‘Et Le Prince Respondit de Par Sa Bouche’: Monarchal Speech Habits in Late Medieval Europe.” In Mystifying the Monarch, edited by Jeroen Deploige and Gita Deneckere, 55–​64. Studies on Discourse, Power, and History. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2006. Lomiento, Liana. “Riflessioni critiche cul concetto di ‘Appropriatezza’ Nel De Musica Dello Ps. Plutarco (De Mus. 32–​36).” Quaderni Urbinati Di Cultura Classica 99, no. 3 (2011): 135–​52. Lourme, Damien. Chanoines, Officiers et Dignitaires Du Chapitre Cathédral de Cambrai (1357–​1426). Etude Prosopographique et Institutionnelle. Thèse de l’École des chartes, Paris (1991). Maritain, Jacques. Philosophy of Nature. New York: Philosophical Library, 1951. Marix, Jeanne. Histoire de la musique et des musiciens de la cour de Bourgogne sous le règne de Philippe le Bon: 1420–​1467. Genève: Minkoff reprint, 1972. Melini, Donatella. “«O lume vostro, O in Italia felice Liguria!» Acrostici, senhal, fatti e misfatti di Luchino Visconti e Isabella Fieschi nascosti nei madrigali musicali del Trecento.” Il Nome nel testo 1, no. 1 (November 2015): 309–​18. Meriani, Angelo. “Teoria e Storia Della Musica Greca Antica Alla Scuola Di Vittorino Da Feltre.” Rivista di cultura classica e medioevale, 58, 2 (2016): 311–​36. Merkley, Paul, and Lora L. M. Merkley. Music and Patronage in the Sforza Court. Turnhout: Brepols, 1999. Palenik, Jeffrey Samuel. “The early career of Johannes Tinctoris: An examination of the music theorist’s northern education and development.” Ph.D. diss., Duke University, 2008.

46 Ottelli Perkins, Leeman L. “Musical Patronage at the Royal Court of France under Charles vii and Louis xi (1422–​83).” Journal of the American Musicological Society 37, no. 3 (1984): 507–​66. Pesce, Dolores. “Guido d’Arezzo, Ut Queant Laxis, and Musical Understanding.” In Music Education in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, edited by Russell E. Murray, Jr., Susan Forscher Weiss, and Cynthia J. Cyrus, 25–​36. Bloomington: Indiana University Press 2010. Piperno, Franco, Biagi Ravenni, Gabriella, and Chegai, Andrea, eds. Cappelle Musicali Fra Corte, Stato e Chiesa Nell’Italia Del Rinascimento, Atti del Convegno internazionale (Camaiore, 21–​23 ottobre 2005). Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2005. Reese, Gustave, Jan LaRue, and Martin Bernstein, eds. Aspects of Medieval and Renaissance Music: A Birthday Offering to Gustave Reese. New York: Norton & C, 1967. Reynolds, Christopher. “Musical Careers, Ecclesiastical Benefices, and the Example of Johannes Brunet.” Journal of the American Musicological Society 37, no. 1 (1 April 1984): 49–​97. Rodin, Jesse, Busse Berger, and Anna Maria eds. The Cambridge History of Fifteenth-​ Century Music. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. Romano, Egidio. Il Livro del governamento dei re e dei principi: secondo il codice bncf 2.4.129. Edited by Fiammetta Papi. Vol. i. Pisa: ets, 2016. Schuh, Maximilian. “Student Mobilities and Masculinities: The Case of the Empire North of the Alps in the Fifteenth Century.” In Travels and Mobilities in the Middle Ages. From the Atlantic to the Black Sea, edited by Marianne O’Doherty and Felicitas Schmieder, 245–​263. Thurnout: Brepols, 2015. Sherr, Richard. Music and Musicians in Renaissance Rome and Other Courts. London: Routledge, 2019. Tinctoris,Johannes. Diffinitorium Musice: Un Dizionario Di Musica per Beatrice d’Aragona, edited by Cecilia Panti. Florence: sismel Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2004. Université de Paris. Rotuli Parisienses: supplications to the Pope from the University of Paris . Volume i . 1316–​1349, edited by William J. Courtenay. Education and society in the Middle Ages and Renaissance. Leiden-​Boston: Brill, 2002. Victore, Hugo de Sancto. Hugonis de Sancto Victore Didascalicon De Studio Legendi: A Critical Text, edited by Charles Henry Buttimer. Vol. 2. Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Latin Language and Literature. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1939. Wegman, Rob C. “‘Musical Understanding’ in the 15th Century.” Early Music 30, no. 1 (2002): 47–​66.

­c hapter 3

Jesuit Education in Colonial Brazil, 1549–​1759 An Overview

Carolina Vaz de Carvalho Endorsed by the Lusitanian Crown, the fathers and brothers of the old Society of Jesus would remain in the territories of present-​day Brazil for 210 years, from the early stages of Portuguese colonial occupation until their banishment from these lands in 1759.1 Among their apostolates, Jesuit pedagogic undertakings had a long-​lasting impact on the organization and consolidation of the society formed by European settlers and the many peoples they either integrated or subjugated. This essay aims at offering an overview of Jesuit educational endeavors in Colonial Brazil, with particular attention to the diversity of institutions and strategies developed to gather different segments of the Society. It begins with a few remarks concerning the Portuguese expansionist enterprise and its association with the Jesuits, while dealing with the first Jesuit educational establishments and practices, which were mainly devoted to teaching and catechizing indigenous peoples. The following section highlights the particularities of the missionary vocation of the later colleges of the Society in the colonial context and their role in the instruction of Jesuit candidates and recruits. The shift in the Jesuit pedagogic effort towards favoring the formal education of European settlers in the several Jesuit institutions is discussed next. The paper concludes with a brief final assessment of the subject.

1 This research benefited from the support of the São Paulo Research Foundation, grants #2020/​14862–​8 and #2019/​21595–​9. For their invaluable assistance and contributions, the author would like to thank Dr. David Salomoni, Università per Stranieri di Siena Prof. Dr. Ana Paula Torres Megiani, University of São Paulo; Prof. Dr. René Lommez Gomes, Federal University of Minas Gerais; Prof. Dr. Martín M. Morales, S.J., and Dr. Irene Pedretti, Historical Archives of the Pontifical Gregorian University; Dr. Lorenzo Mancini, National Research Institute, Italy; Verônica Calsoni Lima, University of São Paulo; and Jonathan Portela, State University of Campinas.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2024 | DOI:10.1163/9789004680234_005

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Preliminary Observations

Although not passively nor unanimously accepted, Portugal’s official dominion over the invaded territories that comprise nowadays Brazil spanned from their first recorded arrival on 22 April 1500, to Brazilian formal independence through a process of negotiations that lasted years but is generally celebrated as taking place on September 7th, 1822. After a few decades of relative neglect and a largely failed attempt of promoting colonization through a system of captaincies in the 1530s, more centralized and intensive efforts from the Portuguese Crown to explore these territories can be said to have begun almost five decades after their initial claim to the land when the office of a Governor-​General and a political-​administrative system over what thereby became the State of Brazil were established, at the end of 1548.2 The State of Brazil would exist as a political and administrative entity, albeit with changing borders, until 1815, when it was elevated to the category of kingdom as part of the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil, and the Algarves. From 1621 to 1772, a portion of the State of Brazil became a separate administrative unity directly subordinate to the Crown in Lisbon. It was subsequently called the State of Maranhão (1621–​1654), the State of Maranhão and Grão-​Pará (1654–​1751), and, finally, the State of Grão-​Pará and Maranhão (1751–​1772), until it was further dismembered. These administrative divisions of the territory implemented by the Portuguese Crown corresponded geographically, but not chronologically, to the divisions that delimited the activities of the Society of Jesus. The Provincia Brasiliae of the Jesuit Lusitanian Assistancy would be instituted in 1552, virtually encompassing all the area of what was then the State of Brazil and, afterward, also the State of Maranhão and Grão Pará, until the Vice Provincia Maragnonensis became a separate entity within the same assistancy in 1727, corresponding to what was previously known as the Jesuit Mission of Maranhão. The early and lasting associations between the Portuguese Crown and the Society are well-​known. The Jesuits caught the attention of King John iii of Portugal even before papal approval was granted to the order, and they would benefit from royal support until the change of winds that led to their expulsion from all Portuguese territories in 1759 and, ultimately, to the Society’s

2 Pedro Puntoni, “O governo geral e o Estado do Brasil: poderes intermédios e administração (1549–​1720),” in “O Estado do Brasil: Poder e política na Bahia colonial –​1548–​1700” (habilitation thesis, Universidade de São Paulo, 2010), 31–​32.

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suppression by Pope Clement xiv in 1773.3 Through the institution of the Padroado, especially in its application extra territorium as juridically configurated by a series of papal bulls through the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, Jesuits were integrated into the Lusitanian expansionist endeavors.4 In providing for the organization, installation, and sustainment of missionaries, Portugal carried out its religious duties as a Catholic monarchy, while the presence of regular and secular members of the Church to attend both to Catholic communities and promote the conversion of non-​Catholic populations could contribute to some degree of social integration and control in Portuguese overseas settlements. As it was clearly summarized by Layla Jorge Teixeira Cesar, since the Lusitanian Crown intended to populate the Brazilian colony with the inhabitants of the land, indigenous peoples needed to be converted to Catholicism, learn specific crafts, and receive basic military training to become proper Portuguese subjects.5 Circulation of news of successful campaigns, such as that of Francis Xavier in Asia, helped to solidify the missionary vocation within the Society and reinforced the general perception of the order’s aptitude for the task of contacting and converting the Gentios [“Gentile”], as native populations from Brazil were often denoted. Furthermore, Jesuit commitment to education, following the precepts issued from the Council of Trent, could advance their aims of both “civilizing” the sylvan Amerindians and moderating the unruly European colonists.6 Education, 3 4

5

6

Dauril Alden, The Making of an Enterprise: The Society of Jesus in Portugal and Its Empire, and Beyond: 1540–​1750 (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1996). A recent, broad synthesis of the early modern Portuguese Padroado, in its specificity through time and in comparison to the Castilian Patronato, is presented by Ângela Barreto Xavier and Fernanda Olival, “O padroado da coroa de Portugal: fundamentos e práticas,” in Monarquias Ibéricas em Perspectiva Comparada (séculos xvi–​x viii), org. Ângela Barreto Xavier, Federico Palomo, and Roberta Stumpf (Lisboa: Imprensa de Ciências Sociais, 2018), 123–​160, http://​hdl​.han​dle​.net​/10451​/37540​. Layla Jorge Teixeira Cesar, “Indigenous Peoples and Colonial Early Modern Education in Brazil,” in Education beyond Europe, ed. Cristiano Casalini, Edward Choi, and Ayenachew A. Woldegiyorgis (Leiden-​Boston: Brill, 2021), 204–​205, https://​doi​.org​/10​.1163​/978900​ 4441​477​_​011; André Marcio Picanço Favacho, “O recolhimento dos meninos: por uma genealogia da ordem pedagógica brasileira” (PhD. diss., University of São Paulo, 2008), 131, https://doi.org/10.11606/T.48.2008.tde-07102008-142332; Serafim Leite, História da Companhia de Jesus no Brasil (São Paulo: Edições Loyola, 2004), 6:615. Dauril Alden (Making, 16) argues that the proceedings from the Council of Trent, which “urged Church leaders to promote education as a means of encouraging and solidifying knowledge of the faith,” may have been a factor in shifting Loyola’s initial reticence in regards to the involvement of the Jesuits in educating laypeople. Other possible reasons mentioned by the author were the role of educational establishment as recruitment centers for the order, as shown by the well-​solidified example of Dominican and Franciscan

50 

Vaz de Carvalho

as Cesar argues, can be considered one of the strongest forms of “fabrication of ideology,” that is, “the redundant imposition, through varied media, of the basic propositions that constitute the hegemonic order,” which would be as important to guarantee the stability of the colony as was physical violence.7 Not only the pedagogical activities carried out by Jesuit missionaries, but also their commitment to promoting “moral uniformity” among Portuguese settlers,8 as well as their effort to materially reproduce Christian European society in the tropics,9 could constitute strategies for the fabrication of such an ideology. Although the Jesuits were neither the first nor the only religious order to provide some sort of teaching in Colonial Brazil –​Franciscans, Capuchins, Carmelites, Mercedarians, and Benedictines were likewise active in these territories under Portuguese jurisdiction10 ‒, the pedagogical endeavors of the Society seemed to be the most ubiquitous and hold to this day a preeminent position in the historiography of education in Brazil. Notwithstanding the mutual advantages of the alliance between the Portuguese Crown and the Society of Jesus, some points of dissent would arise in their dealings, of which two might be considered to have particular consequences for the topic at hand. National identities or allegiances, as Luke Clossey highlights, were one such source of conflict.11 The diverse origins of their members were recognized by the Jesuits as an obstacle to internal unity, as alignment with the interests of one’s homeland and suspicions against foreigners were common cultural traits of the time. Deliberate efforts were made within the order to promote the presence and amicable cooperation of men

7 8 9

10 11

colleges, and an increasing awareness of the necessity and benefit of further education in a progressively urbanized Europe. In December 1551 the Superior General would issue a circular announcement asserting the consistency of the apostolate of education with the Society’s missions and encouraging the establishment of institutions modeled after the Roman College. Cesar, “Indigenous Peoples,” 204. Bruno Martins Boto Leite, “A biblioteca do antigo Colégio dos Jesuítas no Rio de Janeiro,” Anais da Biblioteca Nacional 130 (2010): 257. As Mark L. Grover states, “Jesuit experiences in Brazil involved building European-​like settlements, insistence on European-​style clothing, and the strict use of European methods of education.” “The Book and the Conquest: Jesuit Libraries in Colonial Brazil,” Libraries & Culture 28, n. 3 (Summer 1995): 266. Jane Elisa Otomar Buecke, “Pedagogia jesuítica na Amazônia colonial: teoria e prática,” in Anais do vii Encontro Internacional de História Colonial, org. Carmen Margarida Oliveira Alveal et al. (Mossoró, RN: eduern, 2018), 377; Cesar, “Indigenous Peoples,” 204. Luke Clossey, Salvation and Globalization in the Early Jesuit Missions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008): 58–​63.

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from different nations in their missions and operations.12 Nonetheless, distrust of outlanders was incorporated into State policies and several restrictions on access to Portuguese overseas territories were imposed, from which missionaries were not exempt. There was a tacit understanding that Jesuits from other origins should never outnumber the Portuguese in the State of Brazil, which led to the refusal of specific candidates for these missions even in the face of the chronic deficiency of “vocations” that jeopardized the continuity of the order’s many activities.13 This suspicion would extend even to the “naturals of the land” –​the admittance of those born in the states of Brazil and of Maranhão and Grão-​Pará, either of Portuguese, Amerindian or mixed descent, would be subject to disputes and negotiations throughout the period of Jesuit presence in these lands.14 Another cause of friction was the exploitation of Amerindians’ forced labor and their enslavement, which placed the Jesuits in opposition to the 12 Alden, Making, 109; 267–​272; Clossey, Salvation and Globalization, 60; Eliane C. Deckmann Fleck and Marcio Amantino, “Uma só ordem religiosa, duas coroas: os colégios da Companhia de Jesus do Rio de Janeiro e de Córdoba (séculos xvii-​x viii),” Antítese 7, n. 14 (July-​December 2014): 444, http://​dx​.doi​.org​/10​.5433​/1984​-3356​.2014v7​n14p​442​. This topic was addressed by Fr. Gil González Dávila, Superior of the Andalusia Province between 1585 and 1588, in the reflection exercises he promoted among his confreres around that period: “[…] por ser la Compañía esparcida por todo el mundo; que no es religión para una provincia o un reino, mas la vemos derramada por toda parte; y por estar tan lejos unos de otros, es más difícil el conocerse y comunicarse. Juntamente abraza diversas naciones; en muchas de ellas hay oposición y contrariedad, y no es tan fácil quitar la aversión con que el hombre nace y se cría perpetuamente: 22 lenguas diferentes he visto en el Colegio Romano. Ved cuán difícil será unir tanta diversidad: que mire el español al francés, y no como a francés, sino como a hijo de su madre, de la Compañía, hermano de nuestro hermano mayor Cristo Nuestro Señor. En la misma fundación de la Compañía unió Nuestro Señor diversas naciones; y el Padre Ignacio, en todas las empresas nuevas que comenzaba, seguía este mismo espíritu.” González Dávila, “Plática 46,” in Pláticas sobre las Reglas de la Compañía de Jesús, intro. and notes by Camilo Maria Abad (Barcelona: Juan Flors, Editor, 1964), 594–​595. 13 Leite, História da Companhia, 7:34. Hostility between nations is considered by Leite to be at the root of conflicts both internal to the order and in its relations with colonial society (7:34–​37). Suspicions of espionage led to banning Spanish, French, or English Jesuits from being appointed to the Province of Brazil, whereas only Italian, Portuguese and German candidates would be considered for the Eastern stations of the Portuguese Assistancy around 1575 (2:362). By 1684, a royal decree forbade non-​Portuguese Jesuits from being appointed to certain roles within the Society in Brazil, including the role of Provincial (7:36). 14 Rafael Chambouleyron, Karl Heins Arenz, and Raimundo Moreira das Neves Neto, “‘Quem doutrine e ensine os filhos daqueles moradores’: A Companhia de Jesus, seus colégios e o ensino na Amazônia colonial,” Revista histedbr On-​line, special number (October 2011): 68–​69, https://​doi​.org​/10​.20396​/rho​.v11i​43e​.8639​954; Leite 2:360–​362; 7:86–​87.

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Portuguese settlers. Dauril Alden remarks that this was one of the very few topics on which the Fathers of the Portuguese Assistancy openly disagreed with the prevalent opinion of the Lusitanian elites.15 Since Jesuit missionaries shared with European colonists a set of preconceptions that informed their positive and negative views of the natives of America, they generally agreed on some basic premises –​a paternalistic conception of indigenous peoples as vulnerable and deprived of full capacity; the conviction that the natives had no right to oppose by force to the “pacific occupation” of their territories by the Europeans, nor to reject evangelization; and the certainty that to these ends of territorial occupation and spiritual salvation their subjugation was justified.16 The already mentioned project of catechizing and “civilizing” the Amerindians to make them into “useful vassals,” contributing as workforce in favor of the settlers’ enterprises and joining in military defense of the lands, was a consensus.17 The core of the strife between the members of the Society and their opposers was, in essence, a disagreement on what should be the primary concern of the colonial endeavor: the evangelization of indigenous populations or the economic development benefiting the settlers and the Kingdom. The employment of Amerindians in the colonists’ farms and on varied other trades for extended periods meant their displacement from the villages and missions where the Jesuits conducted their catechetic and pedagogic activities, hindering their progress. Furthermore, the missionaries considered the colonists’ treatment of indigenous people to be “immoral, unjust, and inhumane,” frequently denouncing the abuses and violations of the legislation regulating work relations and enslavement of Amerindians.18 From the settlers’ perspective, the Jesuits, in defending the “liberty” of the natives, were actively denying rightful laborers for colonial operations, while exclusively benefiting from this workforce in the Society’s enterprises. This asymmetry of perceptions led in many occasions to open confrontation and to several temporary 15 Alden, Making, 474. 16 Favacho, “O recolhimento,” 174–​179; Alden, Making, 500. 17 Beatriz Perrone-​Moisés, “Índios livres e índios escravos. Os princípios da legislação indigenista no período colonial (séculos xvi a xviii),” in História dos índios no Brasil, 2nd ed., org. Manuela Carneiro da Cunha (São Paulo: Companhia das Letras; Secretaria Municipal de Cultura; fapesp, 1998), 118; Leite, História da Companhia, 6:615. The expression “useful vassals,” as observed by Perrone-​Moisés, was of common use in the documents of the eighteenth century. 18 Alden, Making, 474, 479–​480; Jonas Araújo da Cunha, “Luzes apagadas: A educação escolar indígena na Amazônia colonial” (PhD diss., University of São Paulo, 2018), 99–​103, https://​doi​.org​/10​.11606​/T​.48​.2019​.tde​-14122​018​-093​140; Cesar, “Indigenous Peoples,” 208; Perrone-​Moisés, “Índios livres,” 120–​123.

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banishments of the missionaries from particular regions.19 The Crown tried to accommodate both interests, favoring one side or another at different times, as can be gauged by the changing legislation and the efforts to implement it, or occasional lack thereof.20 Ultimately, local negotiations on the issue were constant, as a number of factors could tip the balance of forces. 2

Beginnings: Pedagogia Brasílica, Improvisation, Experiments, and Disputes

The first six Jesuit missionaries led by Fr. Manuel da Nóbrega sailed into Salvador, Bahia, on March 29th, 1549, in the same fleet that brought the first appointed Governor-​General of the State of Brazil, Tomé de Souza, along with about 400 soldiers, 600 exiled convicts (degredados) and “many mechanics.”21 The number of Jesuits active in Brazil would increase progressively, in spite of 19 Alden, Making, 224–​226, 480–​481, 484–​491; Araujo da Cunha, “Luzes apagadas,” 100. In a letter written from the College of Bahia on 25 July 1583, Fr. Cristóvão de Gouveia, Visitor to the Brazilian Province, reports to Superior General Claudio Aquaviva that there were four main reasons for the “murmurs” of the Portuguese against the members of the Company: firstly, the opinions expressed by some Jesuits against the captivity and enslavement of the indigenous peoples; secondly, the “seclusion” (recolhimento) of Amerindians in the Jesuit aldeias (Amerindian settlements under European administration); thirdly, Jesuit refusal in lending to colonists all the natives requested to work in their farms; and, finally, a few claims of possession of lands donated to the Jesuits. arsi Lus. 68, fl. 338v, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, quoted in Marcos Roberto de Faria, “A organização de um corpo disperso: uma análise da atividade jesuítica em terras brasílicas (1583),” Revista Brasileira de Educação 19, n. 57 (April-​June 2014): 423–​424, https://​doi​.org​ /10​.1590​/S1413​-247820​1400​0200​008​. 20 Beatriz Perrone-​Moisés (“Índios livres”), offers an overview of the several legislative instruments that regulated relations with indigenous populations in Colonial Brazil, with particular attention to the fundamental juridic categories present in them. Her analysis highlights the distinction between enemy indigenous groups and allied or friendly groups, which framed the legislation and the interactions between European settlers and the natives. 21 Alden, Making, 71; Leonor Lopes Fávero and Thiago Zilio Passerini, “210 anos de educação jesuítica: o ensino de línguas na babel brasílica,” Confluência: Revista do Instituto de Língua Portuguesa, n. extra (Especial 30 anos, June 2021): 204, https://​doi​.org​/10​.18364​/rc​ .2021n​Esp​.447; A. J. R. Russell-​Wood, Um mundo em movimento: os portugueses na África, Ásia e América (1415–​1808) (Algés: difel, 1998), 132. According to the information compiled by Serafim Leite (História da Companhia, 1:204), the six Jesuits were Fr. Manoel da Nóbrega, Fr. António Pires, Fr. Leonardo Nunes, Fr. João de Azpilcueta Navarro, Br. Vicente Rodrigues and Br. Diogo Jácome, all Portuguese with the exception of the Navarrese Azpilcueta.

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momentary setbacks, rising to almost 170 members of the order at the onset of the seventeenth century and reaching approximately 590 religious in 1749, just a decade before their banishment ‒ 445 in the Brazilian Province and 145 in the Vice-​Province of Maranhão.22 Around mid-​April of 1549 their earliest educational undertaking was initiated in the city of Salvador. It was an “abc house” within the local Jesuit residence, where Br. Vincente Rodrigues taught a class in reading and writing Latin for “orphans of the land” ‒ that is, children of Portuguese fathers and Amerindian mothers with dubious status in colonial society ‒ and for a few orphans who sailed from Portugal to be raised by the Jesuits and incorporated into the activities of the order.23 Before long, similar teaching activities would be carried out at the Jesuit residences in São Vicente, São Paulo do Piratininga, Olinda, and Espírito Santo,24 becoming a common practice in the establishments of the Society. Most efforts at this moment, however, were devoted to converting and indoctrinating indigenous groups. Contact with target communities was initially established with the aid of línguas (translators) through itinerant expeditions and visits, with some parallels to the practices that would be carried out in the “Interior missions” in Europe.25 During these visits, missionaries would

22

23

24

25

The data for 1749 is taken from Alfred Hamy, S.J., Documents pour servir a l’histoire des domiciles de la Compagnie de Jésus dans le monde entier de 1540 a 1773 (Paris: Alphonse Picard, Libraire, 1892), 6, 8. Alden gives conflicting figures (169 and 167) for the number of Jesuits in the Province of Brazil in the year 1600 (Making, 74, 219). The author provides tabulated data series on the growth of the Society on pages 74 (Province of Brazil), 219–​ 220 (Provinces of Goa and Brazil) and 598–​599 (Province of Brazil and Vice-​Province of Maranhão), according to which the Jesuits could have numbered over 620 before their expulsion. Ferreira Jr. and Bittar, “Artes liberais e ofícios mecânicos nos colégios jesuíticos do Brasil colônia,” Revista Brasileira de Educação 17, n. 51 (September-​December 2012): 699, https: //​doi​.org​/10​.1590​/S1413​-247820​1200​0300​012; Grover, “Book and Conquest”: 269; Karl Lorenz, “Introduction to Jesuit Pedagogy in Colonial Brazil. Humanist Education and the Ratio Studiorum,” Cadernos de História da Educação, 17, n. 1 (January-​April 2018): 29, https://​doi​.org​/10​.14393​/che​-v17n1​-2018​-3​. M. Ap. Custódio and M.L. Hilsdolf, “O Colégio Dos Jesuítas De São Paulo (Que Não Era Colégio Nem Se Chamava São Paulo),” Revista Do Instituto De Estudos Brasileiros, n. 39 (December 1995): 174–​176, https://​doi​.org​/10​.11606​/issn​.2316​-901X​.v0i39p​169​-180; Leite, História da Companhia, 1:87, 1:161; 6:461. Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 205; Leite, História da Companhia, 2: 234. The discussion surrounding similarities and specificities of catholic interior and foreign missions permeates the volume edited by Pierre-​Antoine Fabre and Bernard Vincent, and is particularly addressed in the contribution by Marie-​Lucie Copete and Bernard Vincent, “Missions en Béatique. Pour une typologie des missions intérieures,” in Missions religieuses modernes.

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put on dramatic representations, teach a few words in Portuguese, learn something of the native languages and habits, and exchange gifts. Soon, catechetical, and pedagogic activities for the Amerindians would also be organized around more fixed settings. As a long-​lasting policy of the Portuguese government, allied indigenous communities were encouraged to establish themselves closer to Lusitanian settlements, in aldeias (“villages”) organized in a European fashion, where they would be subject to Portuguese administration.26 The Jesuits would become prominent actors in the process of contacting and convincing native groups to move into aldeias, and would be charged with the spiritual, sometimes also temporal, administration of most of these communities. Additionally, the Society would organize boys’ houses (casas de meninos), retreats (recolhimentos), or abc houses (casas de bê-​a-​bá), where male children from Amerindian parentage would be accommodated, initially together with the orphans from Lisbon and “of the land.”27 Teaching in these premises would follow the guidelines of what became known as the pedagogia brasílica: learning would begin with spoken Portuguese, followed by the introduction of the Christian doctrine, and reading and writing, optionally complemented by choral singing and instrumental music. Both native and Portuguese languages would be largely employed, with native languages being favored in initial indoctrination. To this end, the missionaries would translate catechisms and elaborate “vocabularies” as aids to their confreres, who would orally impart the lessons to the neophytes.28 ‘Notre lieu est le monde’, ed. Fabre and Vincent (Rome: École Française de Rome, 2007), 261–​285. 26 Perrone-​Moisés, “Índios livres,” 118–​120. Serafim Leite briefly discusses the differences between Jesuit aldeias in the Portuguese and in the Spanish Assistancies in História da Companhia, 6:615. 27 Both the aldeias and the boys’ houses, as well as other establishments and activities, could be referred to by the term “missions.” The polysemy of this word as used by the Jesuits in the early modern period ‒ alternatively referring to a specific place or region, the expeditions of the so-​called missionaries, the activities carried out by these missionaries, the target public of such actions, or a particular kind of religious experience ‒ is a topic addressed in the scholarship. See, for instance, Bernard Dompnier, “Commentaires,” in Missions religieuses modernes. ‘Notre lieu est le monde’, ed. Pierre-​Antoine Fabre and Bernard Vincent (Rome: École Française de Rome, 2007), 311; Charlotte Castelnau-​L’Estoile, Marie-​Lucie Copete, Aliocha Maldavsky and Ines G. Županov, “Introduction,” in Missions d’évangélisation et circulation des savoirs xvie –​x viiie siècle, org. Charlotte Castelnau-​L’Estoile, Marie-​ Lucie Copete, Aliocha Maldavsky and Ines G. Županov (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez, 2011), 2; Clossey, Salvation and Globalization, 14–​15. 28 Leite, História da Compania, 2:233, 5:392–​394; Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 211–​213; Maria Cândida Drumond Mendes Barros, “A relação entre manuscritos e impressos em tupi como forma de estudo a política linguística jesuítica no século xviii na Amazônia,”

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Indigenous habits and traditions would be ridiculed, particularly in the lessons directed to the children. Mechanical arts practiced by the Jesuits themselves would also be taught to the settled Amerindians. The pedagogia brasílica ideally culminated in lessons of Latin grammar. The initial optimism of the missionaries, fueled by reports of massive conversions in the East Indies and by the apparent receptivity of the Amerindians to the Christian message, would soon wane. Frustrated by the “inconstancy” of the natives in matters of faith and habits, a largely employed trope frequently found in the sermons and letters of Fr. Antônio Vieira,29 Jesuits would subscribe to the use of violent strategies to coerce these peoples to adhere to European customs and values.30 More efforts would be devoted to the education and indoctrination of the children, perceived as more prone to assimilating their religious teachings. Among the youngsters, only the most talented would then be singled out to receive instruction beyond the first letters.31 Both the experimental quality of the pedagogia brasílica and the radical shift in approach in the face of unfulfilled over-​optimistic expectations evince a general character of improvisation that marked the earliest pedagogical endeavors of the Society of Jesus in the Provincia Brasiliae, when no established set of rules or guidelines for their educational activities were available. Writing from São Paulo do Piratininga in 1556, Fr. Manuel da Nóbrega opens a letter addressed to the Superior General Ignatius of Loyola stating: “we have come, and until now we have lived without law or rule, but we will work to conform

29 30 31

Revista Letras, n. 61 (2003): 132–​133, http://​dx​.doi​.org​/10​.5380​/rel​.v61i0​.2884​. On the topic of Tupi language in the scope of Jesuit novices’ education, see the discussion below in the session “’For mission purposes’: rationale for Jesuit Colleges in Colonial Brazil.” Fr. João de Azpilcueta Navarro would be the first charged with the task of registering “the sentences and sermons of the land” (report from Fr. Antônio Pires, sj, 2 August 1551, quoted in Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 211). The catechism of the Portuguese Jesuit Fr. Marcos Jorge, published from 1566 in multiple editions, would be used throughout the overseas missions of the Portuguese Assistancy, adapted to the local languages. In the Brazilian Province, it would be translated to Tupi by Fr. Leonardo do Vale in 1574 (Barros, “A relação,”: 130–​131; Leite, História da Companhia, 2:392). Leite (2:393) asserts that Fr. Luiz da Grã had elaborated a catechism in “Brazilic language” around 1560, titled “Diálogo ou Suma da Fé,” which would have circulated in manuscript form. Barros (132–​133) underlines that these catechisms in native languages were elaborated to be read primarily by the missionaries themselves, as Amerindian neophytes were expected to learn the basics of the Christian doctrine within their first two years residing in the aldeias, and oral transmission of knowledge would be a more familiar form of education to them (132–​133). Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, The Inconstancy of the Indian Soul: The Encounter of Catholics and Cannibals in 16th-​century Brazil (Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press, 2011), 4–​8. Cesar, “Indigenous Peoples”: 207–​208. Araújo da Cunha, “Luzes apagadas,” 59.

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ourselves to what we had seen in the college, and, as we had been there briefly, we knew little.”32 Only around that time, seven years after the arrival of the initial group of missionaries, an early version of the Constitutions of the order, with broad instructions on the matter of education, would be available on the land.33 It is not fortuitous, therefore, that a well-​accepted chronological perspective on the participation of the Jesuits in education in Colonial Brazil proposes a division in two periods ‒ the “heroic period,” from their arrival in 1549 to 1599, and the “consolidation period,” from 1599 to their expulsion in 1759 ‒ delimited by the year when the final version of the Ratio Studiorum, which aimed at standardizing the order’s pedagogical practices, was issued.34 Until the more elaborate guidelines of the Ratio were defined, decisions were made ad hoc based on communication with the superiors in Europe through correspondence or by the intervention of designated visitors. Fr. Inácio de Azevedo, the first visitor sent to Brazil in 1566, would be charged with, among other things, overseeing the enforcement of the rules and decrees issued from the first General Congregation of 1558.35 A copy of the final version of the Constitutions along with a volume of Decrees and Bulls would be given to the Procurator of Brazil at Rome on 20 June 1575, and Fr. Cristóvão de Gouveia, the second visitor to the Province from 1583, would be responsible for providing adaptations and complements with regards to the local conditions.36 The uncertainties of the heroic period are at the root of internal conflicts and disputes which involved the foundation and maintenance of educational 32

33 34

35 36

“Saberá V. P. como a estas partes me mandaram os padres e irmãos, que viemos, e até agora vivemos sem lei nem regra, mas que trabalharemos de nos conformar, com o que haviamos visto no collegio, e, como n’elle haviamos estado pouco, sabiamos pouco.” Fr. Manoel da Nóbrega to Superior General Fr. Ignatius of Loyola, São Paulo do Piratininga, ca. January-​May 1556. Published in Revista Trimensal do Instituto Historico Geographico e Ethnographico do Brasil 43, part 1 (1880): 113. https://​www​.ihgb​.org​.br​/publ​icac​oes​/revi​ sta​-ihgb​/item​/107​753​-revi​sta​-ihgb​-tomo​-xliii​-parte​-i​.html​. Marisa Bittar and Amarilio Ferreira Jr., “Casas de bê-​a-​bá e colégios jesuíticos no Brasil do século 16,” Em Aberto, 21, n. 78 (December 2007): 35, https://​per​iodi​cos​.ufrn​.br​/educac​ aoem​ques​tao​/arti​cle​/view​/8362​. Bittar and Ferreira Jr, “Casas”: 35–​36; Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 203. Marisa Bittar and Amarilio Ferreira Jr. (36–​37) propose a further division of the heroic period into three phases: from 1549 to 1556, when most efforts were directed towards catechetical activities for the Amerindian population; between 1556 and 1570, when pedagogic endeavors were intertwined with disputes concerning the interpretation of the Constitutions (see discussion below); and after 1570, when schools and colleges catering to Portuguese colonists prevailed over the abc houses for indigenous children. Fr. Inácio de Azevedo to Superior General Fr. Francisco de Borja, Bahia, 10 November 1566, quoted in Leite, História da Companhia, 2:355. Leite, 2:355.

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facilities by the Society. Fr. Luis da Grã, who arrived in Brazil in 1553 as a delegate from the Portuguese Province and would become the Brazilian Provincial in 1559, directly opposed his confrere and predecessor in the office, Fr. Nóbrega, on many issues of secular affairs, particularly concerning abc houses and colleges. The Jesuit Constitutions typified two kinds of residential establishments: the house (domus), where Professed members of the order would live, preach, and administer the sacraments, and the college (collegium), initially conceived as a domicile for scholastic Jesuits attending universities.37 In accordance to the vote of poverty of the Society, the houses were to be maintained exclusively by alms and voluntary contributions. Differently, an exception was made to allow for the acceptance of endowments and fixed incomes by the colleges, since scholastics, their masters, and other residents would be occupied with educational duties. As the educational apostolate grew in importance within the order, the teaching of the Humane Letters, Philosophy, and Theology to external pupils would be encouraged, and the Jesuits would eventually run many institutions devoted to the education of the general public. From a mainly residential establishment, Jesuit colleges would, in time, assume a double role as teaching facilities and as regional centers for the coordination and sustainment of other activities of the Society, entailing a higher level of formal organization and management in their establishment and operation. Given the material constraints of the colonial context and the earliness of these endeavors, the first Jesuit facilities in the State of Brazil had a hybrid nature, being called to fulfill functions of both residences and colleges. That undefined character, however, meant room for questioning regarding their proper running. Fr. Nóbrega would defend the paramount importance of the abc houses as loci of dissemination of the Christian faith, asserting their essential role in the mission of catechizing the “gentiles,” and would advocate for the need to guarantee their economic support on the triple basis of land ownership, slave labor, and livestock, in spite of the “scandal” that involvement in such worldly business could represent. Fr. Grã, on the contrary, would denounce that the ownership of real estate by such establishments was against the rules of the Society, arguing that they should be immediately closed down and actual colleges established in their place. Taken to the higher instances, the dispute was adjudicated in favor of Nóbrega in 1562, when the Superior General Fr. Diego Laynez expressed his opinion supporting the maintenance of these boys’ houses through the necessary financial means, even slave ownership. In 37 Alden, Making, 18; Charles E. O’Neill and Joaquín Mª Domínguez, eds., Diccionario Histórico de la Compañía de Jesús (Roma: Institutum Historicum, s.i.; Madrid: Universidad Pontificia Comillas, 2001) 1:678.

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spite of the official ruling, the conflict might have accelerated the institution of Jesuit colleges proper, which, in time, became the leading educational facilities in the colony.38 3

“For Mission Purposes”: Rationale for Jesuit Colleges in Colonial Brazil

There was, nonetheless, a prime difference in the foundations for the establishment of Jesuit Colleges in the State of Brazil in comparison to the facilities in “the Kingdom” (i.e., Continental Portugal) –​a difference that is patent in comparison to the Royal College of Arts and Humanities in Coimbra, which was under the administrative control of the Society since 1555 and was generally posited as the standard of excellency aspired by establishments in Portuguese America and elsewhere. A letter from King D. Sebastião I, dated 7 November 1564, clarifies that the Jesuits were sent to Brazil in order to “convert the infidels and gentiles from those parts” and to “instruct the newly-​converted” in the Christian doctrine, in conformity with the duties of the Padroado. In the document, residences and colleges are described as places of retreat or seclusion (recolhimento) for the members of the order “according to their Institute and Religion.”39 Another royal letter from 1568 ascribes similar duties to both the already established College of Salvador and the future College of São Vicente, to be funded and maintained by a new endowment as specified in the document. These institutions are characterized as headquarters from which the residing missionaries would set out to “convert the gentiles” and “teach Christian doctrine in the villages and towns” in the surrounding areas.40 A Consultation 38 39

Bittar and Ferreira Jr, “Casas”: 34–​44. “Padrão de Redizima de todos os dizimos e direitos que pertencerem a El-​Rei em todo o Brasil de que Sua alteza faz esmola pera sempre pera sustentação do collegio da Baya (1564),” passim, arsi Bras. 11, f. 70–​71v, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, fully transcribed in Leite, História da Companhia, 1:193–​194, Appendix B. 40 “registro do padrão do Dote dos Padres da Companhia de jesus,” Lisbon, 15 March 1568, published in Documentos Historicos, Biblioteca Nacional, Rio de Janeiro. v. 15, 1930, p. 18–​25, http://​memo​ria​.bn​.br​/pdf​/094​536​/per09​4536​_193​0​_00​015​.pdf:​“Man​dei que na Cidade do Salvador da Capitania da Bahia de todos os Santos se fundasse, e fizesse um Collegio dos Padres da Companhia de jesus, que ahi está principiado, em que houvesse numero de sessenta Religiosos para do dito Collegio poderem entender na conversão dos gentios, e irem ensinar a doutrina Christã nas aldeias, e povoações da dita Capitania, e das outras a ella mais propinquas […] hei por bem, que na Capitania de São Vicente se funde, e faça outro Collegio, em que possam residir e estar cincoenta Religiosos da dita Companhia para delle se poder entender na Conversão, e ensino da doutrina Christã na

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to the Overseas Council from 1689 is even more explicit on the matter of the obligations entailed by the royal endowment to the Jesuit colleges, stating that it was “out of charity” that the Society began teaching “Humanities and afterwards sciences” to the sons of local inhabitants.41 To use Serafim Leite’s expression, the subsidies to the masters of Jesuit colleges in Brazil were granted for “mission purposes,” whereas the subsidies to the Jesuit masters of the College of Coimbra were granted for “teaching purposes.”42 Therefore, the main obligations entailed in each case were not the same: forming the minds and spirits of young citizens, in Coimbra, producing “a certain kind of person” in the tradition of the humanist education,43 as opposed to maintaining and expanding the ecclesiastical body to guarantee the presence of the Church and the continuity of the missions of the Society of Jesus itself, in Colonial Brazil. Though, in practice, the distinction was never clear-​cut, the primary motivation for the early Jesuit classes of Latin Grammar, Humanities, and Rhetoric (studia inferiora, as defined by the Ratio studiorum), and the later courses of Philosophy and Theology (studia superiora) was, thus, the instruction of their members, since it was somewhat common for these religious to be sent to missions abroad at different stages in the long formation stipulated by the order.

Capitanias e povoações mais propinquas à dita Capitania de São Vicente […]. “(“registro do padrão do Dote”: 19)”. 41 “Consulta ao Conselho Ultramarino sobre os moços pardos da cidade da Bahia, que pedem se ordene aos religiosos da Companhia de Jesus os admitam nas suas escolas do Brasil sem embargo do seu nascimento e de sua cor,” Lisboa, 30 de Janeiro de 1689, cu 005–​02, Caixa 28, Doc. nº 3517–​3519, Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino, quoted in Bruno Martins Boto Leite, “Fábrica de intelectuais. O ensino de Artes nos Colégios jesuíticos do Brasil, 1572–​1759,” História Unisinos 24, n.1, (January-​April 2020): 23, https://​doi​.org​/10​ .4013​/hist​.2020​.241​.03:​“qua​ndo o sereníssimo senhor Rey Dom Sebastião mandou fundar os colégios do Brasil por provisão sua passada em Fevereiro de 568 se serviu aplicar três mil cruzados de sua real fazenda para o sustento de sessenta religiosos, que no da Bahia se haviam de ocupar na conversão da gentilidade e irem ensinar a doutrina escrita nas aldeias e povoações da quela capitania. Mas como o zelo da Companhia senão limitou só a reduzir os bárbaros à fé católica, por aquela obrigação compreendeu também livremente na sua doutrina e ensino aos filhos dos moradores que começaram habitar aquele Estado abrindo por caridade as primeiras escolas das Humanidades e depois das ciências em que não floresceram pouco os filhos do Brasil, cujos gênios e habilidades se perderiam se não tivessem a educação e exercício destas escolas.” 42 Leite, História da Companhia, 7:51. 43 John O’Malley, “Historical Perspective on Jesuit Education and Globalization,” in Jesuits and Globalization: Historical Legacies and Contemporary Challenges, ed. Thomas Banchoff and José Casanova (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2016), 150.

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The issue of the education of Jesuit candidates, novices, and scholastics in Colonial Brazil was tied to the so-​called “issue of vocations,” as their numbers, in spite of the impressive increase through time, were never enough to man all stations and undertake the itinerant expeditions to indigenous settlements and rural areas of the territories under their care.44 Besides constantly requesting more missionaries to be sent from Europe, Jesuits in the Province of Brazil and Vice-​Province of Maranhão took pains to provide adequate training to their confreres and recruits according to the standards set by the Constitutions and the Ratio, attempting to adapt as best as possible to the lack of the familiar structure and resources in the colonial context.45 To that end, a novitiate would be organized in Salvador in 1572 and another one in Rio de Janeiro in 1573. The Bahia novitiate, integrated into the Jesuit College of Salvador, would be appointed as the central novitiate of the province in 1596, although difficulties of various nature could sometimes prevent young Jesuits from joining it.46 The location of the Mission of Maranhão, later vice-​province, offered additional obstacles, as novices needed to travel either to Salvador or to “the Kingdom” at great expenses. The proposed creation of a local novitiate and “studies,” defended by Fr. Antonio Vieira since the 1650’s, would not be instituted until 1680, although the recruitment and training of candidates for the region would remain a matter of concern.47 Beyond the need to organize the novitiates, probation houses, and other absent structures, the specific context in which Jesuits were expected to act posed particular demands to be accommodated. One notable demand was

44 45

46

47

Regarding the number of Jesuits in colonial Brazil, see note 21, above. Lists of Jesuit missionaries inbound to the Province of Brazil and Vice-​Province of Maranhão are providade by Serafim Leite in História da Companhia, 1:204–​208; 4:131–​142; 6:633–​639. Serafim Leite (2:349–​350) discusses some of the challenges faced by the Jesuits in the Province of Brazil, especially in the sixteenth century, in instructing and training candidates, novices and young Jesuits “according to the Institute.” These included the difficulties to allow for segregated novice housing and classes, the formative experiences of hospital assistance, alms collecting, and pilgrimage, and the structure for the Third Probation. The letters from Visitor Fr. Cristóvão de Gouveia dated 1583–​1585, quoted by Faria (“A organização,” passim), similarly address many hindrances to the idealized education of potential and effective members of the order. Superior General Fr. Claudio Aquiaviva, 13 February 1596, arsi Bras. 2, f. 91, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, quoted in Leite, 2:350. It would not be until 1709 when constructions of the Novitiate of Our Lady of Annunciation (Nossa Senhora da Anunciada) at Giquitaia, outside the limits of the city, would begin and the novitiate would be physically dissociated from the College of Salvador, as prescribed in the rules of the order (Leite, 5:232–​233). Leite, 4:91–​92.

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the study of native languages, particularly the Tupi as codified by the Jesuits themselves since their first decades of activities in Brazil. It is estimated that between 360 and 1500 languages were probably spoken in the territories that would compose Colonial Brazil when the Portuguese first arrived, justifying the recurring image of Babel used by Fr. António Vieira to refer to the land.48 The Tupi that Fr. José de Anchieta and Fr. Luís Figueira would render into grammars, also called “Brazilic language” (língua brasílica) and, later, “general language” (língua geral), was an amalgam of several similar dialects in use along the Atlantic coast and the Paraná and Paraguay basins.49 It was considered not only as essential for catechizing, but also as the idiom through which alliances between colonists and Amerindians could be forged.50 Its use as a general language was partially furthered by the Jesuits themselves, as they would often employ it even when catechizing non-​Tupi Amerindians settled in aldeias.51 Although not all the members of the Ignatian order seemed equally inclined to learn it, knowledge of the Brazilic language became a requirement for the admission of young Jesuits in the Philosophy course.52 By 1556 Tupi was 48 49

50 51 52

Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 205, 219. Although the terms língua geral and língua brasílica are being employed in the singular, as they were used in the period, linguistic studies differentiate between as least three “general languages” developed over the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in the context of Portuguese and Spanish colonization of South America. See, for example, Aryon Dall’Igna Rodrigues, “As línguas gerais sul-​americanas,” papia: Revista Brasileira de Estudos Crioulos e Similares 4, n. 2 (1996): 6–​18, 1996, http://www.etnolinguistica.org/artigo:rodrigues-1996​. Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 215, 222. Fávero and Passerini, 215; Leite, Histórida da Companhia, 2:392. An extract from the letter of Visitor Fr. Cristóvão de Gouveia, written from the College of Bahia on 1 November 1584 to the Superior General Fr. Claudio Aquaviva, informs that the novices would not be admitted to further studies after the two years of probation unless they acquired at least a “mediocre” knowledge of the “language of the naturals,” although special exemption could be granted by the Provincial “auditus suis consultoribus.” arsi Lus. 68, f. 410–​411v, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, quoted in Faria, “A organização”: 429. As Faria shows (428), Fr. Gouveia’s initial opinion on the indispensability of learning Tupi would change in the course of the visitation, which began in May 1583. In the same letter, the Jesuit expresses his opinion that the obligation should be alleviated as “there are some who have neither age, nor ability, nor will for this” and who “could serve in other ministries, as procurators, confessors and superiors” without knowledge of the language. Some other reasons for the disregard for learning the língua brasílica listed by the Father Visitor were the lack of “specific vocation for Brazil” and the “many occupations” that prevented the Jesuits in formation from dedicating to their studies (Faria, 425, 430). Nonetheless, the requirement seemed to be still in effect by 1702, as a report from the Brazilian Province to the Missions’ Council in Lisbon stated that young Jesuit students resided in aldeias to learn the languages, without which they were not admitted to study Philosophy: “Em tôdas estas Aldeias assistem Padres; e em algumas Religiosos também Moços Estudantes para aprenderem a língua, sem a qual se não admitem a

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incorporated into the curriculum of the studia inferiora in place of Greek at the College of Bahia, possibly using manuscript copies of Anchieta’s Arte de grammatica da lingoa mais usada na costa do Brasil as textbook.53 It was sometimes designated “Greek of the land” or “Latin of the land,” and its importance was such that, for Jesuit candidates, fluency in Tupi could substitute for further studies in the promotions up the ranks of the Society.54 The learning of other Amerindian languages apparently never reached the same degree of formality as to be officially integrated into the curricula but were carried out according to necessity.55 Similarly, a concern for the mastery of the “language of Angola” arose with the increasing influx of enslaved Africans forcedly brought to the colonies, who, otherwise, could only be catechized after years in Brazil.56 From 1620, pupils from the Jesuit College of Luanda who aspired to join the Society were encouraged to move to the Brazilian Province to labor in indoctrinating and assisting newly-​arrived Africans. Fr. Pedro Dias’s Arte da Lingua de Angola,

53

54 55

56

estudar a Filosofia e são examinados por quatro examinadores e aprovados ou reprovados com juramento.” “Informação para a Junta das Missões de Lisboa,” Baía, 5 July 1702, arsi Bras. 10, f. 23–​26, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, reproduced in Leite, História da Companhia, 5:386. Leite, 2:392; Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 212. According to Leite (2:395), Anchieta’s Arte was considered confuse and not specially learner-​friendly, differently from Fr. Figueira’s later Arte de Grammatica da Lingua Brasílica, but was nonetheless used to provide some sort of method to the language acquisition. From 1574, the Tupi course at the College of Bahia would be interrupted and substituted by a period of residence in the Aldeias (Leite, 2:395; Faria, “A organização”: 423, 429), which entailed particular issues. A report from Visitor Fr. Manuel de Lima, dated 1610, informs that, by then, novices would study Tupi in their residence, beginning in the second year of novitiate (Gesuitici 1255, 14, f. 6v, Biblioteca Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele, Rome, cited in Leite, 2: 395). Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 212; Leite, História da Companhia, 2:395; Lorenz, “Introduction”: 35. For instance, Leite (4:122) mentions that Fr. Vieira prepared catechizing material in six languages while in the Mission of Maranhão –​that of the Tupi, Nheengaíba, Boca, Juruna, and two variants spoken by the Tapajó. In a different passage, Leite (2:396) discusses the elaboration of a catechism and vocabulary to communicate with the Maromomim in the coast of the Captaincy of São Vicente. Leite, 2:335–​336. In this passage, Leite informs that by 1584 the Jesuits in Salvador and Recife had the assistance of línguas to mediate their communication with the newly-​ arrived enslaved Africans. A letter from the Governor of Rio de Janeiro dated 1678, quoted by the author, reports the diligence of the Jesuits in attending to the ships that arrived from Angola “to animate those who come alive and to assist in the good death of those who come sick, who are many” –​which was only possible with a certain degree of mastery of their language –​, as well as to Jesuit efforts in catechizing and baptizing the enslaved Africans in the urban and rural areas (7:100–​101).

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published in Lisbon in 1697, would be explicitly intended for the use of his confreres in Brazil.57 4

The Consolidation of Jesuit Education in Colonial Brazil

Progressively, although not homogeneously, the main focus of the Jesuit pedagogical efforts would shift in response to transformations in the composition and organization of colonial society. The relative significance of indigenous peoples living in aldeias would decrease in many areas, as native populations were decimated or pressured into moving inland by war and diseases, at the same time that an increasing number of enslaved Africans became the main workforce in economic and domestic activities, including Jesuit-​owned farms, residences, and colleges. Their instruction in the Christian doctrine ‒ conceived, as in the case of Amerindians, both in favor of their spiritual salvation and as a means for their “pacification” and “civilization” ‒ would be initially assigned to slave-​owners themselves, though occasionally being carried out by the Society of Jesus and other religious together with the indoctrination of indigenous neophytes. Segregated “lessons” would later be organized, and in Jesuit establishments they could also receive instruction in music and crafts.58 Concurrently, expectations formally voiced by colonists reveal a tacit understanding that providing education at the local and regional levels became one of the duties of the Society.59 For instance, in 1715 the residents of the Village 57 58

59

Leite, 7:98, 100. Leite, 2:260, 2:335–​337; Ferreira Jr and Bittar, “Artes liberais”: 705–​707, 711. Serafim Leite informs that by 1574 specific doctrine lessons for the enslaved were held at the Church of Our Lady of Mercy in Salvador. According to Ana Palmira Bittencourt Santos Casimiro, Maria Cleidiana Oliveira de Almeida and Camila Nunes Duarte Silveira, considerable concerns for the Christian education of enslaved black people specifically would arise in colonial society in the early eighteenth century, when a “catechism for the rude” was formalized by the Bahia archbishopric. Titled Breve instrucção dos Mysterios da Fé, acommodada ao modo de fallar dos escravos do Brasil, para serem catequizados por ella (“Brief instruction in the Mysteries of the Faith, accommodated to the speech of the slaves of Brazil, to be catechized by it”) and heavily influenced by the ideas of the Jesuit Fr. Jorge Benci (1650–​1708), it was an abridged version of the general catechism, following the model of questions-​and-​answers and based on the assumption that the Africans were not “apt to extensive mnemonic processes.” Casimiro, Almeida and Silveira, “Ensaio sobre catecismos: a instrução dos rudes no Brasil colonial (séculos xvii e xviii),” Revista Teoria e Prática na Educação 20, n. 1 (jan.-​abr. 2017): 41–​42, https://​doi​.org​/10​.4025​/tpe​.v20i1​ .44753​. Mark L. Grover reminds us that, in this period, education was considered not a duty of the State or the Crown, but of the Church (“Book and Conquest”: 267).

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of Santo Antonio de Alcântara in the State of Maranhão and Grão-​Pará (also called Village of Tapuitapera) filed through their officials a formal request for a Jesuit residence to be established so that they would “teach the doctrine, good manners and good letters” to the youngsters, claiming that the religious orders already present –​the Mercedarians and Carmelites –​found the idea of educating their children to be “repugnant.”60 Jesuit reputation as educators was solidified over time. Since the first years of the Society’s presence in the State of Brazil the classes directed towards novices and scholastics were also attended by “external” pupils, and from 1576 Jesuits were granted permission by their Superior General to freely open schools of reading, writing, and counting, as long as no commitments of “perpetuity” were made.61 Given the shifts in the social context, the main function originally attributed to Jesuit Colleges in the Province of Brazil, of providing support to evangelical activities in the aldeias and on itinerant expeditions, would compete with their expanding role as public educational institutions with a body of external students formed largely, if not exclusively, by the sons of civil servants, artisans, plantation owners, cattle ranchers, and, later, mining entrepreneurs, who constituted the middle and upper echelons of colonial society.62 In addition to their framing by the categories of the Society of Jesus, as previously remarked, the conceptual and concrete existence of these colleges was also shaped by the regulatory instruments of the Lusitanian Crown, which allowed their royal sanctioning, funding, and the official recognition of the awarded degrees, contingent on their public nature.63 The multiple functions and attributions of the Jesuit Colleges, particularly in the context of the tentative and ever-​changing educational enterprises in colonial territories, alongside the polysemy of the 60 61 62

63

Chambouleyron, Arenz and Neto, “Quem doutrine e ensine”: 70. The royal license for the establishment of a Jesuit “hospice” would be granted on February 1716 (Leite, História da Companhia, 3:513). arsi Bras. 2, Ordinationes, f. 23v, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, quoted in Leite, 7:53. Bittar and Ferreira Jr, “Casas de be-​a-​bá”:37, Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 222–​223; Leite, História da Companhia, 7:51; Breno Machado dos Santos, “Os jesuítas na Amazônia Portuguesa: a “crise de vocações” e seus reflexos na missão do Maranhão e Grão-​Pará,” opsis 9, n. 13 (July-​December 2009): 105, https://scholar.archive.org/work/bxipntbtu5fetpwyevw4ny3cwu​. Whether converting indigenous populations or attending to the urban communities should be the priority of the Society was a matter of strife within the order at large, not reduced to its oversea provinces, associated to the growing importance of the apostolate of education (Faria, “A organização”: 423; Santos, “Jesuítas na Amazônia Portuguesa”: 102–​105). Favacho, “O recolhimento,” 143; Leite, História da Companhia, 6:574, 7:55, 72–​73, Martins Boto Leite, “Fábrica de intelectuais”: 23. Serafim Leite particularly insists on the distinction of Jesuit Colleges as public institutions, in opposition to the private nature of the instruction provided by other religious orders.

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term itself, can partially explain the imprecise uses of the expression both in the documents of the period and in part of the literature on the subject.64 Moreover, it should be noted that colleges proper coexisted with other Jesuit-​ managed educational institutions, such as “seminaries” and “hospices,” with which they were sometimes confounded.65 Data regarding these institutions in the documents and studies are, thus, conflicting. In his monumental research, Serafim Leite referenced twenty loosely-​termed Colégios of the Society that would have existed in the Province 64

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This issue is raised and discussed by Bruno Martins Boto Leite (“Fábrica de intelectuais”: 22), although I disagree with his conclusions and the proposed solutions. For an overview of the uses and meanings of the term within the old and new Society, see O’Neill and Domínguez, Diccionario Histórico, 1:682–​685. According to Serafim Leite’s interpretation (História da Companhia, 5:244; 7:51–​55) and the documental evidence quoted throughout the ten volumes of his work, the “seminaries” (seminários) maintained by the Society in the Province of Brazil and Vice-​Province of Maranhão in the period under discussion operated as boarding schools for boys, not exclusively for those aspiring to ecclesiastic careers, and usually offered classes in the “first letters” and Humanities. The seminaries mentioned by the author, with their respective dates of establishment, are: Seminary of Belém da Cachoeira, 1680 (5:241–​247); Seminary of Guanaré, later moved to Aldeias Altas do Itapicuru, 1741 (3:487, 498); Seminary of Our Lady of Immaculate Conception in Salvador, 1743 (5:235–​236); Seminary of Saint Ursula in Parnaíba, also referred to as “Simbaíba,” 1749 (3:487, 4:103, 5:381); Seminary of Our Lady of the Missions, in the city of Belém do Pará, 1749 (3:524–​525, 4:108); Seminary of Mariana, 1750 (6: 488); Seminary of São Luís, 1753 (3:486–​487); Seminary of São Paulo, annex to the College of São Paulo do Piratininga, 1757 (6:560). It should be noted that, of the three institutions supposedly established before 1749, only the Seminary of Belém da Cachoeira is mentioned in the catalogs for that year, which could indicate either the informality of the others or their conceptual categorization in different terms (Hamy, Documents, 6, 8). The term “hospice” (hospício), in the Lusitanian documents, distinguished a few Jesuit residences authorized by the Crown with explicit teaching duties. Three institutions of this kind are described by Leite: the Hospice of Paraíba, dated 1683 (5:357–​358); the Hospice in the Village of Tapuitapera, founded in 1716 (3:513); and the Royal Hospice of Ceará, in Aquiraz, established in 1727 (3:469). The hospices of Paraíba and Ceará would also have encompassed seminaries. Furthermore, fairly regular classes in reading, writing and counting, Latin, and sometimes even Humanities seem to have been offered in several of the Jesuit residences, without the obligations entailed by their framing as colleges, seminaries, or hospices. The residence of Vigia in the Vice-​Province of Maranhão, instituted in 1702 (Leite, 3:543, Chambouleyron, Arenz and Neves Neto, “Quem doutrine e ensine”: 66), and the Residence of the Savior in Porto Seguro, founded around 1621 (Leite, 5: 264–​266), are two notable examples. In addition, Serafim Leite asserts that the Jesuits were involved in the organization of at least three educational institutions for girls in the eighteenth century: the College of Our Lady of Solitude in the city of Salvador, dated 1739, which operated as a convent and boarding school under the Order of Saint Ursula (5:237); a similar Ursuline institution in São Luís (3:487); and a Jesuit-​run school for girls in Belém (3:525).

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of Brazil and Vice-​Province of Maranhão until 1759.66 Marisa Bittar and Amarilio Ferreira Jr., based on a letter by Fr. Anchieta, assert that, in addition to the five abc houses of Ilheus, Porto Seguro, Espírito Santo, São Vicente, and São Paulo do Piratininga, the Jesuits had already organized three colleges by 1584, located in the captaincies of Baía de Todos os Santos, Rio de Janeiro, and Pernambuco.67 These would have been, respectively, the Royal College of Bahia, instituted in 1564; the Royal College of Rio de Janeiro, officialized in 1568; and the College of Our Lady of Graces of the Village of Olinda, later known as the Royal College of Pernambuco, established in 1576. The college in Salvador was the collegium maximum of the Province of Brazil, although by 1757 it had been surpassed by the College of Rio de Janeiro in economic prosperity.68 During the seventeenth century, six other institutions that fall into the narrower definition of the term would be founded, composing the total of nine collegia –​seven in the Province of Brazil, two in the Vice-​Province of Maranhão –​mentioned in the official catalogs of the Society for the year 1749, along with sixty-​eight residences, one novitiate, one seminary and thirty-​five missions.69 Of those, the older was the College of Saint Ignatius in São Paulo do Piratininga, Captaincy of São Vicente, originally instituted in 1631 and reestablished in 1653. The College of Saint Michael in the city of Santos, in the same captaincy, dated from 1652, being followed in 1654 by the College of Saint Jacob, Captaincy of Espírito Santo. The two colleges of the Vice-​Province of Maranhão –​the College of Our Lady of Light in São Luís and the College of Saint Alexandre in Belém, the latter also a collegium maximum –​would be officialized in 1670. Finally, the Royal College of the Village of Recife, in the Captaincy of Pernambuco, would be inaugurated in 1678. One other establishment, instituted in 1752 and opened in 1755, could be added to the list –​the

66 Leite, História da Companhia, passim. See particularly the general index on vol. 10:51–​54. Cross-​referenced with other studies and documents, Serafim Leite’s 10-​volume work is the main source for the information that follows. 67 Bittar and Ferreira Jr., “Casas de bê-​a-​bá”: 46. 68 Marieta Pinheiro Carvalho, “A expulsão dos jesuítas da América colonial ibérica: um estudo comparado dos Colégios de Córdoba e do Rio de Janeiro,” História Unisinos 19, n. 1 (January-​April 2015): 69, https://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=579866785002. According to Serafim Leite (História da Companhia, 6:419), the College of Rio de Janeiro had attained similar status to that of Salvador and was being prepared to become a collegium maximum following the intended division of the Province of Brazil, a plan that would have been interrupted by the banishment of the order in 1759. For a discussion on the concept of collegium maximum, see O’Neill and Domínguez, Diccionario Histórico, 1:684. 69 Hamy, Documents, 1, 6, 8.

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short-​lived College of Paranaguá, mentioned in the Catalogus Brevis of the Brazilian Province for the year 1757.70 The colleges in Brazil would strive to comply with the Ratio Studiorum after its approval in 1599, with a few adaptations to the local context as befitted the Jesuit modus procedendi. Besides the already discussed inclusion of “Brazilic language” lessons, another such adaptation was the incorporation into the structure of the collegia of the elementary classes of reading, writing and counting, which were the bread and butter of the abc houses of the early years and remained one of the basic activities of the Jesuits throughout the so-​called consolidation period.71 The Jesuit College of Évora and its 7-​year curriculum for the studia inferiora seem to have been the model for the early institutions in Brazil, even if the College of Santo Antão in Lisbon was once mentioned as an example to be reproduced.72 For the Philosophy course, the recommendation was to follow the example of the Roman College, aiming at a duration of three years.73 The Theology instruction would have been offered in two versions –​a two-​year “short” course (curso breve), concentrated in Moral Theology, and a “long” four-​year program (curso longo), which included Dogmatic Theology.74 70 71

72

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“Catalogus Brevis Provinciae Brasiliae an. 1757,” arsi Bras. 6, f. 395–​400v, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, fully reproduced in Leite, História da Companhia, 7:166–​177. Bittar and Ferreira Jr, “Casas de bê-​a-​bá”: 50; Fávero and Passerini, “210 anos”: 217. Amarilio Ferreira Jr. and Marisa Bittar propose a model structure of the Jesuit educational activities carried out in their colleges in Colonial Brazil, including their integration with mechanical arts workshops, and musical and theatrical activities, in “Artes liberais”: 699. Lorenz, “Introduction”: 34–​35; Leite, História da Companhia, 1:56. Lorenz reproduces a list of authors and works recommended for each of the classes in the curriculum of Évora for the year 1563. According to Leite, the colleges in Brazil would slightly deviate from Evora’s course program by adopting authors such as Quintus Curtius and Seneca. Ferreira Jr. and Bittar elaborate a diagram with the curriculum and authors that would have been used in the Jesuit Colleges in the Province of Brazil and Vice-​Province of Maranhão, based on the information and documents compiled by Leite, in “Artes liberais”: 703. The reference to the College of Santo Antão as a standard for an institution to be implemented in the city of Salvador is found in a letter dated 1554 from king D. João iii to D. Duarte da Costa, second Governor-​General of the State of Brazil, quoted in Bittar and Ferreira Jr., “Casas de bê-​a-​bá”: 47, and in Marília de Azambuja Ribeiro, “Marquês de Pombal e o fim do projeto educacional jesuítico em Portugal e seu império (séculos xvi–​x viii),” Clio –​Revista de Pesquisa Histórica 27, n. 2 (2009): 197, https://​per​iodi​cos​.ufpe​.br​/revis​tas​/revi​stac​lio​/arti​ cle​/view​/24151​. arsi Bras. 2, f. 123v, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, quoted in Leite, História da Companhia, 1:30. Superior General Fr. Claudio Aquaviva to Fr. Pero Rodrigues, Provincial of Brazil, 02 September 1600, arsi Bras. 2, f. 133v–​134, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, quoted in Leite, 1:63. There are some interesting prescriptions for the admission of Jesuit students to each course in this letter. Every scholastic should attend the classes of Logic, but only the

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The studia superiora seem to have been more regularly offered in the larger Colleges of Bahia, Rio de Janeiro and São Luís, as a minimum of students was necessary to begin a new class, and Jesuit scholastics from other regions would be sent to these institutions to complete their education when needed if local classes were not available. Most known information regarding the works that were adopted as textbooks and references in the classes have been gathered indirectly, particularly through the documents connected to the process of banishment of the Society from Portuguese territories.75 The teaching of Latin, for instance, seems to have been based on the grammar and syntaxis by the Jesuit Fr. Manuel Álvares, as recommended in the Ratio Studiorum, and his commentators, Frs. António Franco, João Nunes Freires, José Soares, and João de Morais de Madeira Feijó. Fr. Bento Pereira’s vocabulary, trilingual in its initial editions (Latin, Portuguese, and Castilian) and later bilingual (Latin and Portuguese) would also have aided the students.76 No explicit mentions are made concerning the teaching of Greek or Hebrew. For Aristotelian Philosophy, the interpretations and analysis from the masters of Évora and Coimbra, namely Frs. Pedro da Fonseca, Luiz de Molina, Francisco Soares Lusitano, and Baltasar Teles, could have been employed, as well as the Conimbricenses publications and Fr. Rodrigo de Arriaga’s Philosophy course.77 Manuscript manuals would have been locally

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“rude” would be allowed to repeat the exams so they would be “convinced of their inaptitude.” The Philosophy course should be completed by all “mediocre” pupils, who should then proceed taking the “short” course in Theology, whereas the scholars of “outstanding talent” should take the “long” Theology course. Mediocre students are defined as those who “seem moderately gifted either to preach and govern or to be confessors and socii of the Masters of novices,” while talented students were those who show “an elevated degree [of talent] to preach or to govern,” being granted the title of Masters of Arts or becoming “solemn professors.” Luiz Antônio Gonçalves da Silva, “As bibliotecas dos jesuítas: uma visão a partir da obra de Serafim Leite,” Perspectivas em Ciência da Informação 13, n. 2 (May-​August 2008): 219–​ 237, http://​por​tald​eper​iodi​cos​.eci​.ufmg​.br​/index​.php​/pci​/arti​cle​/view​/189; Grover, “Book and Conquest”: 277–​279; Martins Boto Leite, “A biblioteca”: 260–​261; Leite, História da Companhia, 7:57–​60, 63, 78–​81. Leite, 7:57–​58. Leite, 7:78–​79; Bruno Martins Boto Leite, “Conimbricenses nos trópicos: a escrita dos manuais de filosofia da Companhia de Jesus e sua importância nos colégios jesuítas do Brasil,” Revista Brasileira de História da Ciência 8, n. 2 (July-​December 2015): 107, https: //​doi​.org​/10​.53727​/rbhc​.v8i2​.186​. Leite (7:81) remarks that eighty-​four extant copies of Francisco Soares’s Cursus Philosophicus were found in the library of the Jesuit College of Rio de Janeiro in the inventory made after the religious were banished, in 1775. The full document was published in “Auto de inventário e avaliação dos livros achados no Colégio dos Jesuítas do Rio de Janeiro e sequestrados em 1775,” Revista do Instituto Histórico

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compiled by distinguished lecturers such as Frs. Domingos Ramos, António de Andrade, Luiz Carvalho, and António Vieira, the latter of which also prepared a Theology treatise around 1635.78 Other references in the study of Theology suggested by extant evidence could have been, among many others, the Spanish Jesuits Frs. Francisco Suárez and Luiz de Molina, the Belgian Fr. Jacques Lobbet de Lanthin, Fr. Sforza Pallavicino’s history of the Council of Trent, Fr. Denis Pétau’s work on Dogmatic Theology, the edition of the four gospels by the Oratorian Fr. Giuseppe Bianchini, the complete works of Saint Bonaventure, and texts on Moral Theology and disputes by Fr. Bartolomeo Mastri, o.f.m..79 More than reproducing the pedagogical practices and syllabi of the Jesuit colleges of “the Kingdom,” colonial institutions aspired to equality of prestige and parity of degrees, a requirement for alumni to pursue further education at European universities. From 1658 to 1681, the Chamber of Salvador would repeatedly petition for the “honors and degrees” bestowed upon the graduates from the Royal College of Bahia to be equivalent to those awarded at Évora and Coimbra, with partial success.80 Ultimately, the standards represented by the Ratio and those two Lusitanian institutions would prove to be elusive goals for the colleges and other colonial pedagogic endeavors, hindered by a myriad of obstacles. To begin with, Jesuit novices and scholastics were frequently unable to dedicate themselves to studying as much as their counterparts in Continental Portugal, which impacted their academic achievements and their future ability to undertake the numerous, varied tasks they would be assigned. The Jesuit Visitor Fr. Cristóvão de Gouveia reported to his superiors at Rome that many “over the age of thirty” had repeatedly resumed the study of Grammar without being able to complete it due to being charged with other duties to compensate for understaffing, and would never acquire the desired level of knowledge to be ordained priests. In the same letter, Fr. Gouveia communicates the impossibility of organizing an Academy of Humanities at the College of Bahia, requested by the Superior General with the aim of preparing future e Geográfico Brasileiro, 301 (1973): 212–​ 259. https://​www​.ihgb​.org​.br​/publ​icac​oes​/revi​ sta​-ihgb​/item​/107​994​-revi​sta​-ihgb​-vol​ume​-301​.html​. 78 Leite, História da Companhia, 7:79, 63. According to Serafim Leite’s interpretation, the seventy-​eight extant manuscript volumes of “Philosophy workbooks” (Postilas de Filosofia) listed in the inventory of the library of the Jesuit College of Rio de Janeiro could consist of copies of similar manuals, composed by these or other lectures. 79 Martins Boto Leite, “A biblioteca”: 262–​263; Leite, História da Companhia, 7: 63. 80 Leite, 7: 70–​73; Martins Boto Leite, “Fábrica de intelectuais”: 26–​29. As both authors notice, racial prejudice seems to have played as important a part in the matter as economic and political factors.

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teachers, because “the four or five Humanist students that existed were so separated in the labors, aldeias, and Captaincies that they could hardly be gathered in this College to continue their studies.”81 The employment of novices and scholastics in activities that should be performed by other members of the order is symptomatic of the already mentioned “issue of vocations,” which also entailed the momentary or permanent abandonment of residences and outposts. The domus of São Luís, for example, was vacant from 1649 to 1652, after the resident Jesuits perished and no confreres were available to replace them. On a different note, a somewhat frequent complaint from European Jesuits acting in Colonial Brazil was their overqualification. Teaching at the College in São Luís, the Luxemburgish Fr. Johann Philipp Bettendorff lamented in 1671 that, due to the lack of masters and intermittency of the classes, he was forced to teach elementary lessons instead of the Humanities, a function usually fulfilled by less instructed religious.82 Similar sentiments would be voiced by the Moravian Fr. Valentin Stansel, who was appointed for the Chair of Theology in the College of Bahia around 1663. His initial optimism as a missionary in Brazil would quickly vanish and, in letters from 1666 and 1669, Stansel would declare that his efforts in Theology were “fruitless,” that his mathematical training had little use there, and that he would rather go back to Europe to teach Math in any of the Colleges –​perhaps in Évora or Lisbon, as he had done before departing as a missionary.83 Basic material resources for teaching were not as freely available. Even paper had to be imported from Europe and was scarce in the colony.84 Responding to accusations of neglect of their teaching duties, made by the State Procurator of 81

82 83

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Fr. Cristóvão de Gouveia to Superior General Fr. Claudio Aquaviva, Jesuit College of Bahia, 01 November 1584, arsi Lus. 68, f. 410–​411v, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu, quoted in Faria, “A organização”: 429–​430: “Acerca da academia de exercícios de humanidade que V. P. escreve, se haja dentro de casa para fazer mestres, é coisa muito para desejar e logo que cheguei a esta Província […] o procurei. Mas em nenhuma via é podido […], porque quatro ou cinco estudantes humanistas que havia, estavam tão apartados nos ofícios, aldeias e Capitanias que com dificuldade se há de ajuntar neste Colégio, para que pudessem continuar seus estudos e assim possam sair tais que sejam mestres nas primeiras classes.” Chambouleyron, Arenz and Neves Neto, “Quem doutrine e ensine”: 67. Fr. Valentin Stansel to Fr. Athanasius Kircher, Bahia, 10 August 1666, apug Ms. 558, f. 100r–​ 101v, and Fr. Stansel to Fr. Kircher, Bahia, June 1669, apug Ms. 559, f. 89r-​90v, Athanasius Kircher Correspondence, Historical Archives of the Pontifical Gregorian University, Rome. Metadata on Kircher’s letters preserved by the Historical Archives of the Pontifical Gregorian University, as well as digitized copies and transcriptions of part of the collection, can be consulted online at the gate Project website: https://​gate​.uni​gre​.it​/​. Araújo da Cunha, “Luzes apagadas,” 88–​89.

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Maranhão and Grão-​Pará Jorge Sampaio e Carvalho in 1661, when the members of the order were momentarily banished from the region, Fr. Vieira contended that Jesuits even provided the books, papers, pens, and ink for the students who were too poor to afford them.85 Moreover, local economic conditions restricted who among the colonists could dispose of time and income to invest in formal education –​in the same way as Jesuit novices and scholastics, lay students were frequently forced to interrupt their studies. For instance, Fr. Bettendorff reports gladly beginning a Latin class in Belém in the late 1660s, only to have it soon interrupted as young pupil were not dismissed from mandatory military service and had no time to attend the lessons.86 Severe conflicts with colonists or native groups would force Jesuits to leave their residences and establishments every now and then. Besides the occasion in 1661, mentioned above, the Jesuits would again be momentarily banished from the State of Maranhão and Grão-​Pará in 1684, due to disagreements mostly regarding Amerindian forced labor. In the villages of São Vicente and São Paulo do Piratininga, educational activities would have to be suspended in the 1560s because of armed conflicts between colonists and indigenous groups. In 1640, the brief “Commissum nobis” by Pope Urban viii, regarding the freedom of Amerindians, was the cause for new strife between the Society of Jesus and the settlers throughout Colonial Brazil, which culminated in the banishment of the religious from the villages of São Paulo, São Vicente, and Santos. The situation would settle down in 1653, but continuous animosity surrounding the same issues would lead the Jesuits to almost close down permanently the College of São Paulo in 1682, until the crisis was finally defused in 1685.87 “Local disturbance” was pointed to as the reason for the relocation of the Seminary of Saint Ursula from the Village of Mocha do Piauí to Aldeias Altas do Itapicuru, fusing with the Seminary of Guanaré.88 As for the establishments in Olinda and Recife, the Dutch invasion of the region would force the Fathers to abandon premises, returning after 1654.89

85 86

87 88 89

Chambouleyron, Arenz and Neves Neto, “Quem doutrine e ensine”: 67. Chambouleyron, Arenz and Neves Neto, “Quem doutrine e ensine”: 66. Serafim Leite (História da Companhia, 4:107) reports the same incident as occurring in 1681. Formal complaints from the inhabitants of Belém, dated 1688 and 1689, attest to their interest in resuming the lessons in Latin, which would only be reestablished in 1695 (Chambouleyron, Arenz and Neves Neto, 66). Custódio and Hilsdolf, “O Colégio”: 176–​179; Leite, História da Companhia, 6:509–​519, 526–​ 529, 563–​565. Leite, 3:487, 5:381. Leite, 5: 335, 345.

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Final Remarks

As an alternative to the chronological perspective of education in Colonial Brazil, Ana Palmira Casimiro proposes considering the learning opportunities available to different groups of the society,90 an approach which could render a broad and comprehensive, albeit simplified, view of Jesuit contributions to this field. Following her proposition, it can be gathered that the white sons of the Portuguese elite would have had access to a long and diverse formal education, such as offered in the Jesuit Colleges and seminaries, complemented by higher courses in European universities. Women from the elite could receive some formal teachings in the convents and boarding schools kept by feminine religious orders, a small number of which were established with the aid of the Jesuits, although homeschooling of sorts would have been prevalent. The few Portuguese in the middle echelons of the society could have had the chance to learn reading, writing, and counting, perhaps at the Jesuit schools or abc houses. Most Amerindians and people of mixed ancestry would have been taught predominantly the catechism and mechanical arts at the aldeias, missions, plantations, or churches, many of which were run by the Society of Jesus. A fraction of Amerindian boys would have learned the “first letters” in Jesuit abc houses or classes held at the aldeias, and even fewer would have been granted the opportunity to pursue further education, although never as equals to their white fellow countrymen. Particular procedures for the education and indoctrination of enslaved Africans and their descent, focused mainly in their “spiritual salvation,” were developed with the aid of the Society to fit the “rudeness” attributed to these people by the white gaze.91 The others, the “declassified” –​ most of the orphans, abandoned or illegitimate children, freed black men and women, and so forth –​would have been bound to eventual apprenticeships and informal processes of learning, some opportunity for which would be given in Jesuit establishments. With the advancement of the Pombaline Reforms that precipitated the banishment of Jesuits from all Portuguese territories, a very negative picture was painted of the education provided by the members of the Society in Colonial Brazil. The Fathers were rhetorically constructed as being responsible for the economic, political, and cultural backwardness of Portugal and its domains,

90 91

Ana Palmira Bittencourt Santos Casimiro, “Igreja, Educação e Escravidão no Brasil Colonial,” politeia Hist. E Soc. 7, n. 1 (2007): 87, https://​peri​odic​os2​.uesb​.br​/index​.php​ /polit​eia​/arti​cle​/view​/3879​. See note 57, above.

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and their pedagogic methods were deemed “obscure and fastidious.”92 Although most criticisms of Jesuit educational practices were nonfactual, the reforms captained by the Marquis of Pombal indeed posed deep structural transformations in public instruction. Their immediate effect in the American territories, however, was an “educational vacuum,” as the State was unprepared to fill the gap left by the withdrawal of the Society. In spite of the prevailing ideological character of the negative assessment of Jesuit pedagogic endeavors, part of the denounced shortcomings could be attributed to the difference in meaning that education had for the intended pupils. Even among those fully integrated into colonial society and partaking of the European cultural heritage, the value of formal education was not unanimously recognized. Some degree of anti-​intellectualism was deep-​ seated among the higher strata of colonial communities since many of the Portuguese colonists who ventured into Brazil believed they would find “easier” opportunities to thrive in a context that could reward actions over birth, manners, and erudition.93 On the other end of the social spectrum, what did learning “humane letters” mean to the different Amerindians, as communities and as individuals?94 Any attempts at homogeneously summarizing the multiple experiences and strategies of these people would be fruitless. Nonetheless, the “inconstancy of the Indian soul,” which Fr. Vieira would correlate to the tending of a myrtle sculpture –​easy to mold but hard to maintain –​, could be understood as an expression of fundamentally different ways of existing, marked by a flexibility with respect to identity and alterity that seemed incomprehensible to Ignatius’ followers, and that would certainly tint Amerindian appraisal of Jesuit education.95

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Alden, Dauril. The Making of an Enterprise: The Society of Jesus in Portugal and Its Empire, and Beyond: 1540–​1750. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1996. 92 93 94 95

Luiz Eduardo Oliveira, “Os Jesuíta e as reformas pombalinas: rupturas e continuidades,” Revista de Estudos Culturais, n. 6 (September-​December 2016): 115, https://periodicos.ufs .br/revec/article/view/5950​. Araújo da Cunha, “Luzes apagadas,” 102. Araújo da Cunha, 101. As Eduardo Viveiros de Castro comments on the topic, which he discusses from a historic and anthropological perspective in his essay, “the myrtle has reasons that the marble cannot know” (The Inconstancy, 47). Viveiros de Castro uses the expression “relational affinity” to name the prevalent value from the Amerindian perspective.

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“registro do padrão do Dote dos Padres da Companhia de jesus,” Lisbon, 15 March 1568. Documentos Historicos, 15, (Biblioteca Nacional, Rio de Janeiro, 1930): 18–​25. http://​memo​ria​.bn​.br​/pdf​/094​536​/per09​4536​_193​0​_00​015​.pdf​. Rodrigues, Aryon Dall’Igna. “As línguas gerais sul-​americanas.” papia: Revista Brasileira de Estudos Crioulos e Similares, 4, n. 2 (1996): 6–​18. http://www.etnolinguistica.org/ artigo:rodrigues-1996​. Russell-​Wood, A. J. R.. Um mundo em movimento: os portugueses na África, Ásia e América (1415–​1808). Algés: difel, 1998. Santos, Breno Machado dos. “Os jesuítas na Amazônia Portuguesa: a “crise de vocações” e seus reflexos na missão do Maranhão e Grão-​Pará.” opsis, 9, n. 13 (July-​December 2009): 100–​118. https://scholar.archive.org/work/bxipntbtu5fetpwyevw4ny3cwu. Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo. The Inconstancy of the Indian Soul: The Encounter of Catholics and Cannibals in 16th-​century Brazil. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press, 2011. Xavier, Ângela Barreto, and Fernanda Olival. “O padroado da coroa de Portugal: fundamentos e práticas.” In Monarquias Ibéricas em Perspectiva Comparada (séculos xvi–​x viii). Organized by Ângela Barreto Xavier, Federico Palomo, and Roberta Stumpf, 123–​160. Lisboa: Imprensa de Ciências Sociais, 2018. http://​hdl​.han​dle​.net​ /10451​/37540​.

­c hapter 4

“For These Parts of Infidels Great Learning Is Not Needed”

Jesuit Education and Pedagogical Responsibilities in the Early Modern Indian Subcontinent Bradley Blankemeyer 1

Introduction: a General Jesuit View of Education

In the Constitutions formulated by Ignatius of Loyola, the founder imparted that “The aim which the Society of Jesus directly seeks is to aid its own members and their fellowmen to attain the ultimate end for which they were created. To achieve this purpose, in addition to the example of one’s life, learning and a method of expounding it are also necessary.”1 Yet this is only one example of many which expound on the educational purpose of the Jesuits. The education of “unlettered persons” in Christian catechism dominated the early Society documents, but over time the Superior General and Fathers Assistant, informed by the successes at early schools such as that in Messina (est. 1548), developed a more complete understanding of educational policy influenced by humanism. This latter culminated in the Constitutions and the Ratio Studiorum, where a defined set of regulations combined the curriculum of the medieval scholastic university with that of the humanistic schools of Renaissance Italy, blending the ‘Parisian way’ the founders experienced in their own education with the newer form of Latin schools to train well-​ rounded men.2 Robert Maryks described a sort of “Ciceronic pedagogy” which emphasized the humanist-​inspired education of the Jesuit schools, where classical literature informed the disciplines and ideas taught within the colleges.3

1 The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and Their Complementary Norms: A Complete English Translation of Official Latin Texts, trans. George E. Ganss, S.J. (Saint Louis: The Institute of Jesuit Sources, 1996), 172. 2 John O’Malley, “How the First Jesuits Became Involved in Education,” in The Jesuit Ratio Studiorum: 400th Anniversary Perspectives, ed. Vincent J. Duminico (New York: Fordham University Press, 2000), 58–​63. 3 Robert A. Maryks, “The Jesuit Missionary Ethos,” Eighteenth-​Century Studies, vol. 46, no. 3, (2013): 432. A more recent study has looked beyond Cicero to earlier Greek traditions in

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2024 | DOI:10.1163/9789004680234_006

80 Blankemeyer Furthermore, as the Constitutions expressed the need for Jesuit educators at the Society’s colleges to lecture “in a manner suitable for the edification of the people,” the Society thereby applied Cicero’s rhetorical strategy of adapting words and ideas for the purpose of elocution through its educational policies, a method which greatly informed the development of cultural accommodation.4 In the process, developing eloquent speech skills first required adjustment of the message to a form comprehensible to new populations through the act of translation, thereby adding another side to Jesuit education, that of language learning. Based on similar language in the Constitutions, the rules for the Society stated that “for the greater union of the those that live in the Society, and for the greater assistance of those among whom they dwell, all shall study the language of the region wherein they reside, unless their own native tongue be more profitable”.5 Much as with other pursuits of the Society of Jesus, questions centered around a discrepancy between policy and praxis, the difference between prescribing actions and the lived experience and practicality acting upon those directives. In Francis Xavier’s letter prior to departing for India, he requested from his Superior General that he write “more at length on the concepts concerning the method that you would think we ought to have among the infidels there; because, given that experience will show us part of the method that we ought to have, we hope in God our Lord that it will please his divine Majesty to give us the rest by you knowing the manner that we must serve.”6 On the topics of education and language, as well as how this education was administered from curricula to pedagogy, Jesuits differed on the value of their own experience versus the insight of their superiors. This discrepancy between policy and praxis also came to concern how the Society might prescribe a particular formula for training their own in Europe yet not consider this essential within rhetoric and their influence on Jesuit education and ideology, cf. Jaska Kainulainen, “Isocrates’s phronesis and the Early Jesuits,” Journal of Early Modern History, vol. 22, no. 6 (2018): 528–​48. 4 The Constitutions, 201. 5 John Correia-​Afonso, S.J., Jesuit Letters and Indian History. A Study of the Nature and Development of the Jesuit Letters from India (1542–​1773) and of Their Value for Indian Historiography (Bombay: Indian Historical Research Institute St. Xavier’s College 1955), 58. 6 Original text: “muy a largo de las cossas que alla os paresciere acerca del modo que debemos de tener entre [los ynfieles; porque, dado] que la exper[ien]tia nos mostrara parte del modo que debemos de tener, esperamos en Dios n[uestro Se]nor que lo demas plazera a su diuina Majestad darnos por vossotros a conoscer [de] la manera que lo abemos de seruir.” Francisco Xavier to Ignatius of Loyola and Codure, 18 Mar 1541, Monumenta Xaveriana ex autographis vel ex antiquioribus exemplis collecta, vol. 1, (Matriti [Madrid]: Typis Augustini Avrial, 1899–​ 1900), 239.

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the course of mission. Part of this might naturally be explained through the understanding of imperial structures, socio-​political considerations, as well as racial and cultural prejudice, but also a variety of personal opinions. In this paper, I will explore some of the background of education in the Society of Jesus as well as within the context of the Portuguese territories in southern India, followed by a greater exposition of Jesuit understanding of education and the debates that encircled it through the individuals who experienced it firsthand. 2

Language as Starting Point

As Jerónimo Nadal noted in his Regula pro scholaribus Societatis or “Rules” of 1563, studies stood separate from the contemplative prayer within the Jesuit way of proceeding. In making distinctions befitting the cultural accommodationist concept of adiaphora (or indifference), he saw two means for achieving the aid of souls: one was through the typically religious life most regular clergy observed, and the other was in intellectual pursuits.7 Whereas some Jesuits thrived in the mission fields perhaps through charisma and vigor among other traits, others were far more suited to a life of scholarship. Through these different paths, the Society not only proficiently produced personalities like Roberto de Nobili and Matteo Ricci, but also renowned theologians like Robert Bellarmine or scientists such as Athanasius Kircher. Yet a variety of pursuits bridged the gap between the contemplative and active lives Jesuits balanced, one of which was language. The Constitutions suggested that greater edification could be achieved “by endeavouring to learn the [vernacular] language well”, but the expectation already existed among the early Jesuits.8 Beginning with the desire for pilgrimage to Jerusalem and to preach amongst all peoples there, the founders understood the importance of language. Additionally, language was seen as essential to both the unity of the Society and the service to the greater community wheresoever a Jesuit resided, while also recognizing that they may use

7 Jeronimo Nadal, ‘Regulae pro scholaribus Societatis’, in Monumenta Paedagogica Societatis Iesu: Novo Editio Penitus Retractata ii (1557–​1572), ed. Ladislaus Lukács (Rome: Institutum Historicum Societatis Iesu, 1974), 116; Cf. Romano Cessario, “Molina and Aquinas,” in A Companion to Luis de Molina, eds. Alexander Aichele and Mathias Kaufmann (Leiden: Brill, 2014), 303. 8 The Constitutions, 201.

82 Blankemeyer their own native tongue if it was more profitable.9 Once the purpose of the Society shifted towards being sent by the Pope to whatever area necessary, awareness of this principle grew. Applying the rhetorical approach to the study of languages, Loyola stressed that the guiding principle in using the vernacular was “careful disposition to the place and person.”10 In the various cultural environments Jesuits entered, the contemplative-​active life that carried through all aspects of ministry contributed to considerable linguistic success that often surpassed their clerical peers.11 In Juan Polanco’s letter to Diego Laínez in 1547, the secretary laid out front how he felt “that it should suffice to possess these humane letters, especially languages, in subjects capable by age and mental capacity.”12 Aiming towards mastery of Latin, then Greek and later Hebrew, Jesuit education instilled serious efforts at linguistics from the novitiate formation forward. From experiences amongst diverse communities, the limits to proselytism through interpreters led to decisions made by provincial superiors to encourage both the education of indigenous men in European languages as well as the assignment of European Jesuits to advanced study in local languages. Printing presses in Asia and the Americas were established with the enthusiastic support of the Jesuits, especially so when the press in India later developed Dravidian scripts in addition to Latin.13 Yet for language study to be successful, the student must approach the specific language with an element of cultural openness, recognizing that the language has intrinsic value and can impart more than simply mimetic lessons through which to transmit a message born in the native tongue. Similarly, it can be said that the reinforcement of the colonial language evinced the perceived superiority of those who spoke it and the entity it represented. For as prolific as the Jesuits were in publishing grammars, dictionaries, and literature in 9 10 11

12 13

Ignatius of Loyola to various rectors of the Society, 1 Jan 1556, Monumenta Ignatiana. Sancti Ignatii de Loyola Societatis Iesu fundatoris epistolae et instructiones, vol. 10 (Madrid: Typis G. Lopez del Horno, 1903–​11), 451–​2. Cf. Correia-​Afonso, Jesuit Letters, 58. Ignatius of Loyola to various rectors of the Society, 1 Jan 1556, Monumenta Ignatiana, Epp, vol. 10, 452. At least this was true for India, but in the Spanish Americas the Dominicans and Franciscans were the foremost linguists, yet they were also the first missionaries to arrive there; cf. Alan Strathern, “Os Piedosos and the Mission in India and Sri Lanka in the 1540s’” in D. João iii e o Império. Actas do Congresso Internacional, eds. Roberto Carneiro and Artur Teodoro de Matos (Lisbon: cepcep –​Centro de Estudos dos Povos e Culturas de Expressão Portuguesa, 2004), 859. Juan Polanco to Diego Laínez, 21 May 1547, mi Epp, i, p. 521. M. Antoni J. Üçerler, “Gutenberg Comes to Japan: the Jesuits & the first it Revolution of the Sixteenth Century,” The Ricci Institute Public Lectures Series (September 2005): 7–​8.

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non-​European languages, early on few of them labored to learn the languages themselves. In the colleges of Europe, however, even Loyola ordered daily lessons and weekly sermons in the vernacular to encourage those less versed to fully comprehend the local language as well as prove their competency.14 Without the directive of superiors, the motivation to commit oneself in a similar manner to the foreign languages of Africa, Asia, and the Americas rested with the individual. In the context of India, it would take until 1575, with the arrival of the innovative Alessandro Valignano, before a superior acted upon this principle. Where a rhetorical principle like accommodatio blossomed into the more fundamental cultural accommodation was through a more systematic approach to language learning, in which European missionaries devoted more time to linguistics than to some public ministries, schools became centers of serious study for both European and indigenous students learning each other’s language. 3

Education in the Estado da India

In some European colleges, the necessary censure of certain books limited the open intellectual pursuit seemingly furthered by the Jesuits, though not without some resistance.15 In India, some Jesuits referenced or requested copies of texts that at the time were on the Index Prohibitorum Librorum without any awareness of their controversial status, sometimes due to poor communication of recent additions but also because of their own pursuit of education from a variety of sources.16 Nevertheless, curriculum content in Asian schools pointed to issues with humanist pedagogy, as the inculcation of superiority of European culture in indigenous schools to an extent undermined Jesuit attempts to distinguish their identity from the “Western cultural aggression” of the state and settler communities.17 In the colleges of Europe as well as various 14 15 16

17

Ignatius of Loyola to various rectors of the Society, 1 Jan 1556, mi Epp, x, pp. 451–​2. Cf. Ruth Atherton, “Peter Canisius and the Development of Catholic Education in Germany, 1549–​97,” Studies in Church History 55 (2019): 145–​160. E.g. Francis Xavier wrote about how two Jesuits possessed copies of a book by Constantino Ponce de la Fuente, who had been accused of “luteranismo” by the Inquisition in 1543, cf. Francis Xavier to Gaspar Berze, 24 Apr 1552, Monumenta Xaveriana, ex autographis vel ex antiquioribus exemplis collecta [henceforth mx] (2 vols, Madrid, 1899–​1900, 1912), i, 756; also cf. Elisabetta Corsi, ed., Órdenes religiosas entre América y Asia: ideas para una historia misionera de los espacios coloniales (Mexico City: El Colegio de México, 2008), 49. Cf. Teotonio R. de Souza, “Asia and Christianity in History: Addressing Some Problems of Church Historiography,” Asian Christian Review 7/​1 (2013): 18–​27, 26; Cf. Kavalam

84 Blankemeyer global mission fields, Jesuits incorporated Christian principles into performances of classical drama, tweaking dialogue to avoid potentially heretical, pagan passages. Ignatius’ intent in promoting classical theater was not so much for artistic but rather didactic value, as a means to develop good oratorical skills while avoiding the “historic immorality and pagan affinities.”18 While drama would figure less into the India missions than, for example, Japan, theatrical exercise certainly had value in developing an understanding of the value of non-​Christian art for rhetorical and even evangelical purposes. Concerted efforts to marginalize indigenous languages of instruction and indigenous facilitators of education evince much of the motivation behind the state’s concern for social welfare in colonial spaces, which was essentially that of assimilation and control. The fact that Jesuits were often directly involved in these programs further shows how intrinsically linked the state and the Society of Jesus often were. In the prevailing historiography on education in India, there exists for the most part an agreement on education as a form of Christianization and Portugalization. As Ana Paula Sena Gomide remarked, this was one of myriad ways to achieve this: “If mixed marriage was one way to secure permanence of Portuguese presence in the Estado da India, the conversion of local populations and Christian religious education of the descendants of these mixed unions were the principal means to amplify the spheres of Portuguese influence over the Orient.”19 Ines Županov has noted how for Jesuits prior to Nobili “Christianization was for them identical to Portugalization.”20 A more recent publication on the first college in India remarked how “being Portuguese was synonymous with being Christian, seeing that Christianity was in the center of Portuguese culture ... Catechesis, Christian teaching, the daily lived experience of religion, carried with it the cultural charge of ‘being Portuguese.’”21

18 19 20 21

M. Panikkar, Asia and Western Dominance: A Survey of the Vasco da Gama Epoch of Asian History, 1498–​1945 (London: G. Allen and Unwin, 1953). Kevin J. Wetmore Jr., “Jesuit Theater and Drama,” Oxford Handbook Online (2016): 15, accessed July 7, 2016, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199935420.013.55. Ana Paula Sena Gomide, “Entre Goa e Ceilão: a formação do clero nativo e as dimensões das mestiçagens no Oriente português. Séculos xvi–​x viii,” (PhD diss., Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, 2018), 69. Ines Županov, Disputed Mission: Jesuit Experiments and Brahmanical Knowledge in Seventeeth-​century India (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999), 20–​1. Felipe Augusto Borges, Sezinando Menezes, and Célio Costa, “Colégio de São Paulo, em Goa: um colégio jesuítico no oriente (1548–​1558),” Estudos Ibero-​Americanos, 46, 2 (2020): 1–​15, 2.

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Yet we should take caution to distinguish, as has often been done with contemporary Jesuit historiography, between individual Jesuits and their decisions in regard to any force outside the realm of the Society. Negotiating a balance between decision-​making or autonomy and obedience, we can observe through correspondence how Jesuits worked this out –​a simple request to do any given thing or an expression of disagreement and desire to bring in a superior as an intermediary resulted in an exposition of this diversity of thought that defies uniform characterization of the Jesuit order. While we see evidence in the early educational policies within the Estado da India of a system of Portugalization and Jesuit complicity in this, we also observe the seeds of discontent with such approaches and the measures slowly taken to transform pedagogy within the missions across India and in turn in many of the proper imperial spaces as well. This is part of the challenge here –​to certainly confirm this, but also show that there did not exist a consistent policy of Portugalization, and shifting Jesuit politics can illustrate this further; however, my contribution is also to argue that Jesuits acknowledged the problem of Portugalization and in some ways sought to extricate themselves from it at an earlier point than the oft-​cited case of Roberto de Nobili. Ines Županov argues that the context of pre-​1540s India has been “defined as an early period of religious and social permissiveness or even tolerance,” which ended with the arrival of the Jesuits.22 Portuguese control in western India involved “intense Christianization” during what Ronnie Hsia describes as the second period of Catholic expansion in the subcontinent, starting in 1530 and ending around 1600. At this time, the “direct colonial rule” in the islands of Goa and the adjacent region intensified the campaign of violent conversions, ecclesiastical institutionalization, and geographical reach of missions, all which generated a naturally more hostile imposition of political and religious control.23 On the heels of the surge for religious uniformity with the establishment of the Inquisition in Lisbon in 1536 and other Portuguese cities soon thereafter, as well as particularly fervent campaign to embody the spirit of Catholic or Counter Reformation, similar efforts took place in India. Collaborative efforts by the governor, archbishop, and vicar general initiated both the first auto-​da-​fé in 1539 through a makeshift tribunal and the destruction of all Hindu temples and idols throughout the islands of Goa (ilhas da 22 23

Ines Županov, ““One Civility, but Multiple Religions”: Jesuit Mission among St. Thomas Christians in India (16th-​ 17th Centuries),” Journal of Early Modern History, 9/​3–​4 (2005): 284–​325, 289. Ronnie Po-​chia Hsia, The World of Catholic Renewal, 1540–​1770 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 200–​1.

86 Blankemeyer Goa, or Tiswadi) the following year.24 Supplanting the local gauncar estate network, recently erected churches and religious confraternities now received the rents which were once collected for temple maintenance.25 Closely involved with this program were the Franciscans, the first religious order to arrive in India in 1518. Prior to their arrival, however, a number of crucial developments had occurred within the Iberian Peninsula that affected the order; namely, as part of the spiritual renewal of the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, a stricter observance of the Rule of St. Francis by followers of Juan de Guadalupe within the Franciscan provinces of San Gabriel in Spain and Piedade in Portugal birthed friars of a particular zeal who appealed to both Iberian crowns. They stuck to the traditional habit, went barefoot, and kept a strict diet and program of fasting. For the Spanish, these men led the first mission to New Spain in 1524, while the Portuguese friars became the piedosos, named for their province, who formed the earliest group patronised by Dom João iii to send to India.26 In 1538, two of the most notable piedosos, Frei Vicente de Lagos (fl. 1538–​ 50) and Fr. Juan Alfonso de Albuquerque, arrived in Goa following two distinct paths. Frei Vicente departed straight for Cranganore, where he founded a college for Thomas Christians in 1540 that counted one hundred indigenous pupils by 1549, an achievement which earned him praise from the Jesuit Francis Xavier upon his visitation to the area yet also came with the recommendation for a Jesuit to help with the affairs there.27 Albuquerque, on the other hand, remained in the capital, as he had sailed to India for the purpose of serving as the inaugural Bishop of Goa. Thus, the years during which the church in India exerted more spiritual vigor, it was these Franciscan piedosos at the center of it, not only in Goa but also other Portuguese settlements and indigenous principalities as well as southwest Sri Lanka. Vicar General Miguel Vaz Coutinho (fl. 1533–​47) helped to foment this movement. Though not part of the Friars Minor, had great esteem for the piedosos, requesting in 1545 that 24 25 26 27

Alden Dauril, The Making of an Enterprise: The Society of Jesus in Portugal and Its Empire, and Beyond: 1540–​1750, (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1996), 44; for the auto held in Goa, cf. ‘Auto contra o Padre Diogo de Morais’, 6 June 1539, dhmppo, ii, 265–​8. ‘Destino a dar às rendas dos pagodes’ 30 Jun 1541, dhmppo, ii, pp. 293–​305; cf. Charles Borges, “Foreign Jesuits and Native Resistance,” in Essays in Goan History, ed. Teotónio R. de Souza (New Delhi: Concept Pub. Co, 1989), 69–​80, 70. Strathern, “Os Piedosos,” 856–​7. Francis Xavier to Ignatius of Loyola, 12 Jan 1549, mx, i, pp. 480–​1; cf. Carlos Mercês de Melo, The Recruitment and Formation of the Native Clergy in India: An Historico-​canonical Study (Lisbon: Agência Geral do Ultramar, Divisão de Publicações e Biblioteca, 1955); Strathern, “Os Piedosos,” 857.

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Franciscans specifically from the Province of Piedade be sent to India to bolster the ministry there.28 Through their partnership, the piedosos and Coutinho promoted the forceful policies to encourage conversion amongst the gentios of the islands of Goa, a campaign which involved temple destruction and the prohibition of Hindu rites and ceremonies. This perhaps was not unexpected, as Alan Strathern notes that chronicles of the Franciscan movement suggested “a great lust for destroying heathen holy places had always been characteristic of the piedosos.”29 The Franciscans serve as an interesting comparison to the Jesuits highlighted here. In contrast to the Ignatian spirituality of forming an “indifferent” individual and the greater organizational flexibility of the Society of Jesus, the Franciscans’ remained tied to their monastic and ascetic life, which created tensions with the piedoso zeal and expressions of piety in mission. More importantly for discussions here, the Franciscan dynamism relied heavily on their association with their patrons and their reciprocated support in the education and spiritual well-​being of the laity, most especially the Portuguese aristocracy and elites. These connections continued in Asia, where their institutions served the families of the elite of the Estado, ties which Xavier and Županov name as “the reason why their interests were closer to those of the ‘colonizers’, whose spokesmen they easily became, frequently representing their anxieties and goals.”30 As we will see here and in subsequent chapters, despite the differences in clerical ideology and frequent detachment from the affairs of the casado elite, many Jesuits nevertheless served some of those same interests. Francis Xavier was certainly at the forefront of the Jesuit pedagogical development, advising John iii to establish a college for Jesuit training at Coimbra, which came to fruition the year after his departure for India. Upon arriving in Goa, he and his companions were granted the responsibility of running a school founded by the mordomos (“stewards”) of the Confraternity of the Faith, vicar general Miguel Vaz Coutinho and mestre Diogo de Borba, for educating native Goan boys in Christian doctrine and the humanities, though the Jesuits did not take immediate control of this instruction.31 The school became the 28 29 30 31

Strathern, “Os Piedosos,” 857–​8. Strathern, “Os Piedosos,” 859. Ângela Barreto Xavier and Ines Županov, Catholic Orientalism: Portuguese Empire, Indian Knowledge (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 170. Exemplum Historiae fundationis Collegii Goani, Rome, Archivum Romanum Societatis Iesu (arsi), Goa 22, fos. 1–​10. Diogo de Borba claimed around the same time that in Goa “studies have no value in themselves,” Ines Županov, ‘Passage to India: Jesuit Spiritual Economy between Martyrdom and Profit in the Seventeenth Century,’ Journal of Early Modern History, 16/​2 (2012): 121–​59.

88 Blankemeyer College of St. Paul, and while Xavier expressed his appreciation for the Jesuit stewardship of native education, he never worked in the college, his companion and secular priest Paolo da Camerino was the only teacher there, and the school remained in the hands of the mordomos until 1545.32 Education, in particular, served as one of the most significant differences between the Jesuits and other orders, as this college and many others outside Europe that followed afforded the Society the independence to pursue missionary efforts that had hamstrung other orders like the Franciscans.33 Throughout his ministry, organized education served as a less significant aspect of Xavier’s ministry. By the time he preached among the Tamil-​speaking communities along the southern coast, Xavier possessed no books from which to develop curriculum or learn the language, nor did any other companions travel with him on this first mission away from Goa.34 Essentially, there was no infrastructure within which any Jesuit could work, compounded by the lack of members in India, and many Jesuits commented on how these missions compared with the evangelism of the early Church. This kind of directionless service was integral in the early mission of the Society, which Xavier knew all too well. Calling for additional help, as was frequently done, Xavier stated that “persons that do not possess talent for confessing, preaching, or doing other associated works of the Society, after having completed their exercises and having served in humble offices for some months, they will provide much service in these parts, if they should possess bodily strength as well as spiritual.”35 In essence, they should complete the standard novitiate, including the Exercises for a Jesuit seminarian, without additional education. He imparted upon Ignatius that education was not a necessary qualification, “because for these parts of infidels great learning is not needed.”36 Thus Xavier’s perception of an uneducated indigenous population colored his opinion of the level of education required for the Jesuits tasked with instructing them. In order to adjust oneself to be more edifying towards an Indian audience, however, a Jesuit must not only educate themselves but also others. Xavier’s 32

33 34 35 36

John Correia-​Afonso, Jesuits in India, 1542–​1773 (Anand: Gujarat Sahitya Prakash, 1997), 12. There is some disagreement here on the date when the handover took place; Joseph Velinkar claims Lancilotto only took over in 1547, the same year in which the mordomos founders both died. Girolamo Imbruglia, The Jesuit Missions of Paraguay and a Cultural History of Utopia (1568–​1789) (Leiden: Brill, 2017), 87. Stephen Neill, A History of Christianity in India: The Beginnings to ad 1707 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), 144. Francis Xavier to Ignatius of Loyola, 27 Jan 1545, mx, i, 362. Francis Xavier to Ignatius of Loyola, 27 Jan 1545, mx, i, 362.

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colleague Niccolò Lancilotto held some different opinions on the value of education, and his letters contain several key contentions in favor of increased attention to pedagogy within the Society in India, both for members and those in wider society. He felt proselytism required more training, advising that any newly dispatched missionaries must be prepared to counter the heretical claims indigenous people held.37 Whereas Xavier called for new personnel to possess corporal and spiritual strength, Lancilotto added that “this land requires men of great strength and letters and spiritual virtue.”38 Invoking the example of Paul and the other blessed saints, he suggested that the tribulations faced in India were much greater than the apostles faced, and the men of the Society have much less divine blessing than the first Christians. Education of Jesuits therefore had implications for the education of young non-​Christians. As such, Lancilotto felt that the best way to spread the faith was to focus efforts on elevating the status of education in India and in this pursuit to accept more indigenous men into the colleges and train them to be at least Christians and at best Jesuits. Recalling Paul’s words to the Corinthians to “become all to all,” the Italian noted, “wherefore we might desire to be all things to others here … it might be ordered that in all things and to all we adapt ourselves, according to the wishes of the college founders.”39 Included in these objectives were the admission of native students. Whereas Xavier’s purpose was less pedagogical, Lancilotto likely influenced the educational policies of the Society through his letters to Ignatius. Accepting the possibility of the college producing indigenous Jesuits in the future, he echoed the Exercises’ expression of free will in one’s decision-​making, stating that it is necessary to take up children, and to exercise them in letters and in holiness of life, till they arrive to the maturity of age, so that they may choose good or evil for themselves, and then to welcome and accept into our Congregation whosoever shall wish to follow Christ’s path and ours.40

37 38 39 40

Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 5 Dec 1550, di, ii, 127; cf. John Correia-​Afonso, The Ignatian Vision of India: A Historical Study (Anand: Gujarat Sahitya Prakash, 1991), 33. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 10 Oct 1547, di, i, 184. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 5 Nov 1546, di, i,142. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 5 Nov. 1546, di, i, 144; cf. Correia-​Afonso, The Ignatian Vision, 29. Incidentally, shortly before this letter the Constitutions of the College of St. Paul, Goa were drafted and sent to Rome, 27 June 1546, di, i, 111–​29.

90 Blankemeyer The implied motive for this was, of course, conversion with the intention that education would induce indigenous non-​Christians towards the faith –​as well as possible recruitment into the Society. Ignatius consented to this proposition, responding to Lancilotto some years later from his usual backlog of global letters, “I hold as very fit the means you take of training the children in Christian doctrine and life, for it is to be hoped that not only will these turn out well, but they will help many others by their example and conversation.”41 Comparing this idea to what was at that time being attempted in Europe, Ignatius’ secretary Juan Polanco reckoned that “though it is not usual in these parts [Europe] in the colleges of the Society, this work is not foreign to our Institute … and in India it is among the best things one could do.”42 Into the discussion of education entered the Portuguese António Gomes (fl. 1548–​54), who upon arrival replaced Lancilotto as rector of St. Paul’s. Although more fervent than his predecessor and therefore a welcome injection of life into an environment affected by Lancilotto’s lukewarm personality, Gomes presented a threat to policies which Lancilotto thought had greater potential for gaining new converts. Now in Cochin observing the college’s affairs from afar, Lancilotto remarked in late 1548 that “it is true that he has more talent in preaching and confessing than in ruling and commanding.”43 To an extent, Gomes suited the ideals Xavier preferred in new arrivals. The problem with Gomes’ administration of the college was that while he respected the humanistic education favoured by the founding Jesuits, he sought to reform all styles of meditation and oration in the Coimbra tradition. This amounted to more radical practices of mortification and strict authoritarian rule of the college as means of enforcing order. Gomes’ objective, “that this college will be a university for all of India,” signified not the inclusion of all Indian students but rather a university intended for the edification and development of Portuguese living in India, to mould St. Paul’s “of the method and spirit that I had in the college of Coimbra.”44 This concern for reform of spirit of only Christians equated to the dismissal of native students in favor of older and illiterate Portuguese boys, as Gomes placed the welfare of the casados ahead of all others in his ministry.

41 42 43 44

Ignatius of Loyola to Niccolò Lancilotto, 26 Dec. 1553, di, iii, 48. Correia-​Afonso, The Ignatian Vision, 48. Juan de Polanco from communication of provincial Miguel de Torres, 21 Nov 1555, di, iii, 307. Correia-​Afonso, The Ignatian Vision, p. 51. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 26 Dec. 1548, di, i, 439. António Gomes to Simão Rodrigues, 20 Dec 1548, di, i, p. 412; cf. Ines Županov, Missionary Tropics: The Catholic Frontier in India (16th-​17th centuries), (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2005), 124.

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As Gomes remarked in his letter from 1548, “the people of this land are for the most part poor-​spirited, and without having Portuguese we will achieve nothing, because the Portuguese from here do not want to confess to an Indian nor a mestiço priest, but rather one that is Portuguese.”45 The debate brought in many different voices, with Lancilotto, Francis Xavier, and Gomes at various points agreeing with and criticizing the other on specific details. Xavier did not care for the type of fervent Jesuit like Gomes who came from Coimbra, although he agreed with him on the point of barring native Indians from entering the Society. Lancilotto favoured the policy of the mordomos, the confraternity that initially founded the college of Santa Fé, for they had intended it to be “exclusively for the education of indigenous Christian boys.”46 Prior to Gomes’ term as rector, Lancilotto defended the policy of not admitting Portuguese or mestiço boys at all, as he opined that “if we receive Portuguese with these black [boys], they will always be in disputes, saying: ‘You are black and I am white, you are slave and I am free-​born etc.’ Mestiços of this land however carry poor repute, therefore no one here expects anything good from them.”47 The Italian had nevertheless complained that the confraternity had operated the college poorly, and therefore happily welcomed a reform-​ minded rector like Gomes –​that is, until he decided to disregard the place of moços da terra, native boys, who had been attending the institution. The two struck a temporary compromise, and Gomes followed Lancilotto’s suggestion, separating Indian students from Portuguese in lessons.48 The debate did not end there, however, as the question of Gomes’ reputation resurfaced. Continuing his complaints about Gomes, Lancilotto simultaneously called on Xavier, the provincial superior, and the appropriate authority for these local issues, to resolve the situation. He saw that Gomes had created an environment “with so much fervour and so much austerity, that it was necessary for Master Francis [Xavier] to remedy [the situation].”49 Xavier nevertheless failed to handle the issue, and by early 1551 Lancilotto wrote to Loyola 45

António Gomes to Simão Rodrigues, 20 Dec 1548, di, i, 416; Charles Ralph Boxer, ‘The Problems of the Native Clergy in Portuguese India, 1518–​1787,’ History Today, 17/​11 (1967): 772–​80, 774. 46 Županov, Missionary Tropics, 122. Details on this policy are found in Statuta Confraternitatis Fidei, di, i, 776–​80. 47 Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 5 Nov 1546, di, i, 142. 48 In general, indigenous boys were separated in both instruction and boarding; Portuguese orphans actually resided closer to the central building than Indians, while further out were servants and slaves. 49 Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 8 Jan 1550, di, ii, 10; Županov, Missionary Tropics,163.

92 Blankemeyer how “in the College of Goa there is now not a single Indian: all of them were dismissed by Padre António Gomes, and he took Portuguese men.”50 Clearly trying to suppress some of his emotion on the matter, Lancilotto reflected upon how this policy in admission could have been handled better “with much modesty and without any scandal … but the Padre is so fervent and so zealous for the Society, that he would not know how to act if not in this manner.”51 The new viceroy, Afonso de Noronha, finding the college to be less edifying due to the manner in which Gomes altered the college’s student demographics, ordered the indigenous boys to return. When Xavier finally responded to the issue, he too found the details distressing and dismissed Gomes from the position of rector in 1551, sending him to Diu, where he would spend the rest of his years in relative obscurity.52 The Superior General Loyola certainly comprehended the significant needs of the Indian missions but felt hamstrung by a host of factors, not least of which were lack of able Jesuits and Xavier’s dismissal of others, including Gomes.53 Responding to Lancilotto’s request for literate men with more tact than fervor –​six years after the initial request and one year following the reminder being further evidence of the backlog –​Ignatius responded that “on the persons that you say ought to be sent to India, if we should have the strengths equal to your wish, you will be completely satisfied; but in the end we do what we can, and God Our Lord will provide the rest.”54 Loyola’s words indicated the limited options available to the Jesuits in India, and ultimately the conditions created the opportunities for debates and varied responses to the issues that arose. Through Lancilotto’s privileging of native youth education, a greater capacity existed for the elements of accommodation to sprout, yet Gomes’ concern for the Portuguese living in Goa imposed limitations to any development of such an approach. Through these various discussions about education, the ambiguity of the greater Jesuit understanding of responsibilities within one’s mission appears. Beginning with Xavier’s emphasis on preaching over teaching, we see how the charismatic evangelist considered the Society’s priorities outside the classroom 50 51 52 53 54

Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 6 Jan 1551, di, ii, 148. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 6 Jan 1551, di, ii, 148. ‘and because P. Antonio Gomez expelled them [that is to say, the boys] from the College, as we said, he himself was expelled from the Society’, Juan Alfonso de Polanco, Vita Ignatii Loiolae et Rerum Societatis Jesu Historia (6 vols, Madrid, 1894–​98), iv, 663. Cf. John Correia-​Afonso, “Ignatius and Indian Jesuit Vocations,” in Jesuits in India: in Historical Perspective, eds., Teotonio R. de Souza and Charles Borges (Macau: Instituto Cultural de Macau-​Xavier Center of Historical Research, 1992), 79–​80. Ignatius of Loyola to Niccolò Lancilotto, 26 Dec 1553, di, iii, 48.

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rather than inside. In part, this suits the early Jesuit ideology, which as some have pointed out did not initially consider the formal education of students as part of their primary purpose, but rather simply to help the illiterate. Yet from Lancilotto’s perspective as one actively engaged in the college’s operations in Goa, the Italian saw some promise in the education of young indigenous Christians as part of a potentially fruitful native clergy. Much like other aspects of the early Jesuits, dissonance in interpretation of responsibilities hindered the more accommodationist initiatives. 4

Language Learning and Use

With language a greater potential for cultural adaptation arose. Connecting the dots between Ciceronic rhetoric and its humanist resurfacing, the effect the movement had on Ignatius as reflected in the foundational literature, and cultural differences across space, the only way a Jesuit would have even a remote chance at moving an audience to reflect on Christian teachings was by speaking in their own language. Humanist Latin, though a significant aspect of the classical resurgence in the fifteenth century, did not fit within the refreshed policy of accommodatio, in that it could not significantly move all audiences of a global stage. Jesuits’ vernaculars became the norm in correspondence, while indigenous languages over time came to dominate individual study during the mission. Loyola stressed this multiple times in his correspondence during the period in which he drafted the Constitutions, mostly seeking to avoid tensions between members of different backgrounds and nations. While the Constitutions had first suggested that greater edification could be achieved by fully comprehending the local language, it did not tie this principle to any particular region.55 Given the timing of correspondence described below in relation to the period of Loyola’s drafting of the Constitutions, it is probable that this idea first emanated from Jesuit activity in India, despite the fact that some early documents from within the general curia mention the communication issues which arose amongst the diverse dialects of Italy as well as elsewhere in Europe.56 In many instances Xavier more or less learned Tamil for the purpose of reciting prayers and Christian sayings, but his grasp of the language never exceeded mimicry or memorization. He summoned droves of people to his public 55 Loyola, Constitutions, 201. 56 Cf. Ignatius of Loyola, Sancti Ignatii de Loyola Constitutiones Societatis Jesu (4 vols, Rome, 1934–​48), iii,131. Cf. Polanco, Vita Ignatii Loiolae, v, 49.

94 Blankemeyer gatherings, who then learned prayers and the Apostles’ Creed by reciting words spoken in Tamil by Xavier, which he himself had learned only through repetition rather than comprehension. As he described in a 1544 letter recounting his time on the Fishery Coast, Xavier sought to preach Christian doctrine to the people, but noted that obviously no one spoke Basque. He thus “fetched people who understood our language and theirs, and after we had met for many days, with great effort we produced the prayers … and the general confession from Latin into Tamil (malauar).”57 The text described was a basic catechism covering the prayers of the rosary and the Creed, which he had ordered a companion to print to carry out his public preaching in Cape Comorin. It would ultimately inform the Doutrina Cristã and Confessionairo composed in Tamil by Henrique Henriques and published thirty years later.58 The catechism did not evince any linguistic comprehension, yet its production by Xavier at the very least evinced some attempt by the first Jesuit to create a linguistic bridge with the local communities.59 Aware of the difficulties in learning Tamil or Malayalam, Lancilotto recognised the success of his colleagues –​not only Henriques, but also Antonio Criminali who picked up Tamil rather quickly –​in terms of language while noting his own shortcomings.60 As he often had to converse with indigenous people through interpreters, Lancilotto thus determined that the missionaries to India “should work to learn the languages, because through interpreters little or no fruit is made.”61 After a few years of work in both Goa and Kollam, Lancilotto translated this into policy-​making, advising that “the Fathers who dwell here should have fixed provinces and regions and where they should be they should endeavour to learn the languages,” a suggestion he repeatedly made.62 Lancilotto’s close correspondent and friend Henrique Henriques led this effort of more advanced study, becoming the first European Tamil scholar –​ though it was not without its own set of problems. Writing in 1548, Henriques stated that due to the complex grammar and syntax issues, “I did not believe I could succeed and so I gave it up”, and only after the interpreter left did he

57 58 59 60 61 62

Francisco Xavier to the Society in Rome, 15 Jan 1544, mx, i, p. 280. Antoni Üçerler, “Gutenberg Comes to Japan,” 7–​8. Henriques’ translated text of the Doutrina Cristã was published in 1577. Cf. Francisco Xavier, ‘Brevis catechismus Christianae doctrinae’, mx, i, 987–​90. Josef Wicki, “De epistolarum auctoribus,” 43*. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 10 Oct 1547, di, i, 184. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 29 Oct 1552, di, ii, p. 381. Correia-​Afonso, The Ignatian Vision, 38.

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resolve to learn the language.63 Repeating his suggestions as he often did, Lancilotto reminded Ignatius again in 1552 how “much less fruit is produced” by speaking through intermediaries, taking insight from Henriques’ work across the more remote regions of southern India.64 Lancilotto praised the methods Henriques used to better converse with local populations and how this created opportunities to retrieve greater knowledge about the Fishery coast and its people and win them over to the Christian faith. Henriques accomplished this through both a rudimentary grasp of the language –​which increasingly improved –​and a collective of “men who were well-​inclined and well-​conditioned” to help with instructing converts, baptizing the young, burying the dead and caring for the sick. After his visitation to the Cape of Comorin, Lancilotto “was incredibly consoled in seeing how well instructed those people are, and how well informed many of them are on the matters of our most holy faith.”65 Overall, he remarked positively how Henriques “is not only respected among the Christians, but also the Moors and gentios.”66 The fruits of his dedicated work were some of the earliest published works in India, a Tamil grammar, Arte malauar (c. 1566), followed by a doctrinal text, Confessionairo (1580). For Henriques, understanding the “gentilic rites to which they were accustomed” was necessary for the preservation of the new faith of converts, as well as “his methods of penance to punish them.”67 The purpose overall was to ensure retention of Christian doctrine and rejection of superstitions, but this required at least some understanding of what constituted the rites of gentiles, something which only started to arrive once better language comprehension proliferated amongst the missionaries and their coadjutors. Henriques thus echoed the sentiments of his superior Lancilotto in a letter to Superior General Diego Laínez ten years after Lancilotto’s last plea, using practically the same phrasing, that “much, much more [fruit] will be made, if those who come here understand the language.”68

63 64 65 66 67 68

Henrique Henriques to Fathers Ignatius of Loyola, Simão Rodrigues and others, 31 Oct 1548, di, i, 285; cf. Otto Zwartjes, Portuguese Missionary Grammars in Asia, Africa and Brazil, 1550–​1800 (Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing, 2011), 30. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 29 Oct 1552, di, ii, 381. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 29 Oct 1552, di, ii, 382. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 29 Oct 1552, di, ii, 382–​3. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 29 Oct 1552, di, ii, 382; ‘acostumão rytos gentilicos’. Henrique Henriques to Diego Laínez, 29/​30 Dec 1562, di, v, 682; cf. Vito Perniola, The Catholic Church in Sri Lanka: the Portuguese period: original documents translated into English, vol. 1 (Dehiwala: Tisara Prakasakayo Ltd., 1989), 409.

96 Blankemeyer In essence, the question of language stemmed from education. In order to administer a successful mission amongst non-​Lusophone communities, one had to either employ interpreters –​which required instruction of indigenous people in Portuguese –​or learn the local languages oneself. In any scenario, schools and the texts used within them were indispensable to training and initiating comprehension of the mission particulars, despite the demographics of those who enrolled and studied. Jesuit superiors at the time had failed to decide on curriculum and prescribe content, and some companions felt stranded. Lancilotto certainly aired his grievance, responding rather directly to Xavier and his prolonged absence: “those who say that the men of the Society who come here do not have need of being lettered are not those that stop by here.”69 Nevertheless, in contrast to his foil António Gomes, Lancilotto channeled his drive for policy change through obedience to his superiors despite their occasional disregard of his proscriptions as well as their own disobedience, as with Xavier. Just as the Exercises instilled the principle of independent decision-​making, obedience balanced the zeal contained therein, encouraging a more mindful strategy that informed cultural accommodation. Additionally, as Lancilotto had stressed the need for languages as part of missionary appointments to fixed provinces, the placement of Jesuits in these provinces and their expected obedience to their superiors’ decisions regarding such placement greatly influenced the development of serious language study. The Constitutions reiterated this fact on multiple occasions. On the topic of missions and the distribution of individual Jesuits throughout the “diverse regions” of the world, the Constitutions stated that if the pope had not sent a member to a particular location, or they themselves had not chosen a place, then “they may carry on their labour, not by traveling but by residing steadily and continually in certain places where much fruit of glory and service to God is expected.”70 Maintaining residence in one location facilitated language comprehension, therefore prioritizing fixed provincial appointments rather than encouraging more apostolic peregrinations necessarily highlighted the Jesuit responsibility towards language learning. Much like the question of education, given the lack of an established policy in the first decade, in many ways the perspectives of individual Jesuits regarding language relied on their understanding of mission responsibilities and priorities. For most of the Jesuits, their ministry was reserved to the Portuguese settler community as well as those serving the military and the state, while the minority worked in areas outside

69 Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 8 Jan 1550, di, ii, 12. 70 Loyola, Constitutions, 268.

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auspices of the Estado, so their priorities often lied within Lusophone ministry. As missions were established in places like the Fishery Coast and Jesuits began to live in these places rather than simply travel to them, the emphasis shifted to ministry amongst the indigenous communities. 5

Educational Responsibilities

Francis Xavier generally did not place education beyond matters of the faith at the forefront of his ministry and instead focused on preaching the Gospel and baptizing nonbelievers. He emphasized charismatic ministry and evangelical experience in ensuring salvation, rather than the humanist focus on comprehensive study and improved linguistic and rhetoric capabilities which characterized a number of his Jesuit successors.71 When he developed a rudimentary Portuguese catechism in 1542, very little instruction was offered to the initiate before receiving baptism but rather a great deal more after it.72 Overall, Xavier rarely scrutinized conversion methods. However, Niccolò Lancilotto once again expressed discomfort as well as displeasure in the procedures used not only by Portuguese officials and ecclesiastics, but also fellow Jesuits, offering solutions through education. Before discussing the issues of catechism and educational responsibilities, Lancilotto immediately noticed a generally lax approach to the sacramental rites. In his first letter written after arriving in India in September 1545, Lancilotto described the way the various clergy administered the rite of baptism: The manner of baptising them is with their catechism, with holy water, without chrism or any oil, things which I neither praise nor condemn. Here among us there are men who do not wish to baptise anyone in this manner, nor is it possible to remove that scruple from their thinking.73 Lancilotto experienced mixed feelings on the practices employed here, seemingly due to the fact that the proper, canonical process was not being respected but other religious were nevertheless converting Goan Indians. Perhaps he 71 72 73

Ananya Chakravarti, The Empire of Apostles: Religion, Accommodatio and The Imagination of Empire in Modern Brazil and India (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), 118. Cf. Correia-​Afonso, Jesuit Letters, 57. Cf. Županov, Missionary Tropics, 69. Correia-​Afonso, The Ignatian Vision of India, 48. Niccolò Lancilotto to Simão Rodrigues, 22 Oct 1545, di, i, 32.

98 Blankemeyer was less scandalized by these rapid, mass baptisms because so many Christian conversions had been achieved up to that point.74 Important to his account, however, is the recognition of an ongoing debate in his mention of some people –​assumedly Portuguese, or only clerics –​who disagree with this kind of ritually “incomplete” baptism. Lancilotto goes on to describe other tactics employed in the city of Goa, such as the admittance of “Turks and Moors and gentiles without any respect” when mass is said at the cathedral, seemingly to encourage conversion by allowing exposure to the holy mass. It was also possible, however, that the lack of personnel to instruct both potential and recent converts contributed to such openness. Those with whom Lancilotto spoke defended this practice because it allowed non-​Christians to witness the ceremonies and “sacrifices” involved, although he noted “the canons are to the contrary.”75 Nevertheless, he remarked “I who am not that scrupulous am willing to continue the [local] custom of the land,”76 which is to say the practice as it existed. In essence, Lancilotto consented to this type of baptism, even if he had reservations about the elements of the process. The Italian Jesuit did not make reference to any particular theology regarding these conversions, but his remarks two years later expressed a number of concerns about the baptisms and the care converts received after receiving the sacrament. As Aquinas stated in the Summa Theologica, baptism should be deferred for an adequate amount of time, not only “on account of caution for the Church, in order that it not be deceived in conferring baptism falsely,” but also to provide the opportunity “for faith and morals to be examined’ and ‘to be instructed fully in the faith.”77 Lastly, this period of time was so that catechumenates would not receive baptism until the decreed holy days of Easter or Pentecost. Lancilotto’s main contentions were consistent with these Thomist and canonical opinions in that he witnessed many Indian gentios become Christians “for purely temporal interests and many of them to poor ends” or even to avoid imprisonment, and he complained that clerics “baptize them in whatever place or in whatever time...without much doctrine”, and subsequently “many return to gentilisim [heathenism] and Islam.”78

74 75 76 77 78

Joseph Greco, S.J., Le pouvoir du Souverain Pontife à l’égard des infidèles (Rome: Pontificia Università Gregoriana, 1967), 49. Niccolò Lancilotto to Simão Rodrigues, 22 Oct 1545, di, i, 32. Precisely which canons is unclear. Niccolò Lancilotto to Simão Rodrigues, 22 Oct 1545, di, i, 32; ‘io che non so molto scrupoloso me ne vado con el costume de la terra’. Summa Theologica, iii 68.3. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 10 Oct 1547, di, i, 182–​3.

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Lancilotto’s contemporary and compatriot Antonio Criminali explained extensively how the process of instruction should be carried out for these adult converts. After explaining in late 1545 the means by which converts were baptized in Goa –​that is to say, the Indian non-​Christians “gather and say that they want to be Christians; when the sermon is over, when it is preached, they [priests] baptise them immediately” –​Criminali gave his opinion on the same issues as Lancilotto, which included the absence of oil or chrism and the lack of instruction. In contrast to his companion, however, Criminali explicitly referenced the teachings of Aquinas, as well as other Dominican theologians such as Silvestro Mazzolini and Antonio Pierozzi, regarding the amount of time deemed necessary for sufficient instruction in the Christian faith; a period which he said could be forty days (as Erasmus had suggested, along the ancient practice of a Lenten-​long catechumenate) or, following the theologians he cited, six months “or according to the opinion of a prudent man.”79 In his statements, he was certainly far more critical about the practice of the church in Goa than Lancilotto, often repeating how “incomplete” each ceremony was, regardless whether it happens in the city’s churches or those in the surrounding islands. Criminali declared, “I tell them that if they baptise them, that I have scruples in this.”80 It is possible to see the procedures as described by Lancilotto as an example of adjusting the rigors of doctrine to fit the local context, but the second opinion of Criminali portrays outright concern over such laxity in administration of sacraments. Arguably, these adaptations were not done to suit the indigenous people, nor to respect and not contradict their customs according to Ignatius, but rather implemented to suit the lack of personnel, the imperial objective of Christian uniformity across Portuguese territories, and the desire to see the latter realized in spite of the former. As many have stated, conversion was a highly political matter and was tied to the establishment of rule in Goa.81 Based on Lancilotto’s account, there were not enough clerics to instruct indigenous Goans in the faith which they purportedly willingly accepted. Francis Xavier even noted how “the wives of settlers born here, and mestiço daughters and sons, are content in saying that they are Portuguese by family/​nation and not by law: the cause of this is the lack of preachers here who teach the law 79 80 81

Antonio Criminali to Ignatius of Loyola, 7 Oct 1545, di, i, 13–​14. Antonio Criminali to Ignatius of Loyola, di, i, 15–​16. Rowena Robinson, Conversion, Continuity and Change: Lived Christianity in Southern Goa (New Delhi: Sage Publication, 1998), 44; Ines Županov, “Conversion Historiography in South Asia: Alternative Indian Christian Counter-​histories in Eighteenth Century Goa,” The Medieval History Journal, 12/​2 (2009): 303–​325, 312.

100 Blankemeyer of Christ.”82 Instead clerics viewed it as a sign of the victory of religion and evidence that the rest of Asia would fall just as easily –​the divine providence ordained to the cause of the propagation of faith. One example provides evidence of some shift in the process of conversion realized by some Jesuits. In January of 1549, Manuel de Morães wrote to the Society at Coimbra about the positive state of missionary work in the area of Travancore in the far southern point of India, describing among many things the method in which he and his companions carried out baptisms. Although he did not indicate a long period of catechetical instruction, Morães nevertheless noted that “first we work to guide them to an understanding of the truth, and for some days have them learning the orations and instructing them in the truth.”83 While this certainly questioned some claims of prior reports on procedures carried out in the capital of the Estado, the location of this mission pointed to a different experience in the areas outside Portuguese jurisdiction. The narrative proceeded to describe how with some speed the neophytes were escorted to the church, made their confession, and learned the important prayers and creed, and received the sign of the cross per the baptismal rites. Even after all these steps, Morães noted that they then proceeded to carry out the sacrament of marriage for some new converts.84 Given that the people described by the Jesuit were paraiyas, a southern Indian caste group of low status, there is a further dimension of potential benefit for a group that stood outside of caste, whose movement into the Church could have afforded some social capital, at least under the auspices of the Portuguese.85 Therefore, the quick pace of the sacramental process could equally have been encouraged by missionaries as gentios. If we look other parts of his letter, however, some aspects of ministry presented optimism about achieving Lancilotto and Criminali’s intended modus procedendi –​the instruction of local people in groups there by those who already knew the language and taught both adults and young children.86 82 83 84 85

86

Francisco Xavier To Dom João iii, 16 May 1546, dhmppo, iii, 351. Manuel de Morães to the Society at Coimbra, 3 Jan 1549, di, i, 464; “primeiro trabalhamos polo[s]‌trazer a conhecimento da verdade, e tê-​llos alguns dias aprendendo as oraçõis e instruindo-​os na verdade.” Manuel de Morães to the Society at Coimbra, 3 Jan 1549, di, i, 464–​5. Cf. Georg Schurhammer, “Letters of D. João da Cruz in the National Archives of Lisbon,” Kerala Society Papers 1 (1930): 304–​7; ibid., ‘João da Cruz, a Chetti, not a Nair,’ Kerala Society Papers, ii/​10 (1932): 276–​77; and ibid., “Die Bekehrung der Paraver,” Archivum Historicum Societatis Iesu, 4 (1935): 207–​15. Cf. António da Silva Rego, Historia das missões do Padroado Português do Oriente (Lisbon: Agencia Geral das Colonias, Divisao de Publicacoes e Biblioteca, 1949), 365–​75; and dhmppo, i, pp. 260–​75, 278; ibid., ii, 256–​61. Manuel de Morães to the Society at Coimbra, 3 Jan 1549, di, i, 463–​4.

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In a way these practices corresponded to accommodation strategies. Although it is unclear as to the length of time during which this catechism took place, on display were conversions of comparably less force or imposition than that taking place in Goa, accompanied by competent interlocutors bridging the divide of language. Spatially, the absence of more imposing colonial systems created favorable conditions for such a sacramental process to take place. However, as some members passed and superiors changed, the expectation of obedience from new personnel reinforced the more strong-​handed methods amongst the Jesuits, showing once again both the limits of accommodation and the voices in opposition. 6

Race and Native Clergy

Concerning intercultural interaction and communication within the mission, inherent issues of translation could be transcended by teaching and converting those who were culturally more commensurable to take up the mantle of proselytism, firstly as interpreters but also as indigenous clergy. Yet as Lancilotto and Henriques expressed, less progress was made by working through interpreters, so Jesuits needed to first learn the language of the people to whom they ministered. Conversely, one logical conclusion might be to admit indigenous Christians, fluent in these languages, into the Society to serve as proxies for European Jesuit self-​fashioning, as they literally embodied the indigenized Christianity which cultural accommodation sought to manifest. Logic in this regard, however, did not win out against normative racial attitudes of the early Jesuits. As the episodes described above involving Xavier portray, the view of gentios and their level of education played one role in the initiative for admitting native clergy, but the other role was that of racial classification. According to Ângela Barreto-​Xavier and Ines Županov, the negative view of Brahmans and even gentios in general, later shared by Alessandro Valignano in his writings, were part of a deliberate attempt to focus energy and resources on the more desired missionary projects of China and Japan, societies which through racial classification were perceived as more “perfect.”87 The low esteem which Xavier and some others held towards indigenous Christians therefore had a direct influence on their perceived potential as Jesuits.

87

Xavier and Županov, Catholic Orientalism, 127–​8. Cf. Alessandro Valignano, ‘Sumario de las cosas que perteneçen a la provincial de la Yndia oriental’ (1579) dhmppo, xii, 475.

102 Blankemeyer Caste, to an extent, connects native clergy to the larger issue of accommodation. As described above, conversion to Christianity across southern India did not translate to loss of caste distinctions, and through the retention of status Jesuits came to express a preference for Brahmans for minor orders, followed by express directives to only admit those of the higher caste groups. Thus, as missionaries came to comprehend the complexities of caste, the more they warmed to the idea of admitting gentios, but this required assurance of their complete rejection of prior beliefs. Distrust of Brahmans by many missionaries worked against their ordination, yet being viewed as a priestly caste had some effect on changes in policy. As Carlos Mercês de Melo pointed out, the Council of Trent preferred poorer candidates for ordination, but by the time of the Third Provincial Council in 1585 the church in India interpreted this differently, finding “it more prudent and necessary to temporize with the existing system so deeply rooted in the Indian soil, rather than to fight it or condemn it indiscriminately.”88 The Third Provincial Council saw past the religious significance of the Brahmans and instead focused on the reputation of the indigenous candidates, that they “should generally be of honourable and pure castes (castas) and families, because by these the other Christians have more respect.”89 Thus beyond the accommodationist element of presentation –​in this instance the transmission of universal truths of Christianity through the vessel of a commensurable indigenous individual –​reinforcing the importance of reputation and effective evangelical communication equated to selective recruitment of Indian Jesuits based on their social status. The actions of Francis Xavier perhaps provide some clarity on the topic of race and indigenous clergy within the Society. Many of the problems faced by Jesuits working under their superior Xavier were compounded by the fact that Xavier spent most of his time in distant places, concerning himself with mass baptisms and propagation of the faith rather than administration or governance of the colleges he established and the parishes he brought together. Lancilotto saw this as a serious weakness for the future of the Society, stressing that “the priests who come here should have fixed areas in which to work.”90 Xavier’s opinion of native students perhaps correlated with his absence, as Ines Županov suggests that Xavier “spread news of Indian spiritual defaults and 88 89

90

Mercês de Melo, Recruitment and Formation of the Native Clergy, 140. Fr. Vicente da Fonseca, Decrees of the Third Provincial Council, Fourth Action, Bullarium Patronatus Portugalliae Regum in ecclesiis Africae, Asiae atque Oceaniae, ed. José Tavares de Macedo (5 vols, Lisbon, 1872), iv, 77–​8; cf. Mercês de Melo, Recruitment and Formation of the Native Clergy, 139. Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius Loyola, 10 Oct 1547, di, vol. 1, 184.

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flaccidity, partly to justify his displacement toward Japan” and avoid a number of what he deemed lesser pursuits.91 On many of the issues where Xavier took a negative perspective in opposition to some of his companions, the idea of race figured greatly into his judgments. Xavier found the Indian people across the subcontinent mostly to be ignorant and uneducated, while despite the Brahmans serving as the learned elite, he believed they withheld their erudition from the people to retain their own power in society. Once in the service of Christianity, the Brahmans became much less of a problem. After a visit by Xavier, he described one Brahman who converted as “a very good man”, and the first professed Indian Jesuit came from the same caste, as discussed below.92 On a more general level, however, he did not approve of the inclusion of Indian professed clergy. He wrote to Ignatius that “by the experience that I have from these parts I see clearly, my own Father, that through those native Indians the way is not open as through those our Society preserves; and that Christianity will last here in them [Indians] as much as we who are here will stay and reside, or those you will send from there [Europe].”93 It was not for lack of trying that Loyola failed to truly resolve this issue, as his letter to Xavier in 1549 outlined how his friend could endeavor to incorporate worthy indigenous converts into the Society, encouraging him ‘that you should not lose spirit’. Among the many options Loyola would “place before him,” one of these included “to make [Christians] in every part, seeking from there to extract more of them and the best that you are able to, so that they are instructed in the colleges.”94 In the context of the debate and the subsequent obstacles, and even solid barriers post-​1579, to admission of native students and clergy, John Correia-​Afonso perhaps said it best: “there are good reasons for saying sadly that in the matter of native vocations to the Jesuit life, the old Society does not seem to have shared the vision of the great Founder.”95 The greater discussion of native clergy spread from the debates over which students to instruct in the Jesuit college. Niccolò Lancilotto’s constant pressure on Ignatius about the instruction of native students derived not only from a concern for their own edification, but also due to the struggles he faced personally. In 1546, he remarked that the men of this country should be instructed

91 Županov, Missionary Tropics, 57. 92 Francisco Xavier to the Society in Rome, 15 Jan 1544, mx, i, 289. 93 Francisco Xavier to Ignatius of Loyola, 12 Jan 1549, Epistolae S. Francisci Xaverii aliaque eius scripta [henceforth ex], eds. Georg Schurhammer and Josef Wicki (2 vols, Rome, 1944–​45), ii, 8. 94 Ignatius of Loyola to Francisco Xavier, 11 Oct 1549, di, i, 513–​14. 95 Correia-​Afonso, Ignatius and Indian Jesuit Vocations, 80.

104 Blankemeyer in sciences, in houses or colleges of the Society, as “they are more apt to endure the heat of this country, which is generally intolerable.”96 Drawing on the tropical difficulties, Lancilotto instead saw acclimation as an opportunity rather than a sign of depravity. The practice of employing indigenous auxiliaries or even non-​Jesuit priests had already been successfully employed by Francisco Mansilhas, companion to Francis Xavier on the Cape of Comorin, who as Lancilotto noted “has with him two young men who are of that land.”97 They had been trained at the seminary at St Paul’s in Goa but were not Jesuits; one was a deacon, the other of a minor order. Building on his earlier thought, Lancilotto suggested that perhaps those already accustomed to the conditions might prove indispensable to the mission efforts: “to me the best method, that we could have for the conversion of these people and that we could do in colleges like the one where we are, seems for us to teach men of the same origin, those who could endure more the labours of the land.”98 Yet even if Xavier had conceded the schooling of indigenous Christians who sought to work for the Society in other capacities, he did not consider them worthy of ministry to the laity, as he remarked to Simão Rodrigues in early 1549, “those who enter into the Society here are not to go outside the colleges, for not having letters nor virtues nor spirit to be able to attend to the conversion of the gentiles, because for this requires many years of mortification and of experience, as you well know.”99 For most of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, only Brahmans and occasionally some Kshatriyas were allowed to enter in the capacity of lay positions within Jesuit houses and colleges, retaining caste distinctions not only beyond conversion but also through inclusion within the Society, and limiting them to working in professed houses and caring for the sick, among other duties of the “unlearned” members.100 Despite this concession to indigenous Jesuit service, a step towards cultural accommodation through the element of presentation, it seems the negotiation of Jesuit identity in the Estado floated between the exigencies of Portuguese settler sentiments and local caste reputation, showing the limitations of accommodation through partial indigenous membership.

96 97

Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 5 Nov 1546, di, i, 144. Niccolò Lancilotto to Martim de Santa Cruz, Nov 1546, di, i, 45. Their names were Gaspar and Manuel, cf. Francis Xavier to Francisco Mansilhas, 18 Dec 1544, dhmppo, iii, 129. 98 Niccolò Lancilotto to Ignatius of Loyola, 10 Oct 1547, di, i, 184. 99 Francis Xavier to Simão Rodrigues, 20 Jan 1549, ex, ii, 42. 100 Charles Ralph Boxer, The Church Militant and Iberian Expansion, 1440–​1770 (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978), 20.

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Lancilotto challenged the idea, held most strongly by the pro-​Portuguese rector António Gomes, that native vocations would not produce viable Jesuits and went against claims of ignorance to suggest that learned discourse was required to foster local converts. The debate over the place of native clergy within both the empire and the order had contentious periods. When Lancilotto sought to dispatch a token Indian Jesuit brother to Europe as a mission representative in 1553, “the plan was abandoned because the Portuguese did not favour such visits.”101 Back in the Estado, the question of restricting admission surfaced through the Visitor to the Missions Gonçalo Álvares in 1568. In his decision, even Álvares expressed some ambivalence on the topic: From experience the Fathers feel that for now it is not convenient to receive to the Society those of this country, nor even mestiços; and superiors of the other religious orders are much the same. However I am inclined (after I looked after whether there might be some industrious and useful who can help the Ordinary, and whether they could join us) that all doors should not be closed to any nation, for Christ Our Lord died for all.102 Similar to the debate over conversos (descendants of converted Iberian Jews) in the Society, the place of gentile converts from India produced controversy, hindering dissenting voices like Lancilotto’s from having greater effect on policy. The closest the early Society came to respecting these opinions was with Fr. Pedro Luís (fl. 1547–​96), a Brahman convert from the area of Kollam. Born around 1532, he converted at age fifteen and was sent to St. Paul’s for his education, and later served extensively as interpreter and coadjutor, receiving ordainment at last in 1575.103 He would be the only Indian ordained as a priest in the Society of Jesus prior to the suppression of the Jesuits in 1759. Regardless of Luis’ tireless labors and almost half a century of service for the order in India, the General Congregation never changed their standards. In fact, superior general Everard Mercurian decided the opposite and barred admission of native clergy, Asian and Eurasian, just four years after Luís’ ordination.104 Although

1 01 Županov, Missionary Tropics, 262. 102 Gonçalo Alvares to Francisco Borgia, [Dec] 1568, di, vii, 575. 103 Cf. di, vol. 2, p. 382, fn. 17; “Anno 1575 sacerdotio auctus”. 104 Charles Boxer, “The problem of the native clergy in the Portuguese and Spanish Empires from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Centuries,” in The Mission of the Church and the Propagation of the Faith, ed., G. J. Cuming (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), 85–​105, 89.

106 Blankemeyer he never convinced his European companions or superiors to admit his Indian brethren, Luís nevertheless contributed extensively to mission activity on the Fishery Coast through continued linguistic work; the Tamil catechism initiated by Xavier was further improved by the work of Luís, whose expertise contributed to its later printing.105 Luís’ storied career and impact on the early Jesuit mission evince the significance that indigenous clergy held –​and furthermore, the promise they could have held –​for overcoming the cultural incommensurability which the Society would later visualize another way through accommodation. Given this unique position and potential, as Luís himself wrote in 1589, ‘as the only Malabar son in the Society … I do not know for what reasons it is founded’ that others like him should not be admitted.106

Bibliography

Atherton, Ruth. “Peter Canisius and the Development of Catholic Education in Germany, 1549–​97.” Studies in Church History 55 (2019): 145–​160. Barreto-​Xavier, Ângela and Županov, Ines. Catholic Orientalism: Portuguese Empire, Indian Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Borges, Charles. “Foreign Jesuits and Native Resistance.” In Essays in Goan History, edited by Teotónio R. de Souza, 69–​80. New Delhi: Concept Pub. Co, 1989. Borges, Felipe Augusto; Menezes, Sezinando; and Costa, Célio. ‘Colégio de São Paulo, em Goa: um colégio jesuítico no oriente (1548–​1558).’ Estudos Ibero-​Americanos, 46, 2 (2020): 1–​15. Boxer, Charles Ralph. “The problem of the native clergy in the Portuguese and Spanish Empires from the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Centuries.” In The Mission of the Church and the Propagation of the Faith, edited by G. J. Cuming, 85–​105. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970. Boxer, Charles Ralph. “The Problems of the Native Clergy in Portuguese India, 1518–​ 1787.” History Today, 17/​11 (1967): 772–​80. Boxer, Charles Ralph. The Church Militant and Iberian Expansion, 1440–​1770. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978. Carneiro, Roberto and Teodoro de Matos, Artur, eds. D. João iii e o Império. Actas do Congresso Internacional. Lisbon: cepcep –​Centro de Estudos dos Povos e Culturas de Expressão Portuguesa, 2004. 105

Correia-​Afonso, Jesuits in India, 29. The faulty original was published in 1557, with a more accurate translation done by Henrique Henriques, with the help of Pedro Luís, and published in 1578. 106 Fr. Pedro Luís, Brahman, to Fr. Claudio Acquaviva, General, 2 Jan 1589, di, xv, 219–​20.

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Cessario, Romano. “Molina and Aquinas.” In A Companion to Luis de Molina, edited by Alexander Aichele and Mathias Kaufmann, 291–​323. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Chakravarti, Ananya. The Empire of Apostles: Religion, Accommodatio and The Imagination of Empire in Modern Brazil and India. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Correia-​Afonso, John S.J. “Ignatius and Indian Jesuit Vocations.” In Jesuits in India: in Historical Perspective, edited by Teotonio R. de Souza and Charles Borges, 79–​80. Macau: Instituto Cultural de Macau-​Xavier Center of Historical Research, 1992. Correia-​Afonso, John S.J. Jesuit Letters and Indian History. A Study of the Nature and Development of the Jesuit Letters from India (1542–​1773) and of Their Value for Indian Historiography. Bombay: Indian Historical Research Institute St. Xavier’s College, 1955. Correia-​Afonso, John S.J. Jesuits in India, 1542–​1773. Anand: Gujarat Sahitya Prakash, 1997. Correia-​Afonso, John S.J. The Ignatian Vision of India: A Historical Study. Anand: Gujarat Sahitya Prakash, 1991. Corsi, Elisabetta ed. Órdenes religiosas entre América y Asia: ideas para una historia misionera de los espacios coloniales. Mexico City: El Colegio de México, 2008. Da Silva Rego, António. Historia das missões do Padroado Português do Oriente. Lisbon: Agencia Geral das Colonias, Divisao de Publicaçoes e Biblioteca, 1949. Dauril, Alden. The Making of an Enterprise: The Society of Jesus in Portugal and Its Empire, and Beyond: 1540–​1750. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1996. Greco, Joseph S.J. Le pouvoir du Souverain Pontife à l’égard des infidèles. Rome: Pontificia Università Gregoriana, 1967. Imbruglia, Girolamo. The Jesuit Missions of Paraguay and a Cultural History of Utopia (1568–​1789). Leiden: Brill, 2017. Kainulainen, Jaska. “Isocrates’s phronesis and the Early Jesuits.” Journal of Early Modern History, vol. 22, no. 6 (2018): 528–​48. Maryks, Robert A. “The Jesuit Missionary Ethos.” Eighteenth-​Century Studies, vol. 46, no. 3, (2013): 431–​34. Mercês de Melo, Carlos. The Recruitment and Formation of the Native Clergy in India: An Historico-​canonical Study. Lisbon: Agência Geral do Ultramar, Divisão de Publicações e Biblioteca, 1955. Monumenta Ignatiana. Sancti Ignatii de Loyola Societatis Iesu fundatoris epistolae et instructiones, vol. 10. Madrid: Typis G. Lopez del Horno, 1903–​11. Monumenta Xaveriana ex autographis vel ex antiquioribus exemplis collecta. Volume 1. Matriti [Madrid]: Typis Augustini Avrial, 1899–​1900. Nadal, Jeronimo. “Regulae pro scholaribus Societatis.” In Monumenta Paedagogica Societatis Iesu: Novo Editio Penitus Retractata ii (1557–​1572), edited by Ladislaus Lukács. Rome: Institutum Historicum Societatis Iesu, 1974.

108 Blankemeyer Neill, Stephen A History of Christianity in India: The Beginnings to ad 1707. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984. O’Malley, John. “How the First Jesuits Became Involved in Education.” In The Jesuit Ratio Studiorum: 400th Anniversary Perspectives, edited by Vincent J. Duminico, 58–​ 63. New York: Fordham University Press, 2000. Panikkar, Kavalam M. Asia and Western Dominance: A Survey of the Vasco da Gama Epoch of Asian History, 1498–​1945. London: G. Allen and Unwin, 1953. Perniola, Vito. The Catholic Church in Sri Lanka: the Portuguese period: original documents translated into English, vol. 1. Dehiwala: Tisara Prakasakayo Ltd., 1989. Po-​chia Hsia, Ronnie. The World of Catholic Renewal, 1540–​1770. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Robinson, Rowena. Conversion, Continuity and Change: Lived Christianity in Southern Goa. New Delhi: Sage Publication, 1998. Schurhammer, Georg. “Die Bekehrung der Paraver.” Archivum Historicum Societatis Iesu, 4 (1935): 207–​15. Schurhammer, Georg. “João da Cruz, a Chetti, not a Nair.” Kerala Society Papers, ii/​10 (1932): 276–​77. Schurhammer, Georg. “Letters of D. João da Cruz in the National Archives of Lisbon.” Kerala Society Papers, 1 (1930): 304–​7. Sena Gomide, Ana Paula. “Entre Goa e Ceilão: a formação do clero nativo e as dimensões das mestiçagens no Oriente português. Séculos xvi–​x viii.” PhD diss., Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, 2018. Souza, de, Teotonio R. “Asia and Christianity in History: Addressing Some Problems of Church Historiography.” Asian Christian Review, 7/​1 (2013): 18–​27. The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus and Their Complementary Norms: A Complete English Translation of Official Latin Texts. Translated by George E. Ganss, S.J. Saint Louis: The Institute of Jesuit Sources, 1996. Üçerler, M. Antoni J., S.J. “Gutenberg Comes to Japan: the Jesuits & the first it Revolution of the Sixteenth Century.” The Ricci Institute Public Lectures Series (September 2005): 7–​8. Wetmore, Kevin J. Jr., “Jesuit Theater and Drama.” Oxford Handbook Online (2016): 15, accessed July 7, 2016, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199935420.013.55. Županov, Ines. ““One Civility, but Multiple Religions”: Jesuit Mission among St. Thomas Christians in India (16th-​17th Centuries).” Journal of Early Modern History, 9/​3–​4 (2005): 284–​325. Županov, Ines. “Conversion Historiography in South Asia: Alternative Indian Christian Counter-​histories in Eighteenth Century Goa.” The Medieval History Journal, 12/​2 (2009): 303–​325.

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Županov, Ines. “Passage to India: Jesuit Spiritual Economy between Martyrdom and Profit in the Seventeenth Century.” Journal of Early Modern History, 16/​2 (2012): 121–​59. Županov, Ines. Disputed Mission: Jesuit Experiments and Brahmanical Knowledge in Seventeeth-​century India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999. Županov, Ines. Missionary Tropics: The Catholic Frontier in India (16th-​17th centuries). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2005. Zwartjes, Otto. Portuguese Missionary Grammars in Asia, Africa and Brazil, 1550–​1800. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing, 2011.

­c hapter 5

Apology of Human Geography in Daniello Bartoli’s Work Laura Madella 1

Introduction

Examining the schoolbooks that were used in the late nineteenth century to teach Italian children the history of their peninsula, it is easy to see that they combined historical facts with geographical elements and that the authors depicted Italian and sometimes European geography in a moral way. The landscapes and places and conformation of territories were linked to the habits of the inhabitants, or it was supposed they had the power to awake states of mind and foster events. Additionally, often natural landscapes and elements inherently represented positive or negative ideas. We know that interpretations of this kind have remote origins, and complex, sometimes insidious, long-​lasting influences in the cultural history of ideas, and a rich strand of interdisciplinary research is developing around these topics today.1 As far as early modern history is concerned, Daniello Bartoli’s La geografia trasportata al morale (The geography morally read,) certainly marked a fundamental step in which Catholic and Baroque culture appropriated this trend, filled it with its own contents, and reshaped it according to its formal taste. Daniello Bartoli S.J., born in Ferrara in 1608 and dead in Rome in 1685, never travelled outside Italy in his entire life. As a young Jesuit eager to spend his life in the remote mission lands, Bartoli saw his petitions to be sent to the Indies (the so-​called “indipetae”) as denied one by one; rather, he was considered suitable for more intellectual tasks. As soon as he finished his studies, he was appointed professor of philosophy, then itinerant preacher (ca. 1637–​1647), and, finally, historian of the Society of Jesus. This latter assignment was official and overriding. In 1648, the superiors forbade him to preach, because of his frail health, and from then on, he spent his life time, with the exception of very 1 David M. Smith, Moral Geographies: Ethics in a Worlds of Difference (Edinburgh: Edin­burgh u.p., 2000); Gunhild Setten, “The habitus, the rule and the moral landscape,” Cultural geography, no. 11 (2004): 389–​415, and “Moral Landscapes,” in International Encyclopedia of Human Geography, ed. A. L. Kobayashi (Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2020) 2nd edition, vol. 9, 193–​198.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2024 | DOI:10.1163/9789004680234_007

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few, short periods, in the professed house (Casa professa) in Rome, writing the history of the Society of Jesus. Historian of literature Alberto Asor Rosa (1964) called those almost forty years “a single, very long day of study, of which you do not know whether to admire more Bartoli’s patience, tenacity or inexhaustible vitality.”2 As for the texts, the Histories of the Society of Jesus rely on the geographical topic mostly to boost propagandistic and apologetic purposes. The elements of the landscapes in the Histories, understandably, pointed to build the founding narrative of the Jesuit missions and fasten in the readers’ minds the epic deeds of Catholic (indeed Jesuit) heroes such as Francis Xavier, also known as “the Apostle of India.” Although Bartoli’s personal religious vocation and missionary enthusiasm pervade his writings, some scholars pointed out that Geography is less influenced by this aspect: the wonder for Creation stands out, and consequently the glorification of the Creator follows a Catholic ethical framework, but the achievements of the Jesuit Order, for instance, almost disappear from the scene. Asor Rosa acknowledges that this work sets a “hilarious and quiet tone of fervent admiration towards the world.”3 With regard to Geography and other less “militant” writings such as The Recreation of the Sage and The symbols morally read,4 historian of literature Ezio Raimondi speaks of “natural apologetics” and argues that Bartoli pursued the reconciliation of science, humanistic tradition, and Christian spirituality through an appealing rhetoric, upstanding from the Catholic point of view, but avoided sounding punitive to the reader, inspired by the work of Father Marin Mersenne.5 However, more recent studies consider this deviation more as a variation on a theme than a true exception, 2 “una sola, lunghissima giomata di studio, della quale non sai se ammirare di più la pazienza, la tenacia o l’inesauribile vitalità.,” in Alberto Asor Rosa, “Bartoli, Daniello”. dbi Treccani vol. 6 (1964), https://​www​.trecc​ani​.it​/encic​lope​dia​/danie​llo​-barto​li​_%28Diz​iona​rio​-Bio​graf​ ico%29​/​. Where not otherwise stated, translations from Italian to English are by the author. As for a general and more recent Bartoli’s biography see at least John J. Renaldo, Daniello Bartoli: A Letterato of the Seicento (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1988) and Wu Yinlan’s introduction at La Cina di Daniello Bartoli (Roma: Urbaniana, 2014). 3 “tono ilare e quieto di fervorosa ammirazione verso il mondo,” in Alberto Asor Rosa, “Bartoli, Daniello”. (online). 4 La ricreatione del savio (Rome: de’ Lazzeri, 1659) e Dei simboli trasportati al morale (Venezia: Hertz, 1677). 5 Ezio Raimondi, ed., Trattatisti e narratori del Seicento (Milano-​Napoli: Ricciardi, 1960), xiv–​ xv. French Jesuit Marin Mersenne (1588–​1648) was concerned with theology and philosophy as well as mathematics and music theory; recent studies also link Bartoli’s book Del suono e de tremori armonici to his research in this field (Paolo Gozza, “Anche i megafoni hanno un’anima: la «Tromba parlante» (1678) di Geminiano Montanari,” Recercare, 16 (2004): 119–​20).

112 Madella as the ethical framework on which Bartoli builds his divertissement remains too strictly adherent to that one as outlined in the Histories.6 Moreover, the confessional eschatological message is self-​evident, since the last place that Bartoli describes in his geographical review, that is, the landing place of the reader’s journey, is the Holy Land. The fact that Jesuit histories do not appear in the treatise seems to suggest that Bartoli’s intention was that of giving himself a break from the Jesuit histories, which literally suffocated his study and daily life. Because of its complexity and breadth, the History of the Society was conceived from the beginning in several volumes, although it became clear soon that Bartoli’s lifetime would not be enough to complete it. The first volume was devoted to the Life of Ignatius and came out in 1650; by 1664, the year that Geography was completed and published, three volumes more were printed: Asia (1653), Japan (1660), and China (1663).7 It is clear from the titles of Bartoli’s main work that the interaction between history and geography is much more than a possible narrative parameter. As historian Simon Ditchfield wrote about Asia and China, this is the only paradigm according to which his religious order can and should be told, simultaneously alive in time and space, being such a space geographically denoted.8 In the treatise of Geography, the link between the two subjects remains, but apparently reversed: Geography acts as the protagonist and History as the noble sidekick. A third part provides a religious tone to the whole, and that is precisely the moral reading. Moreover, it is no longer that the affairs of the Order that are at stake, but human happenings as a whole. 2

A Moral Reading of World Geography

What is Bartoli’s Geography? In his intentions, Geography should have been a collection of 90 chapters grouped in three parts of 30 chapters each, but Bartoli 6 Marco Arnaudo, “Descrizioni paesaggistiche ed esperienza del lettore nella «Geografia trasportata al morale» di Daniello Bartoli,” in Studi italiani, no. 12/​1 (Jan-​Jun 2010): 5. 7 Later England (1667) and Italy (1673) came out, as well as several monographs devoted to notable sj figures, e.g.: Della vita del padre Vincenzo Carafa settimo generale della Compagnia di Giesv (Bologna: Eredi Benacci, 1651), Missione al Gran Mogor del padre Ridolfo Acquaviva della Compagnia di Giesv (Roma: Varese, 1663); Della vita di Roberto cardinal Bellarmino arcivescovo di Capua della Compagnia di Giesv (Roma: Tinassi, 1678); Della vita di S. Francesco Borgia terzo generale della Compagnia di Giesv (Roma: Tinassi, 1681). 8 Simon Ditchfield, “Baroque around the Clock: Daniello Bartoli sj (1608–​1685) and the Uses of Global History,” in Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, no. 31 (2021): 49–​73.

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completed only the first part and published it in 1664, however adding to the table of contents the plan of the whole work including the titles of the 60 missing chapters. Eventually this first and only volume includes 30 chapters, each one devoted to a geographic environment –​be it a region, an island, a sea, etc. –​in which the author identifies a physical or historical feature, making of this feature a metaphor of a moral human situation. Sometimes metaphors are evident connections, more frequently they require reasoning with several steps to be explained and followed, in the best baroque tradition. One should not attempt to find a common thread in the way places are ordered, for the author himself confesses in the preface that he listed them randomly as they came to his mind, with no other agenda than their final landing in the volume. In fact, the collection begins with a legendary place from Greek mythology, the Fortunate Islands, and ends with the Holy Land, as I already mentioned, but it gets there through a rhapsodic journey that takes the reader through the Mediterranean and the Far East, the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic, North Africa and Northern Europe.9 Each chapter in the book has a headline that is divided into two parts: the name of the place and a short catchphrase that summarizes its moral lesson in the form of an apologue, a summative motto. Because of these features, Marco Arnaudo compares Geography to a variation of the literary genre of the emblem, particularly with the cultural sensibility that the Society of Jesus promoted from its origins through the Spiritual Exercises. These exercises attach great importance to sensory imagination and the association of images and concepts.10 For instance, the title of the third chapter is “Ithaca. Gentle violence of Genius.”11 Bartoli begins by describing the physical features of the real Ithaca, 9

I quote from Daniello Bartoli, La geografia trasportata al morale (Milan: Malatesta, 1664), from here onward La geografia. Here the Index (“Indice”) of the First Part, unnumbered pages: 1. L’Isole Fortunate. (The Fortunate Islands, off the Atlantic coasts of Africa, according to the ancient Greeks); 2. Il Mongibello (Mount Etna, Sicily); Itaca (Ithaca, Ulysses’ homeland, Greece); La Cina (China); Il Capo Non (Cape Cahunar, Morocco); L’Atlante (Atlas Mountains, Morocco); Le Cateratte del Nilo (Cataracts of the Nile river); Le Campagne d’Urabà (Fields of Urabà, Colombia); Zeiland (Zealand, Holland); Le Correnti (The Streams); L’Ultima Thule (Last Thule, Iceland); Capo di Buona Speranza (Cape of Good Hope, South Africa); Le Strofadi (Strofades Islands, Greece); La Madera (Madeira, off the Portuguese coasts); Mitilene (Mytilene, Greece); Capri (Italy); Le Moluche (Maluku Island, Indonesia); Il Promontorio Cafareo (Cape Kafireas, Greece); Gli Antipodi (Antipodes); Rodi (Rhodes, Greece); Il Mar Gelato (Baltic Sea); Le Termopiles (Thermopylae, Greece); La Tessaglia (Thessaly, Greece); La Libia Diserta (desert Libya); Anticira (Antikira, Greece); Terra incognita (Parts unknown); Lago Averno (Lake Avernus, Italy); Scilla, e Cariddi (Scylla and Charybdis, Italy); Il Mar Morto (Dead Sea); Terra Santa (the Holy Land). 10 Arnaudo, Descrizioni paesaggistiche, 6–​8. 11 “Itaca. La soaue violenza del Genio,” Daniello Bartoli, La geografia, “Indice.”

114 Madella which appears as a dry and harsh place. However, the moral reading comes from the literary Ithaca, the realm of Ulysses. The harshness of the island corresponds to the violence and fierceness of Ulysses’ demons, and Ulysses’ story represents the bond between brave, righteous men and their homeland. Notably, Bartoli discusses Ulysses’ education and growth based on two main principles: on the one hand, the theory of temperaments, as Providence is understood as the force that combines elements: Therefore, the features of one’s own aptitude as he comes into the world are due to universal Providence […] She knows well the art of assembling the same principles of natural qualities in different ways, to make different temperaments out of them. Then she mixes these temperaments with the individual habit of the soul, with which she composes an admirable variety of instincts, and to each newborn she assigns and grafts its particular instinct.12 On the other side, the absolute urgency to investigate young people attitudes and understand their real vocation: Such is the importance of everyone knowing and following his true inclination: and it is equally important to be able to recognize the inclinations of others, those of one’s own children and, in general, of the young people, who are still in time to make use of them: and also one should learn to recognize the early and spontaneous clues that nature shows, even if they are still roughly sketched.13 Even without any clear allusion, it is easy to discern in this argument the educational leanings of Jesuit colleges, where understanding students’

12

13

“E il così venire al mondo, con istampato in fronte a ciascuno il carattere della sua propria attitudine, è magistero dell’uniuersal Prouuidenza […] Ella, che ben sa l’arte del variamente accozzare i medesimi principij delle qualità naturali, a farne diuersi temperamenti, d’essi, e dell’habitudine indiuiduale dell’anima, forse in ciascuno accidentalmente diuersa, compone una mirabile varietà d’istinti, e li diuide, e innesta in ognun che nasce il suo particolare.” La geografia, 35. “Tanto vale il conoscere, e tanto importa il seguire ciascuno il suo vero Istinto: e di pari anche conoscerlo in altrui, chi ha figliuoli, o giouentù libera a disporne: ma buon conoscitor si vuol essere, e buon interprete di que’ primi e spontanei, auuegnaché mal formati indizi, che di sé dà la natura.” La geografia, 36.

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individual talents was of paramount importance in enhancing the effectiveness of pedagogy.14 Among the places described and interpreted by Bartoli which belong to the mythological literature of antiquity, there are also the Cataracts of the Nile (Chapter 7)/​“Skills of verbose people: deafening the audience, scaring away the same audience.”15 But one can also find less conventional lands. Notes on Moluccas, Indonesia, at Chapter 17, certainly derive from sixteenth or seventeenth reports and are very accurate on physical details about land and geological features. The motto of Maluku Island is: “Philosophical men: ugly outwardly, good when tried.”16 The saying recalls a Platonic image from the Symposium, very much represented in the Baroque literature and the arts, the one comparing Socrates to a Silenus, ugly outwardly but full of good moral virtues. Bartoli opens his Moluccan essay with a slightly disenchanted political consideration: “England and Holland fought over these islands with weapons and violence, showing us that the world belongs to those who conquer it.”17 Moluccas are then praised because of the precious spices they produce and especially for cloves, which grew on the bare, harsh hillsides of the islands. Bartoli should be impressed by description of volcanoes and the like, as he wrote that Moluccas have “the Hell beneath them. Wildfire burns deep into their belly: you can see it on the mountaintops, especially in Ternate, it puffs out of a great mouth, it blazes, it flames, it throws out a rainfall of ashes and a storm of stones.”18 Cloves have such a fire inside, but they transform this fire into something good; they maintain an edgy, repelling shape, but the qualities of fire, hot and dry, give them the power of preserving and seasoning food. Special and understandable attention seems to be reserved by Bartoli to the cross-​border areas of the known world, which sometimes recur with their mythological names.There is, for instance, the tale of the “Last Thule,”

14

Cristiano Casalini, Claude Pavur, Jesuit Pedagogy. A Reader (Boston: Institute for Advanced Jesuit Studies, 2016), 31 (in the editors’ words), 109–​10 (in Cortesono sj’s words). 15 “Le cateratte del Nilo. Proprietà de’ gran parlatori, assordare chi gli ode, o far fuggire per non udirli,” La geografia, Indice. 16 “Le Moluche. Certi huomini alla Filosofica; niente belli al vederli, tutto buoni al prouarli,” La geografia, Indice. 17 “Tutto altrimenti Inghilterra e Olanda, che le han disputate col ferro, per ragione, allegando, il mondo essere di chi sel guadagna.” La geografia, 259. 18 “l’Inferno di sotto. Han sempre viuo e bollente nelle viscere il fuoco: miratene gli sfogatoi su le cime dei monti, e sopra tutti, quell’altissimo di Ternate, che continuo dalla gran bocca sbuffa, auuampa, fiammeggia, gitta pioggia di ceneri, e tempesta di sassi.” La geografia, 260.

116 Madella whose motto is: “The downside of a mean Loneliness and the benefit of a good Conversation.”19 A lively essay is devoted to Terra Incognita, the unknown place which Bartoli locates at the extreme north and extreme south of the globe and that seems to be hidden by natural barriers impossible to overcome. Bartoli does not give it any realistic appearance nor historical or literary reminder. On the contrary, exactly because it is “incognita,” that is, unknown, it allows for the invention of poets to describe it. The author imagines the access to the Terra incognita somewhat like Dante’s descent into hell, and such he presents it to the reader, immediate, sudden and hostile, with three short sentences that even recall the famous terzina engraved on the gate to hell in Canto iii: “Nobody here can gybe, nobody ships the oars, nobody cast anchor for shelter. Unknown Land. Just mention it, that’s all you need to learn.”20 All the more reason for it to lend itself to Bartoli’s imagination, which has a noble purpose. In the author’s fantasy, Terra Incognita has no physical features; rather, it is a Dantesque place that imprisons a category of people who, whether dead or alive, made no difference in their time, much like the sloths: In my opinion, Terra Incognita is the largest and most populated region in the whole world […] In my opinion, people who entered that place and got lost there, were that very endless mass of people we realized were alive only when they died: since they left behind no good or lasting work, even though they could have done many things to remind men that they too were men. But since they did nothing but live, in dying they lost everything.21

19 “L’ultima Thule. I Mali della mala solitudine, I Beni del ben Conuersare,” La geografia, 156. 20 “Qui non si abbatte vela, qui non si lieua mano dal remo, qui non si gitta ancora per dar fondo. Terra incognita. Il solo nominarla, è comprenderne quanto v’è da saperne.” Dante’s terzina read: “Per me si va nella città dolente,/​Per me si va nell’eterno dolore,/​Per me si va tra la perduta gente.” (Inf. iii, 1–​3). 21 “Per quanto a me ne paia, la Terra Incognita si è la maggiore, e la più popolata regione di quant’altre se n’habbia il mondo. E v’entra, secondo me, e vi si perde l’infinita turba di quegli, che il mondo non ha saputo che fosser vivi, senon perché morirono: così niuna lodeuole, e dureuole opera lasciarono dopo sé, potendone far di molte, onde restassero in memoria fra gi huomini d’essere stati huomini: ma null’altro facendo che viuere, ogni cosa perdettero col morire.” La geografia, 397.

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From this point, Bartoli argues around the chapter’s apologue, “Those who die forever in forgetfulness. Those who live forever in glory.”22 The discriminating factor is the exercise of virtue; when it is lacking due to laziness and indolence, as it is with slothful people, the meaning of human life is lost in oblivion and loneliness, far from the metaphorical space or land shared by that part of humanity that strives to improve itself and the world. To those who protest that practicing virtue is exhausting and lacks gratification, Bartoli reminds us that human functions common to animals, such as the vegetative and motive ones, are rewarded by nature with the pleasure humans take in performing them. If nature concerns itself with rewarding menial and mechanical activities, why should it fail to gratify human beings when they use their noblest and most peculiar characteristic, namely the rational soul? “Could it be that virtue alone, which is the best part of man, which should qualify him, does not bring any pleasure to entice us and thrive for it?”23 For nothing else is needed to taste the merit of good deeds nor to appreciate those who perform them. In the representation of world geography, an important consideration pertains to what Bartoli did not write. Volumes 2 and 3 should have contained several metaphors on lands newly discovered in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Bartoli had already decided their mottos: “The New World: One is worth a thousand, but the contrary is not true”; “St. Helen, little island on the route from Europe to India. Kindness”; “The two Oceans between the Strait of Magellan: When scholars fight against each other, the best wit wins”; “Los Pintados, American barbarians: There’s neither justification nor excuse for embellishing vileness of vice”; “Panama, and Nombre de Dios, between the two Americas. Antipathy”; “Florida: Dictionary of trickeries”; “Tierra del Fuego: Mischiefs within family”; “Peru: A great intellect is a treasure to the whole world.”24

22 “Terra incognita. I sempre Morti nella dimenticanza. I sempre Viui nella gloria.” La geografia, p. 395. 23 “Sola la Virtù, ch’è il meglio, per non dire il tutto dell’huomo, non haurà piacere che ci alletti ad esercitarla?” La geografia, 398. 24 “Il Mondo Nuovo. Uno val per mille, mille non vagliono per uno”; “La S. Elena, isoletta a mezzo la nauigatione d’Europa all’India. La Cortesia”; “I due Oceani entro allo Stretto del Magaglianes. Le zuffe de’ Letterati in contesa a chi più può d’ingegno”; “Los Pintados, barbari dell’America, ignudi, e dipinti. Le bruttezze del vitio non v’ha protesti né scuse, che bastino ad abbellirle”; “Panamà, e Nombre de Dios, fra le due Americhe. L’Antipathia”; “La Florida. Il vocabolario de gl’inganni”; “La Terra del Fuoco. La Discordia in casa”; “Il Perù. Il pregio d’una gran mente che ha onde far ricco il mondo.” La geografia, “Indice.”

118 Madella In the first volume, only Chapter viii touches upon an American object: “The Fields of Urabà. A long life becomes shorter for those who live pointless. A short life becomes longer for industrious people.”25 In this title, Bartoli refers to the Caribbean coasts of Columbia surrounding the Gulf of Urabà as a cultivated land, which is the meaning of Italian word “campagna” as used in this context. That’s the reason why the essay opens with a with a generous portrait of the land and the people who inhabit it, although they are described as barbarians and savages: although they are “more than half-​naked,”26 they cultivate the soil with joy and dedication, and the soil produces three harvests a year, which seems like a miracle (Bartoli argues) in comparison with the desert conformation of North Africa and Arabia. Here the metaphor begins: Of course, since it is impossible in nature to get three crops a year, you will have already understood that I am alluding to another fecundity, another soil, another kind of seed, another kind of crop. Since to everyone his own life is his own farm, and it doesn’t matter to have it big, it does matter to have it fruitful.27 The reader can attribute at least two levels of interpretation to these lines. The first interpretation is the one provided by the author himself: on a fecund soil man has a way to engage, work, get involved, while on a wasteland he will spend his days motionless, he will grow old without doing anything useful. On the contrary, being unable to do anything leads to idleness, which is a dangerous friend both to man’s earthly existence and to his afterlife; and Bartoli pontificates at length, and with abundance of learned quotations from ancient philosophers, about the merits of the industrious life. The second interpretation is not clearly stated but emerges quite easily: in South America, the Catholic Church had found fertile soil to sow the Gospel and conquered souls in profusion, while the desert places that are mentioned –​ Libya and Arabia –​were the realm of Islam, where there are no conditions even to attempt such sowing.

25 “Le campagne d’Urabà. La vita lunga essere brieue a chi non fa altro, che viuere. La brieue farsi lunga coll’operare,” La geografia, 108. 26 “più che mezzo ignuda turba di mietitori,” La geografia, 108. 27 “All’impossibil cosa che questa è, per auuerarsi nell’ordine della natura, voi v’accorgete, che io d’altra fecondità, d’altre terre, d’altro genere di sementa, e di ricolta intendo. Ad ognuno la sua vita è il suo podere: non istà il fatto in hauerlo grande, sta in hauerlo fruttifero,” La geografia, 110.

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Since Bartoli’s Histories did not encompass the Jesuit missions of America, it is significant that, in the only part of Geography that came out in print, Bartoli chose to devote an essay to the New World and represent it as a positive symbol in his cartography of vices and virtues. 3

A Geography of Humanity and Its History

The thirty “geographical” essays contain a treasure trove of scenarios and meanings, which the preceding paragraph attempts to exemplify while being aware of its modesty, yet I believe it is interesting to sketch out a study of Geography by delving into its preface.28 In fact, not only does Bartoli entrust her with his mission statement, explaining the reason that led him to write, but he outlines the preface like the essays, in the sense that he builds it with the same structure, starting with a geographical subject, which, however, is also historical, literary, and, in a sense, scientific, and develops a series of arguments that will come together again in the lines of the final assertions. In addition, the author uses these pages to express various considerations about geography as a discipline, a subject of study and teaching, about its relationship to history and their role in the knowledge of human affairs. Although La geografia is one of those amenable works to which the author devoted himself in the pauses he took from his main and more serious duty (i.e. composing the Histories of the Society of Jesus), it could not be “too amenable,” that is, aimed exclusively at the amusement of both the writer and reader, since that would be immoral. Very much to the point, in fact, Marco Arnaudo recalled in his essay that “the criticism against unhelpful writings is expressed with extreme clarity already in The Man of Letters,29 and with recourse (by curious coincidence) precisely to the metaphor of travel.”30 Therefore, Bartoli explains the good intentions of his work through a metaphor taken from Pliny the Elder’s Historia naturalis, book 21, ­chapter 12 on Flowers. This is Plinius’ tale in the renowned translation by Philemon Holland (1601):

28 29 30

La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. L’huomo di lettere difeso et emendato (Rome: Corbelletti, 1645). “la critica contro le scritture non utili viene espressa con estrema chiarezza già nell’Uomo di lettere, e col ricorso (per curiosa coincidenza) proprio alla metafora del viaggio,” in M. Arnaudo, “Descrizioni paesaggistiche ed esperienza del lettore nella “Geografia trasportata al morale” di Daniello Bartoli,” in Studi italiani, xii, 1 (Gennaio-​Giugno 2010): 11.

120 Madella There is a towne or burgade called Hostilia, situate upon the river Po, the inhabitants of this village, when they see that their Bees meat goeth low therabout, and is like to faile, take their hives with Bees and all, and set them in certaine boats or barges, and in the night row up the said river Po against the streame five myles forward. The morrow morning out goe the Bees to seeke food and releefe. Now when they have met with meat, and fed themselves, they returne againe to the vessels aforesaid: and thus they continue daily, although they chaunge their place and haunt; until such time as their maisters perceive that the hives be full, by the settling of their boats low within the water with their weight, and then they return home againe downe the streame, and discharge the hives of the honey withing.31 It’s a little story about how, from Ostiglia, a then-​little village upon the Po River in Lombardy, people travelled up and down the river with their bees and had them feed themselves during the journey from different species of flowers, so to produce honey while both human and bees enjoying a kind of vacation. But from Bartoli’s inkwell the little story flows out almost threefold in volume, and dramatized, thanks to an abundance of dynamic details (the gestures of the hypothetical ancient peasants preparing the boats for launching, the movements of the boat, the water, and the bees themselves) and sensory stimuli, which Plinius’ original tale did not have. For example: [The people of Ostiglia] as soon as the signs showed that spring was about to bloom, would pull out their wide, flat boats, carefully clean them, spread their hulls and wipe away bad smells with fragrant perfumes; then they would equip them with everything they needed for a long journey.32 Bartoli derives from the wandering bees an apparently easy moral teaching, focused on the convenience to study geography as a proper subject. He writes that “a similar path seems to be that, equally amiable and profitable, of the study of geography,”33 and he goes on to explain that studying geography is 31 32

33

Pliny the Elder, Historia naturalis, l. xxi, 12, English translation by Philemon Holland (London: Islip, 1601). “[Gli habitatori d’Hostilia] al primo muouere, e fiorir della primauera, tratte fuori certe loro ampie barche, e piatte, racconciauale con gran cura, spalmauanle, e con odorosi profumi spentone ogni puzzo, ogni reo fiatore, le forniuano di ciò ch’era mestieri a un lungo viaggio.” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. “D’un simigliante andare mi sembra essere l’altrettanto ameno, che profittevole studio della Geografia.” D. Bartoli, La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages.

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equally useful for both the mind and soul, like an easily found and pleasant nourishment which we could take with no effort. However, as the writing goes on, the portrait of geography as a profitable subject of study and learning becomes more articulate. To begin with, studying geography seems to be very congenial to the culture of Bartoli’s times because –​according to Bartoli –​it stimulates the five senses through imagination, a faculty that the Jesuits were familiar with cultivating during their period of formation, and whose relevance Arnaudo traces back to Loyola’s Spiritual Exercises.34 In addition to this, dealing with geography requires an aptitude for observation and practice of thinking that recalls crucial aspects of the theatrical experience: The whole earth, of every climate and conformation, whether flat or not, cultivated or desolate, frozen at the poles, or burning in the central belt, its lakes, its rivers, the sea in all its breadth and the many islands that dot it, the whole earth, I repeat, is an open field to navigate with a movement of the eyes that is not at all tiring, with a beneficial recreation of the soul. We encounter here a continuous change of theaters and sceneries, and even different worlds.35 Bartoli suggested that geography in the mid-​seventeenth century had a peculiar identity in comparison to ancient times. People’s mindset had changed, probably because of firsthand accounts of the many voyagers from all around the globe, perhaps even because of Jesuits’ firsthand accounts.36 People were no longer content to acquire knowledge by observing some odd objects as 34 35

36

Arnaudo, “Descrizioni paesaggistiche,” 5–​6. “Tutta la terra, di qual ch’ella sia conditione, e postura, montagnosa o piana, colta o diserta, nell’estreme zone gelata, o nella mezzana ardente; e i laghi, e i fiumi, e quanto è in ampiezza il mare; e le tante isole, onde egli è altroue sparso, altroue anche gremito; tutta dico, è campo aperto a spatiaruisi, con un niente faticheuole correr de gli occhi, e con un tutto gioueuole ricrearsi dell’animo. Quiui un continuato cambiamento di teatri, e di scene; anzi un variar di mondi s’incontra.” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. From the late 16th century, missionaries’ letters and visitors’ reports whose messages and style were deemed most suitable were printed and published. Among them: Letters from Eastern India (Lettere dall’India orientale. Venice: Ferrari, 1580), News from China and Japan (Avisi della Cina et Giapone. Venice: Gioliti, 1588), Letters from Japan (Lettere del Giapone. Rome: Zanetti, 1588). Also worth mentioning is the great success of Natural and Moral History of the Indies (Historia natural y moral de las Indias) by José Acosta S.J., which first came out in Sevilla, 1590, and was translated into major European languages within a few years.

122 Madella detached from their own environments and experience. Rather, they were driven to learn through a more demanding curiosity: A very different thing from the walks of the idle ancients in the ancient square of Rome, where every day there was the curious market of freaks, brought from all over the world, in front of which the spectators felt no desire to see remote places, and no wonder before nature's taste for the unusual.37 Unlike their ancestors, Bartoli’s contemporaries and –​as one might assume –​ his audience, thus Catholic and Jesuit readers, were not distant spectators of the world events; their desire to learn about remote places and stranger things does not denote their naiveté; rather, it showed their willingness to be directly involved, albeit to a limited extent, in foreign realities. From this perspective, relation with ancient sources does not imply empathy toward the authors or the audience of their time, but it is rather instrumental, thus distancing itself from the earlier Renaissance mentality. History, within which Bartoli seems to include purely historical but also literary sources, complements the temporal dimension with the two-​dimensional surface of geography “which possesses no more than the present, nor is it able to see beyond the surface that is shown before it.”38 With chronology taking on the function of providing depth, the result is a three-​dimensional object, namely geography as a subject of teaching and study and an occasion for meditation, as it was conceived by order in the mid-​ seventeenth century. This coincidence of perspectives is certainly not surprising in the orthodox and committed Bartoli, but it is interesting to summarize what geography meant in the seventeenth century for the Society of Jesus and its schools. In this regard, the research of historian of geographic thought Giorgio Mangani is relevant in its conciseness.39 Geography allowed students 37

38 39

“Altro che il passeggiare degli otiosi, per quell’antica piazza di Roma, oue ogni dì si teneua il curioso mercato de’ mostri, recatiui da lontanissime parti del mondo, con esso quant’altro nulla sentisse del pellegrino, dell’ammirabile, del disusato in genere di natura.” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. “la quale non possiede più che il presente, né vede oltre la superficie che le si mostra innazi,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. Giorgio Mangani, “La geografia dei gesuiti,” in Matteo Ricci. Cartografia, ed. F. Mignini (Rome: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato, 2013), 41–​56. For a more recent exploration of the role of the Society of Jesus in shaping the concept of geography as a subject of teaching in the early modern period, see David Salomoni and Henrique Leitão, “Schooling the Discoveries. Jesuit Education Between Science and Geographic Literacy in the Age of

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to simultaneously train memory and compositional skills. Not surprisingly, it was taught in colleges as part of the first two classes of humanity and rhetoric: the classification of toponyms and other elements made it an excellent training for memory and a reservoir of loci based on which a teacher could build rhetorical and literary exercises. It was also indispensable to biblical, and therefore theological, studies. In view of the missionary vocation of the Society, then, the practical mathematical application of geography played a fundamental role: it enabled cartographic representation, the construction of maps, and navigational instruments. Of course, Bartoli, in a humanistic way, supports his arguments with the valuable scaffolding of ancient auctoritates that were exquisitely appropriate to the subject, such as Plutarch and his Life of Demetrius; Macrobius’ Saturnalia; Lucian of Samosata’s True History, the archetype of the travel literature even in a metaphorical sense; Seneca’s letter 104 Ad Lucilium. Through them Bartoli unfurled an enthusiastic apologia for Geography, which, however, does not sound naïve at all. In two paragraphs that are perhaps among the most lively and ironic in the preface, Bartoli explains how Geography emerges as a philosophical condition. Geography represents the positive side of looking outside oneself, the earth’s surface mirrors man’s inner cosmos, and travel is the philosopher’s own dimension: a particular journey, indeed, a pilgrimage (it. “pellegrinare”). While running around the world (it. “viaggiar da corriero”) allows the voyager nothing more than the superficial observation of a map, matching the names of places whit their location on the globe, the philosophical journey enable the authentic understanding of the same map, which implies knowledge of the historical events that affected its territories and reflection on the moral content of those very events. Geography, then, is either human geography or nothing: Traveling so quickly and with no guide, even if it would enable you to circle the seas and lands in less time than it took the famous ship Victoria, would not compensate you one-​thousandth of the advantage you would gain by being accompanied by the two most experienced, most eloquent and wisest guides I know, namely History and Morality. Besides the fact that you would enjoy yourselves much more.40

40

Iberian Expansion,” Educazione. Giornale di pedagogia critica, x, 1, 2 (2021): 7–​34 (Part i) and 7–​32 (Part ii). “Un così andare a stracca, benché deste la volta per tutto attorno il mare, e la terra, in meno giorni, che non vi spese anni la famosa naue Vittoria, non però sia mai vero, che v risponda l’un per mille de’ beni, che oltre all’impareggiabil diletto, haureste, prendendo a fare i geografici vostri viaggi, accompagnato; e non da cui che sia, ma, per mio consiglio,

124 Madella From this observation, several paragraphs follow that focus on the mutual cooperation between Geography and History in portraying the human world truthfully. First, each subject focuses on only one dimension, while human reality lives on multiple dimensions: As for History, History without Geography is blind: living in the dark, she cannot tell which part of the world her events belong to […] History can draw very well, create fancy colors and deal with honorable subjects, but what for, if Geography does not provide the only table and canvas in which that very fact can be portrayed? as it so strongly belongs to that place, that any other placing would be a forced adjustment and a pretence.41 This dual sensorial dimension of sight and speech soon enters the semantic field of theater “to show you scenes and theaters, or whatever else you want, beautiful performances to see.”42 Not only do Geography and History together create a veritable portrait of the human world, they enable humankind to become aware that the visible world is something that has its own historicity, that it has changed in the past and will change again in the future: So, in a sense we can say that the old world is dead and buried by its own ruins, which have become the foundations of the new world, built on top of them with different style, different design, different architecture, different layout, different techniques; and this new world, too, will fall apart as the centuries go by, and what is now a building will one day become substructure, and will support a new (God knows which) rising

41

42

dalle due, le più sperte, le più faconde, le più sauie parlatrici, d’infra quante habbian gratia nel dire; e sono l’Historia, la Morale,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. Victoria was the only ship of Magellan’s expedition that succeeded in completing the circumnavigation of the globe and returned to port in 1522. “E quanto all’Historia, ella, senza la Geografia è come orba: così tutta al buio non sa a qual parte della terra si volgere per rinuenire il doue de’ fatti […] ma a che pro hauer buon disegno, color fini, nobile argomento, se la Geografia non le dà il piano, e la tauola in cui sola il tal fatto può historiarsi, come sì proprio di tal luogo, che a niun altro se non per ingannevole infingimento si adatterebbe?,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. “spiegarui innanzi scene, e teatri, o che che altro v’è in piacere, spettacoli di mirabile apparenza,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages.

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of Nations, of habits, of things. Nevertheless, it will not disappear from History.43 This view of death and regeneration of the world as a cyclical phenomenon, reminiscent of the myth of the Phoenix, is suggestive and perhaps disorienting. It echoes in it from the sixteenth century an octave by Torquato Tasso, who, in Gerusalemme liberata, defines the terrestrial globe in opposition to the “blissful fields [of Paradise], set ablaze with eternity,”44 as follows: the sphere where rain and thunder stir, A world that, self-​consumed, self-​fed, and torn, By inward warfare, dies and is reborn.45 Both Tasso and Bartoli exclude the purifying element of sacred fire from the process of decomposition and recomposition of the world. While Bartoli does not mention the sacred fire at all, Tasso reserves it to Heaven. And this is perhaps why in Bartoli’s image, unlike what happens in the decomposition and rebirth of the wondrous bird, the same matter, as decomposed and regrouped, produces new forms that are different from the previous ones. In fact, no human process is able to make a tabula rasa of what has been, to bring back the sands of the hourglass, least of all on the metaphorical level of human consciousness. 4

Bartoli’s Geography in Historical Perspective

Bartoli’s books were a huge and lasting success. During the nineteenth century, the erudite Jesuit born in Ferrara was still held as a master of Italian prose not only by Roman Catholics and Jesuit supporters. We find his works’ many

43

44 45

“Così per l’una parte può dirsi, che il mondo vecchio è morto, e dentro sé medesimo sotterrato, a far le fondamenta del nuovo, edificatogli sopra, con istile d’altro disegno, altra pianta, altro ordine, altro lavoro; e questo medesimo anch’egli, col voltare de’ secoli rouinerà a pezzi a pezzi, e quel che hora è fabrica, diuerrà, quando che sia, sustruttione, a portare un’altra (Iddio sa quale) alzata di nationi, di costumi, di cose. Ma non per ciò sia vero ch’egli perisca all’Historia,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. “campi lieti e fiammeggianti/​d’eterno,” T. Tasso, Gerusalemme liberata c. ix, 61, vv. 5–​6. Torquato Tasso, The Liberation of Jerusalem, transl. by Max Wickert, New York: Oxford u.p., 2009, p. 471. Tasso’s Italian verses in Gerusalemme, c. ix, 61, vv. 6–​8: “di là donde tuona e piove, /​ove se stesso il mondo strugge e pasce, /​e ne le guerre sue more e rinasce.”

126 Madella reprints in the libraries of laymen writers such as Giacomo Leopardi and anticlerical Italian patriots of the early nineteenth century.46 In the seventeenth century, part of the Histories and some biographies of illustrious Jesuits were translated into Latin, the lingua franca of the Church, gaining an understandably wider audience. Geography was never translated and circulated mainly in Italy, where in any case it had at least a dozen reprints from 1664 to 1716.47 After 1716, there were none until the 1820s. By the second half of the eighteenth century, in fact, the popularity of Jesuit literature collapsed along with the reputation of the order under the blows of denigrating campaigns that targeted the Society from within and outside the Church. But after the Restoration of the order, Bartoli’s writings began to be printed again, often with the addition of some explanatory apparatus or appendix, perhaps with the editorial intent of bringing the public closer to an age of men and books that in more recent times had been chastised as immoral and dangerous. For instance, in 1826 Brixian publisher Francesco Cavalieri published Geography translating the author’s many Latin quotations into Italian in order to cater to those who did not know Latin: a clear sign, this, of an openness to a more popular audience, who could read very well but had not necessarily done classical studies. He also wrote a brief introductory note with contextual information, emphasizing that Bartoli’s book was valuable for its content but especially for its language, which speaks to the reader’s intellect –​a praise to Bartoli as a rhetorician, not as a religious man: To say nothing of the purity of the language in which he writes and the gracefulness of the style (as the Author takes us to examine in Geography now one remarkable place and now another, and he paints them for the eyes of our intellect in such vivid and appropriate colors, that we really seem to see them, and derive the greatest amusement from them).48

46 47 48

Many of Bartoli’s volumes are listed in the library catalog of Giovita Scalvini (1791–​1843), a Brixian exile persecuted by Austrian repression after 1821 uprisings. Rome: Ghezzi, 1664; Milan: Malatesta, 1664, 1665; Modena: Soliani, 1665; Bologna: Recaldini, 1669, 1672; Bologna: Recaldini, 1672; Venice: Prodocimo, 1676; Venice: Pezzana, 1664, 1665, 1666, 1707, 1716. “lasciando stare la purità della lingua, in cui sono elle dettate, non che la leggiadria dello stile […] (mentre l’Autore ne trasporta a considerare or questo, or quel luogo notabilissimo della Geografia, e te lo dipinge agli occhi dell’intelletto con sì vivi e proprii colori, che ti par di vedertelo innazi, e ne cogli tutto il diletto),” La geografia trasportata al morale, vol. 1 (Brixia: Cavalieri, 1826), “Al leggitore,” unnumbered pages.

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During the Restoration and the Risorgimento, Bartoli’s Geography was published and appeared again in the main Italian bookstores excluding Rome –​ in Venice, Milan, Turin, Florence, and Naples –​alone or more often together with the writer’s entire corpus, with commentaries and appendices that suggest careful and expensive editing, or in cheap editions without any apparatus, and even in excerpts and compendia.49 Several books were, in fact, anthologies of Bartoli’s different works, specifically composed for use in schools as models of Italian rhetoric, grammar, and lexicon.50 After the post-​unification nineteenth century established the canon of modern-​age Italian literature, Bartoli, as a prose-​style master, was left to the bizarre inclinations of a few early nineteenth-​century Italian “romantics,” while Bartoli as a scholar maintained his reputation. The twentieth century also gradually retrieved the humanist and linguist51 and handed over to the 21st century the task of deepening the historiographer.52 Geography finds some limited space in anthologies, along with another work similar to it in concept, content and style, On Symbols As Morally Read (De’ simboli trasportati al morale, 1677) but, so far, it has never been reissued re-​published in its entirety, probably because the times has not felt the need for it. Like the wind does, Bartoli wrote, time and History tear down towns and cities and changes human governments: “If they don’t cancel Monarchies, Empires and Kingdoms, at least they move them”53 and not always for the better. But neither should man be under any illusion that his role and history is excessively great and important, and geography urges him to realize

49 50

51 52 53

Historical and geographical descriptions from father Daniello Bartoli’s work (Descrizioni geografiche e storiche tratte dalle opere del padre Daniello Bartoli. Milan: Silvestri, 1826). Elements of grammar and orthography drawn from Pallavicino, from Bartoli […] to use in Jesuit schools (Elementi della grammatica e dell’ortografia ricavati dal Pallavicino, dal Bartoli […] per uso delle scuole de’ Padri della Compagnia di Gesù. Naples: Scarpati e Starita, 1826); Italian phraseology or collection of twenty-​thousand sentences and expressions […] with several chapters on the parts speech and some beautiful descriptions by fr. Daniello Bartoli (Frasologia italiana o sia raccolta di venti mila frasi o modi di dire […] con l’aggiunta di diversi capitoli intorno le parti del discorso ed alcune bellissime descrizioni del p. Daniello Bartoli. Milan: Rusconi, 1826). Modern edition with philological comments on The man of Letters, defended and emended (L’huomo di lettere difeso et emendato. Bari: Paoline) were published in 1960, The Forest of Words (La selva delle parole. Milan: Pioltello) in 1979; both underwent several reprints. Among the Histories of the Society, China was published in 1975 then updated and reprinted in 1997 (Cina. Milan: Bompiani), Japan in 1985 (Giappone. Milano: Spirali) and Asia in 2019 (Asia. Turin: Einaudi). “e se non anco [si portan via] le Monarchie, gl’Imperi, i Regni, pure almen li trasportano,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages.

128 Madella that: because it makes clear how small the natural, physical space in which human affairs take place is in comparison to uninhabited earth space, and how small in turn the earth is (“this little mound of earth”)54 when compared with celestial space and the entire universe.55 Therefore, awareness of the historicity of the world implies awareness of the limits of all that is visible and experiential and of the impermanence of everything, no matter how important and great it seems. Within this horizon of fragility, the moral element, which is also a pedagogical element, since it manifests itself to be learned, offers a hope that is not religious insofar as it is otherworldly or post-​mortem; before being a medicine for the soul, moral teaching can influence men’s behavior and thus their earthly future, the new worlds that will be built by new relics. Together with the idea of a Geography that responds to human curiosity, the theme of a world that is continually renewed by its relics and, above all, the theme of a man who can learn by his history, convey an impression of optimism, of confident expectation, of constructive movement. They even suggest an attitude in the spiritual meaning of History that leans toward the later theories of Giambattista Vico. These traits are poisoned, however, by another human constant that Bartoli traces in the association between Geography and History: the presence of war. There is not a shred of land or a stretch of sea for which History has no memories, at least memories of war, those are never lacking: For if we study every place on earth, we see that every place has at one time been the field of bloody battles; sooner or later, every place has dealt with armies and war, has been a theater for the glory of the victors and a cemetery for the defeated.56

54 55 56

“questo piccol mucchio di terra,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages. Here Bartoli quotes Seneca’s letter 91,17 to Lucilius: studying geometry, Alexander should learn that his alleged wide domains would always be small in comparison to the size of the earth and universe. “Che a chi luogo per luogo la studia, tutta la terra si truoua ad essere un continuato campo di sanguinose battaglie; auuegnaché successiuamente l’una sua parte in un tempo, l’altra in un altro, sieno state in brighe d’armi, e di guerra, teatri alla gloria de’ vincitori, e cemiteri alle ossa de’ vinti,” La geografia, “Introduttione,” unnumbered pages.

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Bibliography

Arnaudo, Marco. “Descrizioni paesaggistiche ed esperienza del lettore nella «Geografia trasportata al morale» di Daniello Bartoli.” Studi italiani, no. 12/​1 (Jan-​Jun 2010), 5–​20. Asor Rosa, Alberto. “Bartoli, Daniello”. Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, 6 (1964), https://​www​.trecc​ani​.it​/encic​lope​dia​/danie​llo​-barto​li​_%28Diz​iona​rio ​-Bio​graf​ ico%29​/​. Bartoli, Daniello. De’ simboli trasportati al morale. Venice: Hertz, 1677. Bartoli, Daniello. Descrizioni geografiche e storiche tratte dalle opere del padre Daniello Bartoli. Milan: Silvestri, 1826. Bartoli, Daniello. Elementi della grammatica e dell’ortografia ricavati dal Pallavicino, dal Bartoli […] per uso delle scuole de’ Padri della Compagnia di Gesù. Naples: Scarpati e Starita, 1826. Bartoli, Daniello. Frasologia italiana o sia raccolta di venti mila frasi o modi di dire […] con l’aggiunta di diversi capitoli intorno le parti del discorso ed alcune bellissime descrizioni del p. Daniello Bartoli. Milan: Rusconi, 1826. Bartoli, Daniello. La geografia trasportata al morale. Brixia: Cavalieri, 1826. Bartoli, Daniello. La geografia trasportata al morale. Milan: Malatesta, 1664. Bartoli, Daniello. La ricreatione del sauio. Rome: De’ Lazzeri, 1659. Casalini, Cristiano and Pavur, Claude. Jesuit Pedagogy, 1540–​1616. A Reader. Boston: Institute for Advanced Jesuit Studies, 2016. Ditchfield, Simon. “Baroque around the Clock: Daniello Bartoli sj (1608–​1685) and the Uses of Global History.” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, no. 31 (2021): 49–​73. Gozza, Paolo. “Anche i megafoni hanno un’anima: la «Tromba parlante» (1678) di Geminiano Montanari.” Recercare, no. 16 (2004): 119–​20. Leitão, Henrique and Salomoni, David. “Schooling the Discoveries. Jesuit Education Between Science and Geographic Literacy in the Age of Iberian Expansion.” Educazione. Giornale di pedagogia critica, x, 1 (2021): 7–​34. Leitão, Henrique and Salomoni, David. “Schooling the Discoveries. Jesuit Education Between Science and Geographic Literacy in the Age of Iberian Expansion.” Educazione. Giornale di pedagogia critica, x, 2 (2021): 7–​32. Mangani, Giorgio. “La geografia dei gesuiti.” In Matteo Ricci. Cartografia, edited by F. Mignini, 41–​56. Rome: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato, 2013. Pliny the Elder, The Historie of the World. Commonly called The Naturall Historie. London: Islip, 1601. Raimondi, Ezio. Trattatisti e narratori del Seicento. Milan-​Naples: Ricciardi, 1960. Renaldo, John J. Daniello Bartoli: A Letterato of the Seicento. Bologna: Il Mulino, 1988. Seneca. Letters on Ethics to Lucilius. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2015.

130 Madella Setten, Gunhild. “Moral Landscapes.” in International Encyclopedia of Human Geo­graphy, 2nd edition, vol. 9, edited by A. L. Kobayashi, 193–​198. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2020. Setten, Gunhild. “The habitus, the rule and the moral landscape.” Cultural geography, no. 11 (2004): 389–​415. Smith, David Marshall. Moral Geographies: Ethics in a Worlds of Difference. Edinburgh: Edinburgh u.p., 2000. Tasso, Torquato. Gierusalemme liberata. Ferrara: Baldini, 1581. Tasso, Torquato. The Liberation of Jerusalem, transl. by Max Wickert. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Yinlan, Wu. La Cina di Daniello Bartoli. Rome: Urbaniana, 2014.

­c hapter 6

From ‘La Sfera’ to the Atlas

Transformations in the Early Modern Geography Textbooks, 1400–​1800 David Salomoni Early modern school textbooks can be complex, making them difficult for contemporary readers to understand. As stated by Anthony Grafton, early modern scholars and students took a variety of approaches to their books, many of them unfamiliar to us now. In most cases, they read to reap, and what they reaped they sorted in the virtual bins known as Loci communes. […] Using these methods, a teacher or student could transform any ancient or modern work of literature into a textbook for more or less any discipline.1 Geography textbooks during the period between 1400 and 1800 present a significant exception to the complexity of early modern school textbooks. While geography could be studied through a variety of literary and religious texts, such as the ancient Homeric poems or the Bible, many of the same texts used for the transmission of geographical knowledge in the ancient world, including works by Strabo, Pomponius Mela, and Pliny the Elder, remained in use for centuries in European schools during the Renaissance and Reformation. However, new literature specifically designed for educational purposes began to emerge in the early fifteenth century, developing its own distinctiveness that would last for centuries. Although this literature was initially influenced by the aforementioned literary texts, particularly in terms of the nomenclature of peoples and lands, it eventually evolved to become more specialized and tailored to educational needs. This essay aims to explore the nature and evolution of geography books during the early modern age as an educational tool, with significant implications for the spread and understanding of new scientific and epistemological paradigms. In the following pages, I will examine the unique characteristics

1 Anthony Grafton, “Textbooks and the Disciplines,” in Scholarly Knowledge: Textbooks in Early Modern Europe, edited by Emidio Campi, et al., (Genève: Droz, 2008), 27.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2024 | DOI:10.1163/9789004680234_008

132 Salomoni of this literature in terms of structure and content. The geography textbook emerged from a scientific treatise called “The Sphere” and gradually evolved into the familiar modern atlas and geography manual over centuries. This evolutionary process reflects a profound shift in the understanding of physical science. Despite its importance, the topic of pre-​university teaching of geography remains overlooked by historiography. Prior to the fifteenth century, geography was typically taught as part of the Quadrivium in European universities and schools, primarily through the study of geometry and astronomy. During the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance, geographical concepts were encompassed within a broader cosmological discourse referred to as cosmography. However, a gradual shift in epistemology occurred as direct observation of natural phenomena replaced ancient and biblical authorities, leading to the emergence of an independent geographic discipline. The separation and specialization of these disciplines was influenced by various cultural, religious, and political factors and eventually led to the birth of the modern geography textbook in the eighteenth century. As previously mentioned, the cultural transformation that gave rise to the independent geographic discipline was influenced by a variety of factors. Chief among these was the age of European maritime expansion, spearheaded by Portugal and Spain, which brought Europeans to previously unknown lands unmentioned by ancient historians. This challenged traditional cultural authorities and redefined geographical knowledge. The resulting emphasis on empirically grounded knowledge led to the production of new scientific treatises, including cosmographic books that compiled the latest developments in mathematics, astronomy, and geography. The newfound geographical awareness introduced new concepts, such as oceans, continents, and currents, which expanded and modified maps and planispheres. Another important factor in the evolution of geography textbooks was institutional. The rise of new religious teaching orders during the Catholic Reformation led to an unprecedented experiment in education. Orders such as the Jesuits, Barnabites, Somascans, and Piarists, created a vast network of colleges across Europe and beyond, standardizing educational programs and methods and circulating knowledge globally. This worldwide expansion contributed to the development of a new geographical sensibility that was essential to transmit to students. From Europe to the Americas, Asia, and the Philippines, this global Catholic educational community facilitated the emergence of a new awareness of the earth. It is worth noting that the increase in literacy levels during the sixteenth century played an important role in the emergence of new geographic literature for educational use. The growth in the non-​university student population

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created a demand for textbooks and contributed to the development of a population that was more interested in scientific, astronomical, and geographical matters. For example, Guillaume des Bordes’ book La sphere de Jean de Sacrobosco experienced such an editorial success among non-​ university readers that its printer, the Parisian Guillaume Cavellat, “largely stopped publishing university texts, and turned to the more lucrative genres of French schoolbooks.”2 However, it is important to keep in mind that schools were not just a means of disseminating geographic knowledge, but they were part of a larger educational project aimed at conveying a new idea of God and humanity. The teaching of how the world was made, by whom it was inhabited, and how it was in the universe was intended to promote a new understanding of the relationship between humanity and the divine, and this approach would have a long-​term influence on the development of geographic literature.3 The combination of these changes gave a strong impetus to the emergence of geography as an autonomous discipline from the ashes of the medieval Quadrivium. Consequently, this gave rise to new literary and pedagogical tools, in particular, the modern educational atlas and the geography textbook. However, we should not think that this process took place linearly, according to predetermined logic. Despite the importance of this epistemological change, we should note that the structure of geographic texts for schools has shown an equally conservative character over the centuries. Within the pages of these books, the way of listing the parts of the world and their respective descriptions has not changed much from the fifteenth century until contemporary times. The evolution over the centuries of this type of document is the thread to follow to understand the rise, the evolution, and the diffusion of new geographic concepts. Texts for proper educational use of geography can be traced back to the early fifteenth century, coinciding with the rediscovery in Italy and Europe of Claudius Ptolemy. There is, however, another important source for this type of literature: the thirteenth-​century text by Englishman John Holywood Tractatus de Sphaera. From the fifteenth century, translations and editions inspired by the book of Sacrobosco spread more and more rapidly. Some early cases can be traced in Italy, perhaps because the Peninsula first produced Latin

2 Kathleen Crowther, et al, “The Book Everybody Read: Vernacular Translations of Sacrobosco’s Sphere in the Sixteenth Century.” Journal for the History of Astronomy, 46, 1, (2015): 4–​28. 3 On the differences and peculiarities between geography teaching in Catholic and Protestant settings see: Axelle Chassagnette, Savoir géographique et cartographie dans l’espace germanique protestant (1520–​1620), (Genève: Droz, 2018).

134 Salomoni translations of Ptolemy.4 It is no coincidence that the Florentine geography manual of the early 1400s produced by Leonardo and Gregorio Dati, entitled La Sfera, has a structure inspired by Holywood’s treatise, but it is accompanied by maps inspired by Ptolemaic projections.5 An important translation of Sacrobosco’s text is represented by Piervincenzo Danti’s La Sfera di Messer Giovanni Sacrobosco, made in Perugia in 1498.6 From this union of Ptolemy and Holywood, it can be said, a new scientific-​educational literary genre was born. As we will observe in the following pages, modern atlases for schools arose between the fifteenth and nineteenth centuries. The process displayed strong elements of both rupture and continuity. It should not be thought, however, that the development of geographic educational literature was linear. Especially during the seventeenth century, texts entitled The Sphere gradually abandoned the more descriptive aspects of the conformation of the earth to evolve into works of a scientific, astronomical, and mathematical nature. This type of content, pertaining to the discipline of cosmography, would, however, decline over time, increasingly losing its specifically educational character. This was due, in part, to the affirmation of an epistemology in which knowledge became increasingly specialized, to the detriment of a unitary conception of knowledge. Beginning in the seventeenth century, atlases and proper geography books for schools and children became widespread (Apparato all’historia di tutte le nazioni et il modo di studiare la geografia, Venice, 1598; Scuola de’ principi e de’ cavalieri, cioè la geografia, la rettorica, la morale, l’economia, la politica […] Bologna, 1676; A New Geography, or a Description of the Most Eminent Countries and Coasts of the World, with Maps of Them, and Tables of Their Latitude and Longitude, London, 1681; An Idea of Geography and Navigation Containing Easie Rules for Finding the Latitude, London, 1695). This phenomenon intensified considerably during the eighteenth century: Geographia hierarchica, Munich, 1710; Eraste, ou, l’ami de la jeunesse: entretiens familiers, dans lesquels on donne aux jeunes gens de l’un et de l’autre sexe, des 4 The first Latin translation from the Greek of Ptolemy’s Geography was produced by the Tuscan Jacopo D’Angelo (1360–​1419) in 1406. 5 For an exhaustive census on the circulation of specimens of this text in Italy refer to Lucia Bertolini, “Censimento dei manoscritti della Sfera del Dati. I manoscritti della Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale e dell’Archivio di Stato di Firenze (Continua da asnp, S. iii, xv, 1985),” Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. Classe di Lettere e Filosofia, 1988, Series iii, Vol. 18, No. 2 (1988): 417–​588. 6 See R. Clemens, “Medieval Maps in a Renaissance Context: Gregorio Dati and the Teaching of Geography in Fifteenth-​Century Florence,” in Cartography in Antiquity and the Middle Ages Fresh Perspectives, New Methods, edited by Richard J.A. Talbert and Richard W. Unger, (Leiden-​Boston: Brill, 2008), 237–​256; and Crowther, The Book Everybody Read, 12.

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notions […] l’astronomie, l’histoire naturelle, la géographie, Paris, 1774; Atlas elementaire, Paris, 1774; La géographie, Ramier de Rudière, 1775; Atlas géographique de toutes les parties connues du globe terrestre pour servir […] à l’education de la jeunesse, Paris, 1785; Les études convenables aux demoiselles, Paris, 1789; A New Moral System of Geography: Containing an Account of the Different Nations Ancient and Modern, London, 1792; A New and Easy Introduction to Universal Geography in a Series of Letters to a Youth at School, London, 1797. These texts often maintained a structure very similar to the old Sphere literature of the fifteenth century, including a description of the parts of the world and its physical and moral geography, as well as information on the people who inhabited those regions. 1

At the Origins of Geography Textbooks: ‘La Sfera’ Manuals in Humanist Italy

As mentioned, the meeting of John Holywood’s thirteenth century De Sphaera with the newly rediscovered Ptolemy’s Geography contributed to the birth of modern geography and a new scientific literary genre. Let us now briefly focus on these two germinal elements. Englishman John Holywood, also known as Johannes or Giovanni Sacro­ bosco, wrote the small treatise De Sphaera Mundi around 1230 when he was a professor at the University of Paris. This booklet was an abridgment of ancient Greek and Arabic astronomy, and it explained the structure and motions of the heavens, particularly the movements of the sun, moon, and fixed stars. De Sphaera also included some basic geographical information, such as the dimensions of the earth, the size of the seas, and the latitudes of different climatic zones. This short treatise quickly became one of the most widely used cosmographic manuals in Europe between the late Middle Ages and the early modern age, thanks to its agile content and ease of reproduction. Given the nature and educational purposes of the medieval age, De Sphaera was mainly used in universities, at least until the end of the fourteenth century.7 The work would go on to have enormous popularity even in the early modern age, giving rise to a long series of re-​editions, commentaries, and adaptations. Among 7 Medieval non-​university schools were widespread and were primarily secular schools. They were governed and financed by local nobles or princes or by municipal councils, whose purpose was to train notaries and chancellery clerks. For this reason, the course of study rarely went beyond the Trivium, and rarely went so far as to include geometry and astronomy, which remained relegated to the study of medicine and theology.

136 Salomoni the most famous professors who used it was the astronomer Cecco d’Ascoli at the University of Bologna. According to a recent article by Kathleen Crowther, “there were over 200 different editions of the Sphere printed between 1472 and 1673.”8 It is precisely such editorial longevity that allows us to closely follow the innovations, continuities, and budding of parallel editorial lines in the genre of geographical literature. Simultaneously with the diffusion of the first printed editions of Holywood’s De Sphaera, another geographical ‘fever’ was spreading in Italy. Italian and European humanism since the fourteenth century had not been insensitive to the fascination of geographical thinking. De Sphaera probably contributed greatly to the construction of this sensibility. The attention paid by late medieval humanists and philologists played an important role in the rediscovery of ancient science but, above all, in the study of those texts with a renewed critical method. A turning point in this process of rediscovery occurred in 1397 when the Byzantine scholar Emanuele Crisolora brought the Geography written by Claudius Ptolemy to Florence. This text had an extraordinary impact on European culture, in scientific, philological, and literary terms. It was Jacopo Angeli, a student of Crisolora’s school of Greek, who translated Ptolemy’s Geography into Latin in 1406. An important aspect of this translation is that Jacopo Angeli titled it Cosmographia instead of Geographia. This semantic reflex is an ideal starting point for understanding two things. The first is the role of geography as a non-​autonomous discipline within the organization of late medieval knowledge. The second, retrospectively, is that within the medieval Quadrivium, there already existed the discipline of geography which, like a statue that gradually emerges from the marble block, would rise over the centuries from the ashes of ancient cosmography. 8 Crowther, et al., 5. In past decades, historians were not always sensitive to the cultural and editorial history of ‘Sphere literature’. However, a new interest in this genre has arisen in recent years. According to Crowther (et al.) the most complete bibliography is the one compiled on-​line by Roberto de Andrade Martins of the Group of History and Theory of Science: https://www.ghtc.usp.br/server/Sacrobosco/Sacrobosco-ed.htm​ . See also Jürgen Hamel, “Johannes de Sacroboscos Handbuch der Astronomie (um 1230) –​kommentierte Bibliographie eines Erfolgwerkes,” in Wege der Erkenntnis: Festschrift für Dieter B. Herrmann zum 65. Geburtstag, eds., Dietmar Fürst and Eckehard Rothenberg (Frankfurt am Main: Harri Deutsch, 2004), 115–​170; and Hamel, Studien zur “Sphaera” des Johannes de Sacrobosco (Leipzig: Akademische Verlagsanstalt, 2014). And important contribution on the topic is represented by Matteo Valleriani, “The Tracts on the Sphere: Knowledge Restructured Over a Network,” in The Structures of Practical Knowledge, ed., Matteo Valleriani (Cham: Springer, 2017), 421–​474. The most up-​to-​date work is represented by Andrea Ottone and Matteo Valleriani, eds., Publishing Sacrobosco’s De sphaera in Early Modern Europe: Modes of Material and Scientific Exchange (Cham, Switz.: Springer, 2022).

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Ptolemy’s Geographia (or Cosmographia), brought to Italy by Crisolora and translated into Latin by Angeli, found itself immediately immersed in an educational context, albeit a high-​level one. Even the Tuscan cultural environment, particularly the Florentine one, in which Crisolora settled, was no accident. Tuscany in the early fifteenth century was one of the most active forges in Europe in cultural and scientific production. The receptivity to the ancient geography book was immediate and profound. The humanists’ interest in Ptolemy’s work was more directed towards the philological aspects, such as the study of the ancient names of peoples and cities. However, the set of maps that accompanied the book also aroused great interest. In the Florentine workshops, a series of cartographic ‘archetypes’ were formed, which were then reproduced in the sumptuously illustrated copies of Geographia, along with Jacopo Angeli’s Latin version. The first workshops specialized in Ptolemaic cartography, such as that of Piero del Massaio, were established in Florence. Piero was indeed a painter and not a cartographer because his codices were strictly derived from the specimen of Ptolemy’s Geography brought to Florence by Crisolora9 and other models –​ with the name of places translated into Latin –​that he and other codex painters kept in their workshop, which implies a work of copying, if not tracing, and does not necessarily require cartographic knowledge. Piero’s activity can be traced back to at least 1460, the year in which he was paid for “painting a Ptolemy” on behalf of Alvero Alfonso, Bishop of Algarve. Although this is partially outside the educational sphere, it is important to understand it as a phenomenon that penetrated deeply into the first geographic literary productions for strictly pedagogical purposes. In the encounter between the tradition of Holywood’s De Sphaera and the cartographic fortune of Ptolemy, we find the first long-​lasting structural evolutionary leap leading to the future model of school atlases and geographic textbooks. A nice document proving this link is a schoolbook named La Sfera, a booklet of cosmography produced in Florence at the beginning of the fifteenth century, which was probably written between 1422 and 1435. The attribution of the work is uncertain, with doubts existing between Leonardo (1360–​1425) and Gregorio Dati (1362–​1435). Leonardo was a Dominican theologian, philosopher, and preacher who became the General of the order in 1414. Among Leonardo’s erudite productions, we find a commentary on Aristotle’s Meteors. Gregorio,

9 Today preserved into the Vatican Apostolic Library, Urb. Gr. 82. From this very ancient Greek code, several later codes were derived.

138 Salomoni on the other hand, was a humanist and merchant who was active in Florence. In both cases, the cultivated and erudite origin of this manual is evident.10 The booklet was most probably intended for the education of the children of the rich Florentine merchant bourgeoisie. The text consists of four books of the same length in vernacular verses, beginning with the sky and ending with the earth. Although its main source was the popular John Holywood’s Tractatus De Sphaera, the Florentine book included something new for a schoolbook: An accurate description of the Mediterranean coasts accompanied by fragments of portolan charts used by sailors for navigation. These maps are ordered from east to west, ranging from the Black Sea to the Atlantic. Dati’s Sfera has been considered the first European proto atlas after Ptolemy. As an educational tool, it shows elements of both innovation and continuity. Its vision of the world is still medieval, and its pedagogical aims are oriented towards a practical end. The Sfera presents the earth in its cosmological context and describes the two most common geographic models of the earth’s surface, namely Macrobius’s Zonal map and Isidore of Seville’s T-​O map. Africa is described very vaguely beyond the northern coast, with Mauretania to the west and Ethiopia to the east. However, as an element of innovation, Dati’s close connection to the world of navigation is evident, showing clearly how much practitioners of navigation had an early influence on cosmographic literature and its teaching. A later text similar to Leonardo and Gregorio Dati’s La Sfera is a manuscript produced in nearby Perugia in 1498. It is a vernacular translation from Holywood’s De Sphaera, made by goldsmith Piervincenzo Danti (1440–​1512) for his children Teodora and Giulio.11 This vernacular translation demonstrates the longevity and versatility of Holywood’s text structure. The work’s private destination also highlights the permeability between late medieval educational

10

11

The doubt about the attribution of La Sfera persists in modern historiography. Denis Cosgrove, for example, mentions as the author of the book Leonardo Dati, cf. Apollo’s Eye: A Cartographic Genealogy of the Earth in the Western Imagination (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001), 96–​98, while for Clemens (Medieval Maps in a Renaissance Context, 237–​256) the authorship is to be attributed to Gregorio. On the dispute see: Paolo Viti, “Dati Leonardo,” in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Vol. 33 (Rome: Treccani, Istituto dell’Enciclopedia Italiana, 1987). On Piervincenzo Danti and his descendants see: Francesco Paolo Fiore, “Piervincenzo Danti,” Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Vol. 32 (Rome: Treccani, Istituto dell’Enciclopedia Italiana, 1986). See also: Francesca Rogari and Cecilia Scaletti, “To Know is to Map: Egnazio Danti Architect and Surveyor,” in Disegnare il tempo e l’armonia. Il disegno di architettura osservatorio dell’universo, edited by Emma Mandelli and Gaia Lavoratti (Firenze: Alinea Editrice, 2010), 586–​589.

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frontiers, from the universities to the walls of the domestic hearth. Even the explicit destination for a girl’s geographic education is significant in terms of the gendered educational divide. The social context in which Piervincenzo produced the translation was not very different from that of the Dati brothers. He was a goldsmith and highly cultured craftsman born into a rich and noble family in Perugia. He studied mathematics under the master Alfano Alfani, to whom he dedicated his work, and was a passionate humanist reader of Dante Alighieri, from whom he also derived his family name. In sum, it is the same world of the erudite upper-​middle class of central Italy that saw the production of La Sfera in Florence seventy years before. The fortune of Piervincenzo’s translation did not end with his family. In the second half of the sixteenth century, Piervincenzo’s nephew, Egnazio Danti (1536–​1586), printed the manuscript, which had likely continued to be used within the family circle. Egnazio took the initiative to print three editions: two in Florence (1571 and 1579) and one in Perugia (1574). Although the original manuscript is lost, the printed versions remain, displaying the additions made by Egnazio and possibly by Piervincenzo as well. One of the most significant geographic pieces of information added to Holywood’s original text is a reflection on the falsity of the idea that torrid areas are uninhabitable. Piervincenzo (or Egnazio) explains that this is based on the travels of Christopher Columbus, who went to the latitudes that ancient texts had deemed unsuitable for life, thereby disproving them once and for all.12 Piervincenzo’s translation does not devote much space to descriptions of the parts of the world, as we find in the work of the Dati brothers. Besides the title, the work of the 1420s and that of 1498 have in common the descriptions of the Earth’s place in the universe, the celestial spheres, and the fundamental elements of astronomy. They differ, however, in their textual structures. The Dati’s Sfera is a description in verse of the parts of the world, its regions, seas, rivers, cities, and peoples. The most frequent reference is to ancient and biblical texts, as well as to Holywood himself, to whom the book explicitly refers. The Sfera of Piervincenzo Danti, however, is an annotated and revised translation of Holywood, faithful to its nature as a cosmographic-​mathematical treatise. No ethnographic hints are found in it, and even the parts of the world are described in relation to climatic zones. These examples reveal how the structure of Holywood’s text was slowly altering while maintaining the same Aristotelian-​Ptolemaic intellectual frame 12

Piervincenzo Danti, La Sfera di Giovanni Sacrobosco tradotta da Pier Vincenzio Dante de Rinaldi con le annotazioni del medesimo (In Perugia: Stamperia di Giovanni Berardino Rastelli, 1574). Mentions of Columbus’ voyages can be found at pages 14, 32, and 50.

140 Salomoni of reference. With the slow manipulation of the text, not only was the intellectual framework of the geographical discourse changing, but also the very epistemological foundations on which it rested. It is a slow process made of permeation between ancient authorities and new experiences of travel and discovery. Despite their common origin, the two texts that we have just seen summarize the characteristics of the two main strands of geography textbooks that would develop in the following centuries. On the one hand, the “Sphere” strand proper, which will give continuity to cosmographic treatises until its exhaustion at the end of the seventeenth century. On the other hand, a more descriptive approach, less analytical (at least from a mathematical point of view), from which modern atlases and geography textbooks will arise. 2

On the Edge of Epistemology: Geography Textbooks between Religion and Pedagogical Needs

The two cases analyzed here were both part of the late medieval humanistic cultural horizon. They were both produced in the fifteenth century, a time of great scientific fervor and drastic change. Nonetheless, the novelties brought by the oceanic discoveries were soon followed by the deep fractures created by the Protestant Reformation. The religious crisis faced by Europe during the sixteenth century had important repercussions also in the world of science and geographical thought. From the earliest stages of the Reformation, the Protestant world gave great importance to the mathematical disciplines: They were considered propaedeutic to theology because they allowed distinguishing the false from the truth. Geography took on particular importance because God’s Creation was taught through it. This approach can be seen in the educational reforms implemented by Philip Melanchthon in the organization of studies at the University of Wittenberg, which inspired many Protestant schools and universities. Compared to the Protestant world, Catholics lagged somewhat behind, at least during the sixteenth century.13

13

Axelle Chassagnette, Savoir géographique et cartographie dans l’espace germanique protestant (1520–​1620), (Genève: Droz, 2018), 269. See also Antonella Romano, La Contre-​ Réforme mathématique: constitution et diffusion d’une culture mathématique jésuite à la Renaissance, 1540–​1640 (Paris: Ecole Française de Rome, 1999); Id., “Du Collège Romain à la Flèche: problèmes et enjeux de la diffusion des mathématiques dans les collèges jésuites (1580–​1620),” Mélanges de l’Ecole français de Rome. Italie et Méditerranée, 107, 2 (1995): 575–​627.

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Despite these differences, the evolution of textual structures in geography books persisted throughout the sixteenth century. Until the first decades of the next century, these transformations continued to occur within the mathematical disciplines. Geography had not yet achieved the status of an autonomous discipline. As stated by the Jesuit historian François de Dainville, geography penetrated “clandestinely into the classrooms, disguised as erudition.”14 The various types of “Sphere” manuals continued their slow evolution toward the modern Atlas. An interesting example is represented by A briefe introduction to geography: containing a description of the grounds, and general part thereof. Very necessary for young students in that science, published in Oxford in 1630.15 This text endured a long life with several editions until the dawn of the eighteenth century. The author, William Pemble, was a theologian who stressed the close relationship between religion and geography. The book was designed for specific educational use and allows us to observe the moment of transition between the Aristotelian and Ptolemaic approaches and the empirical approach to geography. First, it defines what geography is, namely “an art or science teaching us the general description of the whole earth,” distinguishing it from topography and chorography. The questions posed by the author at the beginning of the book demonstrate the gradual move away from Ptolemy’s teachings. Pemble asks: whether there be more Sea or Land? whether the sea would naturally overflow the land, as it did in the first creation, was it not withheld within his bankes by divine power? whether the deepened of the Sea, doth exceed the height of the mountains? whether mountains were before the flood? what is the height of the highest hills? Whether land came since the flood? what is the cause of the Ebbing and flowing of the Sea? what is the origin of springs and rivers? what manner of motion is the running of the rivers is?16 Pemble’s geography book represents a clear evolution towards modern geography textbooks while still being inspired by the mathematical model of “Sphere” 14

François De Dainville, L’éducation des jésuites (xvie–​x viie siècles), (Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1978), 427–​470. The sentence is also quoted in Chassagnette, Savoir Géographique, 267. 15 William Pemble, A briefe introduction to geography: containing a description of the grounds, and general part thereof. Very necessary for young students in that science (Oxford: Printed by John Lichfield, 1630). 16 Pemple, A briefe introduction, 19.

142 Salomoni treatises. The book highlights geography as a teaching discipline, rather than cosmography, and every reflection is based on an empirical approach. While the framework is still theological, the primary support is direct experience. During the sixteenth century, the development of mathematical-​geographical literature in the Catholic context was greatly influenced by Christopher Clavius, a German Jesuit. Clavius’ work In Sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco commentarius (1581) represented for more than a century the model for the majority of treatises produced on the ‘Sphere’. This work referred explicitly to some exquisitely geographical aspects, as a subdivision of the parts of the world, revealed by the voyages Portuguese and Castilian oceanic voyages.17 In its nature, however, the Commentarius remained a book of Cosmography, in which the mathematical and astronomical aspects clearly prevail over the geographical ones. Nevertheless, despite the advice given by Clavius for the preparation of the mathematical section of the Ratio Studiorum contained in the Ordo Servandus in addiscendis disciplinis mathematici (1581), this discipline was not placed at the core of the programs of Jesuit colleges. In general, Catholic Europe did not place a strong emphasis on geographic teaching during the sixteenth century. Teaching mainly relied on existing works, and mathematical instruction was primarily taught to younger students. The professors of mathematics in Jesuit colleges tended to be inexperienced and did not remain in their positions for long periods, which made it difficult for them to pursue continued studies. However, there were some exceptions, such as areas with a strong maritime tradition. The Jesuit College of Messina is one example. Mathematics teaching became important in the first school opened by the Society of Jesus in Italy, and mathematicians and cosmographers like Francesco Maurolico (1494–​1575) and Christopher Clavius were active there. Maurolico was the author of a Cosmographia published in Paris in 1558, and the presence of both mathematicians in Messina was relevant to the Society of Jesus’s need to produce scientific compendia covering cosmography.18 Portugal and Spain, thanks to their maritime traditions, 17

18

Cf. “per Africam, per Taprobanem, in Indijs orientalibus, per Insulas Moluccas, per Americae, sive nove Hispanie provinciam quae Peru nominator […] Experientia autem quotidiana Lusitanorum Hispanorumque satis nos edocet terrae huic habitabili multos assignari antipodes.” The edition consulted for this article is: Christophori Clavii Bambergensis, ex Societate Iesu, In Sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco Commentarius, (Romae: ex Officina Basae, 1575), 126. Francesco Maurolico, Cosmographia (Parisiis: Apud Gulielmum Cavellat, 1558). See Corrado Dollo, Modelli scientifici e filosofici nella Sicilia spagnola, (Napoli: Guida Editore, 1984), 9–​38; and Rosario Moscheo, Francesco Maurolico tra Rinascimento e scienza galileiana. Materiali e ricerche, (Messina: Società Messinese di Storia Patria, 1988); Id., “Il ‘corpus’

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developed as well important centers for research and study of mathematics. It was no accident that Clavius studied in Coimbra between 1555 and 1560. The problem, at least for Portugal, was the initial lack of qualified mathematicians, forcing the arrival of teachers from abroad.19 In the same decades, however, geographic teaching within the Catholic world, especially in Jesuit colleges, also benefited from cultural exchanges with the Protestant world. Since the 1520s, Lutheran universities prioritized mathematical-​ geographical studies following Melanchthon’s reformation of studies at Wittenberg. This triggered a mechanism of competition and exchange with positive effects on textbook production. Among the most important examples is the University of Vienna, where Protestant and Catholic professors worked side by side until at least 1587. In Germanic Catholic circles, a geography textbook that enjoyed some success during the sixteenth century was De Geographia Liber Unus, written by the humanist Heinrich Glarean, who had studied in Bern, Vienna, Cologne, and Basel. During his stay in Basel, between 1514 and 1529, Glarean published his Geographia in 1527. In the Swiss city, he had relations with Erasmus of Rotterdam and Oswald Myconius. Unlike the latter, however, Glarean did not adhere to the Protestant Reformation, being forced to leave the town. It was probably Glarean’s religious choice that made his work attractive for mathematical-​geographical teaching in the Jesuit colleges of the imperial area. A general revival of mathematical-​geographical studies occurred in the middle decades of the seventeenth century. In this period, we witness the production of important works. Giuseppe Biancani, who had studied mathematics under Clavius at the Roman College, wrote a mathematical treaty: the Sphaera Mundi seu Cosmographia Demonstrativa, which is clearly inspired by Clavius’s Commentary on Holywood’s De Sphaera. In this work Biancani describes in a lucid and accomplished style how the world was shaped: “Iam tota terra secundum superficiem dividitur in quatuor partes praecipuas, Europam, Asiam,

19

mauroliciano degli ‘Sphaerica’: problemi editoriali, in Filosofia e scienze nella Sicilia dei secoli xvi e xvii,” in Atti del Convegno, Catania (23–​24 novembre 1995), edited by C. Dollo, i vol., (Catania: Le idee, 1996), 39–​84. Ugo Baldini, “L’Insegnamento della matematica nel Collegio di S. Antão a Lisbona, 1590–​ 1640,” in A Companhia de Jesus e a Missionação no Oriente, (Lisboa, Brotéria, Fundação Oriente, 2000), 275–​310; Id., “As assistências ibéricas da Companhia de Jesus e a actividade científica nas missões asiáticas (1578–​1640): Alguns aspectos culturais e institucionais,” Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, 54 (1998): 195–​245. See also Luìs Miguel Carolin, Henrique Leitão, “Natural Philosophy and Mathematics in Portuguese Universities, 1550–​1650,” in Universities and Science in the Early Modern Period, edited by Mordechai Feingold and Victor Navarro-​Brotons (Dordrecht: Springer, 2006), 163.

144 Salomoni Africam, Novuum Orbem, seu Americam.”20 During this period, other important mathematicians and cosmographers who were active in the teaching of geography were Giovanni Riccioli and Nicolò Cabeo, both active in the Jesuit college of Parma. Riccioli was the author of Geographie et hidrographiae reformatae, published in Bologna in 1661. In the imperial area, we find professors such as Johann Vögelin, Wolfgang Lazius, Christopher Grienberger, and Paul Guldin. Grienberger, in particular, entered the Society of Jesus in 1580, studied mathematics in Prague and was a professor in Vienna between 1590 and 1591. He then joined Clavius in Rome in 1595 where he published his most important works in Rome, succeeding to his master in 1612. Even in the Iberian area, despite the early exposure to problems related to knowledge of the world through explorations, a proper geographic discipline was not immediately defined. The Academia Real Matematica was founded by Philip ii only in 1582.21 Although scientific and mathematical studies were advancing in Spain and Portugal with good results throughout the second half of the sixteenth century, geographical teaching was still hidden in the other sciences. In this context, translations and new editions of Euclid’s Elements were very popular.22 It is from the seventeenth century onwards that new approaches to the discipline began to spread in Europe. Geography gradually ceased to be the specific domain of mathematicians and began to be studied by historians. In the Catholic world, there had been an ambiguous attitude towards geography until the beginning of the seventeenth century. This discipline, in its more descriptive aspects, had been relegated to the minor studies of the Trivium, linking it to the study of ancient authors to understand the events of the biblical and classical peoples. However, some authors, while maintaining this historicist approach, also began to bring to geography the fruits of the increasingly widespread diffusion of mathematical and geometric education. In practice, this resulted in the publication of maps made according to geometric projection calculations in their books of historical geography.

20 21 22

Giuseppe Biancani, Sphaera Mundi seu Cosmographia Demonstrativa, (Bononia: 1619). On Biancani’s thought and his relationship with Clavius see: Shin Higashi, Penser les mathématiques au xvie siècle (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2018), 360–​364. Vicente Maroto, Esteban Piñero, Aspectos de la ciencia aplicada en la España del Siglo de Oro (Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León, 20062). To follow Euclid’s spreading in Early modern Europe see: Michael J. Sauter, The Spatial Reformation: Euclid between Man, Cosmos, and God (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019).

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An example that can be looked at as the juncture between the Jesuit cosmographic tradition and the new geographic-​historic sensibility is represented by the Apparato all’historia di tutte le nazioni et il modo di studiare la geografia, written by Antonio Possevino and published in Venice in 1598.23 Possevino’s book relaunches and gives centrality to a more historical approach to geography seen by historians as more backward than the mathematical one. A very prolific author of this genre was the Italian author Giulio Cesare De Solis, active between the end of the sixteenth and the middle of the seventeenth century. Between 1587 and 1621 we count 54 editions of his books published in Italy. The titles of De Solis’ works are revealing, such as L’origine di molte città del mondo. Discorso dove si da notizia di tutti i paesi e popoli del mondo, and Discorso di cosmografia, doue si hà piena notitia di tutte le prouincie, città, castella, popoli, monti, mari, fiumi, & laghi di tutto il mundo. Et tutto quel che è occorso dalla natiuità di Christo onsino all’hora presente. Besides De Solis, many examples could be made in order to show this slow but steady changing of geographic sensibility. Among them we find Fabio Magini’s description of Italy, published in Bologna in 1630, Luca di Linda’s Le relationi et descrittioni universali et particolari del mondo, published in 1674, and Vincenzo Maria Coronelli’s Corso geografico universale con tavole geografiche, published in Venice in 1692.24 However, this type of geography book was not only published in Italy. Every European cultural context participated in this cultural change. Some of these works were even translated into Italian. This is the case of the Scuola de’ principi e de’ cavalieri, cioè la geografia, la rettorica, la morale, l’economia, la politica […], published in Bologna in 1676 and in Venice in 1677. This book was translated by the abbot Scipione Alerani from the French work written by the erudite François de La Mothe Le Vayer for the education of the young king Louis xiv. In addition to France, a contribution to a renewed educational approach to geography came from England. We mention A New Geography, or a Description of the Most Eminent Countries and Coasts of the World, with Maps of Them, and Tables of Their Latitude and Longitude, and An Idea of Geography and Navigation Containing Easie Rules for Finding the Latitude, both published in London, respectively in the year 1681 and 1695. The attention given to the

23 24

Antonio Possevino, Apparato all’historia di tutte le nazioni et il modo di studiare la geografia (Venezia: Presso Giovan Battista Ciotti, 1598). The specimens of the books referred to here are: Luca di Linda, Le relationi et descrittioni universali et particolari del mondo dal marchese Maiolino Bisaccioni tradotte, osservate, e nuovamente molto accresciute e corrette (In Bologna: per Gioseffo Longhi, 1674); Vincenzo Maria Coronelli, Corso geografico universale con tavole geografiche (Venezia: a spese dell’autore, 1692).

146 Salomoni mathematical aspects shows how the coexistence between a mathematical and historical approach to geography lasted for a long time. However, the literary-​historical approach to the study of geography was heading towards ever-​increasing success, which would reach its zenith during the eighteenth century. 3

The Eighteenth Century and the Rise of the Modern Atlas

In the middle decades of the eighteenth century, English watchmaker John Harrison made a series of increasingly accurate and cutting-​edge clocks.25 This type of production, seemingly far from the topic of this essay, namely the evolution of geographic textbooks, solved a crucial problem addressed by the books of our interest. Harrison’s clocks, in fact, solved the problem of the difficult calculation of longitude at sea. For centuries, maritime powers competed to find the best calculation technique, awarding prizes to the first to succeed. Harrison’s technical achievement closed a long and dramatic chapter in the history of navigation, but also in the process of knowledge of the planet earth. In a sense, Harrison’s solution to the calculation of longitude moved the mathematical issues of geography into a more restricted field, reserved for technicians and experts. Until the end of the seventeenth century, as seen in the two London editions at the end of the preceding paragraph, questions related to the calculation of latitude and longitude found ample space in geographic textbooks. From the middle of the eighteenth century, however, mathematical issues disappeared, while a social, moral, and historical approach became firmly established. The hypothesis I want to suggest is not a strict cause-​and-​effect correlation between the affirmation of a historical-​geographical perspective at the expense of a mathematical one. These two types of content within geography textbooks coexisted for centuries, beginning at least, as we have seen, in the fifteenth century, and did not suddenly end in the eighteenth century. However, it remains true that as the problem of longitudes was solved, geography textbooks increasingly became a coherent and unified literary genre, more and more like modern school geography manuals. The examples are manifold and involve all European and extra-​European cultural areas. In 1700, in France was publushed by Nicolas de Fer the L’atlas 25

The history of John Harrison is narrated in: Dava Sobel, Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time (New York: Harper Collins, 1995).

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curieux ou le monde répresenté dans des cartes générales et particulières du ciel et de la terre: divisé tant en ses quatre principales parties que par états et provinces et orné par des plans et descriptions des villes capitales et principales. As we can grasp from the title, technical and scientific aspects are not expelled, but a descriptive approach is definitively stronger.26 De Fer, however, was not a pedagogue but a cartographer, and his work, although an educational use cannot be excluded, was not primarily intended for schools. It serves here to show a broader intellectual tendency. A real explosion of educational geography textbooks was realized in the second half of the eighteenth century, right after Harrison’s resolution of the longitude problem. Among the French texts we find the Eraste, ou, l’ami de la jeunesse: entretiens familiers, dans lesquels on donne aux jeunes gens de l’un et de l’autre sexe, des notions […] l’astronomie, l’histoire naturelle, la géographie (1774), the Atlas elementaire (1774), La géographie, published by Ramier de Rudière in 1775, the Atlas géographique de toutes les parties connues du globe terrestre pour servir […] à l’education de la jeunesse (1785), Les études convenables aux demoiselles (1789), and the Atlas des enfans ou, Nouvelle méthode pour apprendre la géographie, avec un nouveau traité de la sphere,27 which had known several edition between the 1780s and 1790s. All these books, except the last one which was published in Lion, were published in Paris, which became the powerhouse of European printing in the Age of Enlightenment. However, England and the Anglo-​ Saxon world were no less involved in the production of geography textbooks. The New Moral System of Geography: Containing an Account of the Different Nations Ancient and Modern and the New and Easy Introduction to Universal Geography in a Series of Letters to a Youth at School were published in London, respectively in 1792 and 1797. Particularly important are also the books printed in (or meant for) eighteenth and nineteenth-​century America. Important examples are represented by An Essay on the Dignity and Usefulness of Human Learning. Addressed to the Youth of the British Empire in Europe and America, published in London in 1769, the manual Geography Made Easy, printed in New Haven in 1784, the Elements of Geography, printed in Boston in 1796, and a Short but Comprehensive System of the Geography of the World, published in Hartford in 1796 and 1805. 26

27

Nicolas de Fer, L’atlas curieux ou le monde répresenté dans des cartes générales et particulières du ciel et de la terre: divisé tant en ses quatre principales parties que par états et provinces et orné par des plans et descriptions des villes capitales et principales […] (Paris: Chez l’Auteur, 1700). Jean-​Marie Bruyset, Atlas des enfans ou, Nouvelle méthode pour apprendre la géographie, avec un nouveau traité de la sphere (A Lyon: Chez Jean-​Marie Bruyset, père et fils, 1790).

148 Salomoni As mentioned, however, mathematical, and technical issues did not simply disappear from geography manuals. This appears clearly in titles of some books, for example in Alexis Claude Clairaut’s Theorie de la figure de la terre, tirée des principes de hidrographie, published in Paris in 1743, or in Filippo Perez’s La sfera spiegata colle figure in piano: Trattato utilissimo ai giovani studenti di geografia, printed in Pesaro in 1793, or even in Juan Andrés’ La figura de la tierra.28 In this scientific and geographical climate, new suggestions, inspired by what today we would call deep history, were also making their way. The crisis of some religious references and scientific progress had called into question the age of the Earth. In the second half of the eighteenth century, the idea that the Planet was much older than indicated by biblical chronology was increasingly accepted.29 In general, however, the late eighteenth century saw the emergence and spread of atlases and geography compendia. The evolutionary path of this literary genre which began with the late medieval “Spheres” had come to maturity. Books such as the Atlas encyclopedique contenant la geographie ancienne et quelques cartes sur la geographie du Moyen Age, la geographie moderne, et les cartes relatives a la géographie physique, produced by Rigobert Bonne and Nicolas Desmarest between 1787 and 1788, the Atlas minimus, or, A new set of pocket maps of the several empires, kingdoms and states of the known world with historical extracts relative to each, published in London in 1792, or the Cosmographie de l’Académie des Enfans à Versailles, ou, Petit atlas élémentaire astronomique, géographique et historique, and the Cosmographie du musée des jeunes demoiselles, both published in Paris respectively in 1774 and 1790.30

28

Alexis Claude Clairaut, Theorie de la figure de la terre, tirée des principes de hidrographie (Paris: David fils, 1743); Filippo Perez, La sfera spiegata colle figure in piano: Trattato utilissimo ai giovani studenti di geografia (Pesaro: Stamperia Gavelli, 1793); Juan Andrés, La figura de la tierra, edited and translated by Cristiano Casalini and Davide Mombelli (Madrid: Casimiro, 2017), 7–​9. 29 Daniel Lord Smail, On Deep History and the Brain (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007). 30 Rigobert Bonne, Nicolas Desmarest, Atlas encyclopédique contenant la géographie ancienne, et quelques cartes sur la géographie du moyen age, la geographie moderne, et les cartes relatives a la géographie physique (A Paris: hôtel de Thou, rue des Poitevins, 1787–​1788); Emanuel Bowen, Atlas minimus, or, A new set of pocket maps of the several empires, kingdoms and states of the known world, with historical extracts relative to each (London: Printed for C.D. Piguenit, 1792); Philip Fresneau, Cosmographie de l’Académie des Enfans à Versailles, ou, Petit atlas élémentaire astronomique, géographique et historique (À Paris: Chez la Veuve Hérissant; Versailles: Chez l’auteur à l’Académie des Enfans, 1774); Id., Cosmographie du musée des jeunes demoiselles (Paris: Chez la veuve Hérissant, 1790).

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The examples that I provided are just a few from a list that could be much longer. It is also important to note that there was a specific production aimed at girls. Within this framework, however, one aspect must be emphasized. Until the end of the seventeenth century, even within contemporary historiographical analysis, a geographical approach based on descriptions of peoples, political and social forms, and historical paths of regions was evaluated as fundamentally retrograde, anchored in a biblical view of geography and tainted by religion. From the eighteenth century onward, this perspective would become dominant. Certainly, the intellectual categories employed would no longer be those of mythological or ancient peoples, but the analytical and descriptive structures would remain the same. 4

Notes on the Evolution of Geographic and Ethnographic Concepts

Educational geography texts allow us to follow the evolution of important spatial concepts, such as those of ‘ocean’ and ‘continent’. Throughout the early modern age (broadly understood from the fifteenth to the early nineteenth century), different ways of understanding and defining what a continent or ocean entails were in competition. Concerning the oceans, for a long time, political and cultural considerations influenced the way of conceiving their domesticability, as well as their place on the map. Until after Magellan’s voyage, the Ptolemaic imprint remained strong. The experience of the largest ocean in the world had disproved that America could represent an extreme offshoot of Far-​East Asia. Despite this, Spanish political circles translated the Ptolemaic idea of a greater extension of the dry land with respect to the waters covering the earth, into the idea that the Pacific was a domesticable area.31 How did the complexity of conceptualizing continental spaces translate into geography textbooks for educational use? We have just seen that textbooks mirrored the slow historical evolution of what geography is and its role in a broader reorganization of Western scientific knowledge. It is easier to observe this in relation to the development of the idea of continents.32 For example, the idea of America as the so called fourth part of the world after its ‘discovery’ in 1492 had several variations. In fact, despite this conceptualization 31 32

Political implications of geographic concepts are explained in Ricardo Padrón, The Indies of the Setting Sun: How Early Modern Spain Mapped the Far East as the Transpacific West (Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 2020). On this topic refer to Martin W. Lewis, Kären E. Wigen, The Myth of Continents: A Critique of Metageography (Berkeley-​Los Angeles-​London, University of California Press, 1997).

150 Salomoni of the earth’s conformation taking hold during the sixteenth century, it was not the only existing way of thinking about the terrestrial orb. By the end of the 1400s, competing representations of the world would remain for a long time. For example, an Italian geography textbook dating back to the central decades of the eighteenth-​century defined Europe as “the smallest of the three parts of the ancient continent,”33 while Asia is defined as “the largest part of the ancient continent,”34 and Africa is called “the largest peninsula in the world.”35 America, on the other hand, is described as “the largest region of the world which alone makes a continent.”36 In these excerpts, the world is represented symmetrically, with two components opposed to each other: the ancient and the new continent. The ancient continent is made up of three parts: Africa, Asia, and Europe, the ancient Orbis Terrarum, while the new continent, America, is defined as the largest region of the world. This specular geographical conception echoes a Ptolemaic perspective, which was still alive in the middle of the eighteenth century. The problem of conceptualizing geographic notions doesn’t deal only with their development but also with their creation. It is interesting to understand, for example, how and when the idea of Oceania as a continent was born. This name makes its appearance between the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, and despite its delay, it fits directly into the cultural path that began after the American ‘discovery’. This space, defined as an oceanic continent, a terrestrial space defined by water and insularity, is peculiar and reflects the complexity of these cultural mechanisms. Finally, another important aspect offered by geography textbooks concerns the ethnographic and ethnological definition of cultures and peoples in the world. For example, in the aforementioned eighteenth-​century geography manual, Europe is defined as the “most beautiful” of the “three parts of the ancient continent” for “the cleanliness and number of its inhabitants,” who are then defined as “brave, honest and civilized.”37 On the other hand, Asia is defined for its wealth and history, particularly its biblical and ancient past. The manual states that Asia “in the distribution that was made of the world after 33

34 35 36 37

This geography textbook remains untitled and is kept at the Library of the Palácio Nacional da Ajuda, in Lisbon. It dates to the central decades of the eighteenth century. The dating is made possible thanks to the information provided within the work about the reigning monarchs of Europe at the time of its writing. The archive location is: 51-​i -​ 55, 1r. Ibid., 69r. Ibid., 94r. Ibid., 109r. Ibid., 1r.

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the flood, was assigned to Sem, the firstborn son of Noah. There, Abraham was born […] and the monarchies of the Medes, the Babylonians, the Assyrians, and the Persians flourished.”38 If the peoples of Asia, out of respect for its history and for having been the cradle of Christianity, are at least celebrated, for the peoples of Africa, the anonymous author does not spend many words. Of the African continent, it is said that because it falls for the most part “under the torrid zone, where the heat is excessive, it is not very populated, especially in the interior of the country.”39 Its inhabitants are said to be “of fine stature and very sturdy, but very deceitful and cowardly.”40 Finally, as for America, its inhabitants are defined as being of Asian origin, arrived during ancient migrations. This is just one example to show the complex layering characterizing geography textbooks as sources for studying the evolution and diffusion of scientific concepts. What has just been said about the inhabitants of the various continents brings us to the last point. As stated by Michael Sauter, in fact, the cultural revolution brought by early modern geography “reshaped European anthropology.”41 In other words, by the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the new geography that had emerged from ages of scientific and historicist reflection was ready for a moral hierarchization of the peoples of the earth.42 Recent centuries have also shown us with what tragic consequences. As Sauter further explains There are subtle differences in attitude toward the distinct populations, as Western European peasants and burghers are unarmed, whereas the people from ‘barbaric’ culture in Eastern Europe and other exotic places burnish weapons. For example, in the images of indigenous Peruvian and Canadian peoples, each figure bears a bow and arrow, while the Englishman is a stylish fellow who sports a top hat and a cane. Bauer’s globe regularized diversity precisely by fixing humanity’s difference within space.43

38 39 40 41

Ibid., 69r. Ibid., 94v. Ibidem. Michael J. Sauter, The Spatial Reformation: Euclid Between Man, Cosmos, and God (Philadelphia: University of Philadelphia Press, 2019), 15. 42 See The Anthropology of Enlightenment, edited by Marco Cipolloni and Larry Wolff (Stanford: California Stanford University Press, 2007). 43 Ibid., 16. Bauer’s globe, named “The Earth and Its Inhabitants,” is preserved in the Collection of the Utrecht University Museum, inv. No. um-​373.

152 Salomoni Sauter references the Globe made by Carl Bauer in 1825 in Nuremberg to support their argument. This miniature globe comes with a series of figurines that depict the peoples of the world, which serves an obvious educational purpose. Like the manuscript textbook mentioned earlier, this pedagogical tool reflects the emerging ethnological demands in the context of Europe’s expanding colonialism. While the inclusion of exotic and distant peoples in geographical works with an educational purpose may seem novel, it is not entirely new. This serves as evidence of the genre’s continuity despite significant changes over the centuries. The textbook La Sfera, produced in Florence during the first half of the fifteenth century, illustrates this attitude. The peoples of Asia are described as “fierce and cruel peoples” who “clothes the limbs of their body with animal skin,” although they are recognized a certain sense of morality because their hated crime is theft.44 Speaking of Europe, barbaric characteristics are still attributed to the eastern peoples, consistently with eighteenth and nineteenth-​ century descriptions. Moving westward, however, the same warrior characteristics that are seen as cruel in the East are described as virtues in the West: “In Europe where France is located /​There were many and warlike [people], /​ Who used the sword, rapier, and lance /​In deeds of arms so glorious.”45 As for Africa, the discourse made by Gregorio Dati is different. Africa is defined as the smallest region of the Orbis Terrarum, its northern part is described as the heir to an ancient glory, as part of the Roman Empire, the cradle of civilization, and the birthplace of St. Augustine, now fallen into barbarism. The landscape itself reflects the wilderness of that place: “Africa is now called Barbary /​For being full of barbarous people: /​Deserted in many places it seems to be, /​And of evil animals it is full: /​In its sandy places there is no way, /​And he who passes through them regrets it: /​For by the sand he is suffocated, /​And by wild beasts, he is torn.”46

44

45 46

“Parti son crudi popoli e feroci. /​Ed hanno undici regni aggiunti a sette; /​Nel cavalcar prontissimi e veloci /​Con grande industria traggon lor saette, /​A punir lo adulterio son atroci.” “E’ veston le lor membra sol di pelle, /​E non han di tessuta lana ornato: /​Il cibo loro è dolce latte e melle /​E il furto stimon massimo peccato.” Gregorio Dati, La Sfera (Milano: G. Daelli e Comp. Editore, 1865), 184, 190. “Nell’Europa sita è ancor la Francia /​Ove furon già molti e bellicosi, /​Quali operorno spada, stocco e lancia /​In fatti d’armi tanto gloriosi.” Dati, La Sfera, 198. “Affrica adesso è detta Barberia /​Per l’esser piena di barbara gente: /​Diserta in molti luoghi par che sia, /​E d’animal malefici è frequente: /​Ne’ suoi luoghi arenosi non è via, /​ E chi passa per quelli se ne pente: /​Perocchè dalla rena è suffocato, /​E dalle fiere bestie è lacerato.” Dati, La Sfera, 208.

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The same attitude can be seen in the writings of other intellectuals and cosmographers a little later on. Though not strictly related to the educational environment, the writings of Francesco Guicciardini bear witness to the same cultural context as La Sfera. Guicciardini describes the peoples encountered by Columbus on his voyages as “unhappy” due to their lack of certain resources such as men, religion, knowledge of letters, skills in artifice, weapons, science, experience, and other essential elements. He goes on to compare them to “tame animals.”47 In 1575, a similar opinion was expressed by André Thevet regarding the inhabitants of Patagonia. In his book Cosmographie Universelle, which was widely used for educational purposes, the French royal cosmographer stated that “these people are not to be treated delicately, given their natural strength. Furthermore, they are so bloodthirsty, skilled, and well-​prepared for battle that only twenty of them could defeat one hundred of ours. They fearlessly expose themselves to death in their fury, similar to a lioness or tigress whose cubs have been taken away.”48 Despite the differences in the descriptions of Guicciardini and Thevet, separated by only fifty years, these two intellectuals agreed on one essential point. According to Guicciardini, the American populations were docile, tame, and lacked skill. On the other hand, according to Thevet, the inhabitants of Patagonia were skilled, bloodthirsty warriors. Nevertheless, both attributed to these people a feral, animalistic, and wild nature. In both cases, native populations were compared to animals. In summary, long before the nineteenth century, a hierarchy of the earth’s human populations had emerged. This racial and racist perspective pervaded works and educational institutions and echoed across the European states. 5

Conclusion

The remarks made about geographic textbooks in these pages encompass a vast time frame and topic, which cannot be exhausted in such a short space. Nonetheless, some clear elements can be highlighted. Geography manuals for school use reflect a variety of cultural, scientific, pedagogical, and epistemological developments that defined the history of early modern Europe. 47 48

“infelicissime perché, non avendo gli uomini né certa religione né notizia di lettere, non perizia di artifici non armi non arte di guerra non scienza non esperienza alcuna delle cose, sono, quasi non altrimenti che animali mansueti.” Guicciardini, Storia d’Italia, vi, 9. Michiel Van Groesen, Imagining the Americas in Print: Books, Maps, and Encounters in the Atlantic World (Leiden-​Boston: Brill, 2019), 43.

154 Salomoni Historiography has sometimes underestimated this literary genre, which can be of extreme interest in several ways. Above all, geography texts for schools were the tangible fruit of the transformations brought about by European mentality and culture through the process of maritime expansion that began in the fifteenth century. Geographical discoveries and oceanic voyages did not only affect the lives of people in the Old Continent through new foods, plants, and novelties brought from America and Asia. To make those places real, they had to be thought of, described, and brought into the minds of Europeans, as well as into their homes and kitchens. The pedagogical revolution brought about by religious orders between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries allowed for an unprecedented widespread distribution of this knowledge thanks to a standardized network of schools spread throughout Europe, as well as in America and Asia. Thanks to the Jesuits, whom we have spoken about in more detail in this chapter, and other religious orders, geographic literacy was no longer only the prerogative of certain social classes, as seen in the case of the late medieval Florentine merchants but could be extended to broad strata of the population. This process, as we have seen, was not linear. Different ways of imagining the globe came together over the centuries. The ancient Aristotelian-​Ptolemaic conception gradually gave way to new ways of looking at the world. The definition of some modern geographical categories, i.e. metageographies, cultural representations of space, was not easy. Let us use the concept of “continent” as an example. The definition of what a continent is cannot be based on simple direct experience. This was possibly the experience of the habitability of the torrid zones, at the equator, disproving the classical authorities who considered these places unfit for life. What we now call a continent is something too large to be experienced by an individual during a single experience. Only space travel would have made it possible to embrace such vast expanses at once. From this, we can understand how the process of defining a continent is a cultural process with room for debate. This margin of reflection is clearly shown in the textbooks seen in the previous pages. These manuals show aspects of strong transformation and equally great change. We have observed the gradual transition from the association of geography with mathematics to its association with history. Even the textual structure of geography books, despite the change in content, maintained significant stability over the centuries. Generally, we find a description by sections of the continents and their regions, accompanied by a description of the peoples who live there. These descriptions become more accurate as time goes by. The geographical transformation contained within the pedagogical revolution of the early modern age was at once epistemological, cultural, scientific,

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and anthropological. The radical change in the way of thinking about the world had profound political and religious consequences. It determined the way in which the European powers would later divide up the world; it produced a potentially devastating way of looking at humanity, made of civilized peoples and others to be civilized, introducing a category that would have the most tragic consequences in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The spread of atlases and modern geography textbooks, however, also had positive effects. They allowed for the first time to think of the world as a whole, contributing to the first cultural globalization. Thanks to the work of many missionaries (Jesuits, Franciscans, Dominicans, etc.), this literary genre merged and circulated knowledge drawn from worlds until recently distant and inaccessible in the villages of Europe. Before the telephone, radio, television, and the internet, geography books, especially those for children and schoolkids, brought people a little closer to the world.

Ancient Bibliography

Andrés, Juan. La figura de la tierra, edited and translated by Cristiano Casalini and Davide Mombelli. Madrid: Casimiro, 2017. Biancani, Giuseppe. Sphaera Mundi seu Cosmographia Demonstrativa. Bononia: presso l’autore, 1619. Bonne, Rigobert; Desmarest, Nicolas. Atlas encyclopédique contenant la géographie ancienne, et quelques cartes sur la géographie du moyen age, la geographie moderne, et les cartes relatives a la géographie physique. A Paris: hôtel de Thou, rue des Poitevins, 1787–​1788. Bowen, Emanuel. Atlas minimus, or, A new set of pocket maps of the several empires, kingdoms and states of the known world, with historical extracts relative to each. London: Printed for c.d. Piguenit, 1792. Bruyset, Jean-​Marie. Atlas des enfans ou, Nouvelle méthode pour apprendre la géographie, avec un nouveau traité de la sphere. A Lyon: Chez Jean-​Marie Bruyset, père et fils, 1790. Christophori Clavii Bambergensis, ex Societate Iesu. In Sphaeram Ioannis de Sacro Bosco Commentarius. Romae: ex Officina Basae, 1575. Clairaut, Alexis Claude. Theorie de la figure de la terre, tirée des principes de hidrographie. Paris: David fils, 1743. Coronelli, Vincenzo Maria. Corso geografico universale con tavole geografiche. Venezia: a spese dell’autore, 1692.

156 Salomoni Danti, Piervincenzo. La Sfera di Giovanni Sacrobosco tradotta da Pier Vincenzio Dante de Rinaldi con le annotazioni del medesimo. In Perugia: Stamperia di Giovanni Berardino Rastelli, 1574. Dati, Gregorio. La Sfera. Milano: G. Daelli e Comp. Editore, 1865. Fer, Nicolas de. L’atlas curieux ou le monde répresenté dans des cartes générales et particulières du ciel et de la terre: divisé tant en ses quatre principales parties que par états et provinces et orné par des plans et descriptions des villes capitales et principales […]. Paris: Chez l’Auteur, 1700. Fresneau, Philip. Cosmographie de l’Académie des Enfans à Versailles, ou, Petit atlas élémentaire astronomique, géographique et historique. À Paris: Chez la Veuve Hérissant; Versailles: Chez l’auteur à l’Académie des Enfans, 1774. Fresneau, Philip. Cosmographie du musée des jeunes demoiselles. Paris: Chez la veuve Hérissant, 1790. Linda, Luca di. Le relationi et descrittioni universali et particolari del mondo dal marchese Maiolino Bisaccioni tradotte, osservate, e nuovamente molto accresciute e corrette. In Bologna: per Gioseffo Longhi, 1674. Maurolico, Francesco. Cosmographia. Parisiis: Apud Gulielmum Cavellat, 1558. Pemble, William. A briefe introduction to geography: containing a description of the grounds, and general part thereof. Very necessary for young students in that science. Oxford: Printed by John Lichfield, 1630. Perez, Filippo. La sfera spiegata colle figure in piano: Trattato utilissimo ai giovani studenti di geografia. Pesaro: Stamperia Gavelli, 1793. Possevino, Antonio. Apparato all’historia di tutte le nazioni et il modo di studiare la geografia. Venezia: Presso Giovan Battista Ciotti, 1598.



Recent Bibliography

Baldini, Ugo. “As assistências ibéricas da Companhia de Jesus e a actividade científica nas missões asiáticas (1578–​1640): Alguns aspectos culturais e institucionais.” Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, 54 (1998): 195–​245. Baldini, Ugo. “L’Insegnamento della matematica nel Collegio di S. Antão a Lisbona, 1590–​1640.” In A Companhia de Jesus e a Missionação no Oriente, 275–​310. Lisboa, Brotéria, Fundação Oriente, 2000. Bertolini, Lucia. “Censimento dei manoscritti della Sfera del Dati. I manoscritti della Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale e dell’Archivio di Stato di Firenze (Continua da asnp, S. iii, xv, 1985).” Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. Classe di Lettere e Filosofia, Vol. 18, No. 2 (1988): 417–​588. Carlton, Genevieve. World Consumers: The Demand for Maps in Renaissance Italy. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2015. Carolin, Luìs Miguel; Leitão, Henrique. “Natural Philosophy and Mathematics in Portuguese Universities, 1550–​1650.” In Universities and Science in the Early

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Modern Period, edited by Mordechai Feingold and Victor Navarro-​ Brotons. Dordrecht: Springer, 2006. Chabod, Federico. Storia dell’idea d’Europa. Roma-​Bari: Laterza, 2005. Chassagnette, Axelle. Savoir géographique et cartographie dans l’espace germanique protestant (1520–​1620). Genève: Droz, 2018. Cipolloni, Marco; Wolff, Larry (eds.). The Anthropology of Enlightenment. Stanford: California Stanford University Press, 2007. Clemens, Raymond. “Medieval Maps in a Renaissance Context: Gregorio Dati and the Teaching of Geography in Fifteenth-​Century Florence.” In Cartography in Antiquity and the Middle Ages Fresh Perspectives, New Methods, edited by Richard J.A. Talbert and Richard W. Unger, 237–​256. Leiden-​Boston: Brill, 2008. Cosgrove, Denis. Apollo’s Eye: A Cartographic Genealogy of the Earth in the Western Imagination. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001. Crowther, Kathleen, et al. “The Book Everybody Read: Vernacular Translations of Sacrobosco’s Sphere in the Sixteenth Century.” Journal for the History of Astronomy, 46, 1, (2015): 4–​28. De Dainville, François. L’éducation des jésuites (xvie–​x viie siècles). Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1978. Dollo, Corrado. Modelli scientifici e filosofici nella Sicilia spagnola. Napoli: Guida Editore, 1984. Fiore, Francesco Paolo. “Piervincenzo Danti.” Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Volume 32. Roma: Treccani, Istituto dell’Enciclopedia Italiana, 1986. Grafton, Anthony. “Textbooks and the Disciplines.” In Scholarly Knowledge: Textbooks in Early Modern Europe, edited by Emidio Campi, et al., 11–​36. Geneva: Droz, 2008. Higashi, Shin. Penser les mathématiques au xvie siècle. Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2018. Lewis, Martin W., Wigen, Kären E. The Myth of Continents: A Critique of Metageography. Berkeley –​Los Angeles –​London: University of California Press, 1997. Lord Smail, Daniel. On Deep History and the Brain. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007. Maroto, Vicente; Piñero, Esteban. Aspectos de la ciencia aplicada en la España del Siglo de Oro. Valladolid: Junta de Castilla y León, 2006. Padrón, Ricardo. The Indies of the Setting Sun: How Early Modern Spain Mapped the Far East as the Transpacific West. Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 2020. Publishing Sacrobosco’s De sphaera in Early Modern Europe: Modes of Material and Scientific Exchange, edited by Andrea Ottone and Matteo Valleriani. Cham, Switz.: Springer, 2022. Rogari, Francesca; Scaletti, Cecilia. “To Know is to Map: Egnazio Danti Architect and Surveyor.” In Disegnare il tempo e l’armonia. Il disegno di architettura osservatorio dell’universo, edited by Emma Mandelli and Gaia Lavoratti, 586–​589. Firenze: Alinea Editrice, 2010.

158 Salomoni Romano, Antonella. “Du Collège Romain à la Flèche: problèmes et enjeux de la diffusion des mathématiques dans les collèges jésuites (1580–​1620).” Mélanges de l’Ecole français de Rome. Italie et Méditerranée, 107, 2 (1995): 575–​627. Romano, Antonella. La Contre-​Réforme mathématique: constitution et diffusion d’une culture mathématique jésuite à la Renaissance, 1540–​1640. Paris: Ecole Française de Rome, 1999. Sauter, Michael J. The Spatial Reformation: Euclid between Man, Cosmos, and God. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019. Valleriani, Matteo. “The Tracts on the Sphere: Knowledge Restructured Over a Network.” In The Structures of Practical Knowledge, edited by Matteo Valleriani, 421–​474. Cham: Springer, 2017. Van Groesen, Michiel. Imagining the Americas in Print: Books, Maps, and Encounters in the Atlantic World. Leiden-​Boston: Brill, 2019. Viti, Paolo. “Dati Leonardo.” In Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Vol. 33. Rome: Treccani, Istituto dell’Enciclopedia Italiana, 1987.

Index Africa 63–​64, 73, 83, 113, 118, 138, 142n, 144, 150–​152 Alamanni, family 24 Albertanus from Brescia 41 Alberti, Adovadro 17 Alberti, Benedetto 16 Alberti, Giannozzo 16 Alberti, Leon Battista 16–​17 Albuquerque, Juan Alfonso de 86 Alden, Dauril 49n, 52 Alfani, Alfano 139 Al-​Farabi, Arab philosopher 30n Algarve 137 Alighieri, Dante 116, 139 Aligret, Simon 33, 36 Alfonso, Alvero 137 America, continent 2, 6, 52, 59, 62n, 82, 83, 117, 118, 119, 132, 147, 149, 150, 151, 154 Andrés, Juan 148 Angeli, Jacopo 136–​137 Angola 63 Aquinas, Thomas 21, 98–​99 Arabia 118 Aragon (Trastàmara), dynasty 36, 38 Beatrice, princess of Naples 38 Ferdinand ii, king of Aragon 36 Ferrante, king of Naples 38 Aristotle 137 Arnaudo, Marco 113, 119, 121 Arzoni, family 24 Asia, continent 2, 5n, 49, 82–​83, 87, 100, 112, 132, 149, 150–​152, 154 Asor Rosa, Alberto 111 Astesano from Asti 21n Atlantic Ocean 62, 113, 138 Augustine of Hippo 152 Avignon 17 Aviz dynasty  John iii, king of Portugal 48, 68n, 86–​87 Sebastian i, king of Portugal 59–​60 Barcelona 12 Barnabites, religious order 132 Barreto-​Xavier, Ângela 87, 101 Basel 143

Bauer, Carl 152 Baxandall, Michael 20, 23 Belém da Cachoeira, city in the current State of Bahia, Brazil 66n Belém do Pará, city in the current State of Pará, Brazil 66n, 67, 72 Benedictins, religious order 50 Bentivoglio, dynasty 38 Berlin 11 Bern 143 Bianchini, Giuseppe 70 Binchois, Gilles 36 Bittar, Marisa 67 Black Sea 138 Boethius 32, 39 Bologna 36, 38, 134, 144–​145 University 36, 136 Bonne, Rigobert 148 Borba, Diogo de 87 Bordes, Guillaume des 133 Boston 147 Bourges 33 Boynton, Susan 32 Brazil 3–​7, 47–​51, 53–​54, 56n–​68, 71–​74 Native populations 47–​55, 62, 73–​74 Bruges 17 Burcius, Nicolas 38 Burgundy 33, 36, 41 Calligraphy, teaching of 12 Cambrai 35 Camerino, Paolo da 88 Cape Comorin 94–​95, 104 Capuchins, religious orders 50 Caribbean, sea 118 Carmelites, religious order 50, 65 Casimiro, Ana Palmira 73 Castiglione, Baldesar 40 Castile, kingdom 4 Catholic Reformation 6, 85 Cavalieri, Francesco 126 Cavellat, Guillaume 133 Cecco d’Ascoli 136 Charles of Valois 41 China 101, 112

160 Index Cicero 80 Clairaut, Alexis Claude 148 Clement xiv, Pope 48 Clossey, Luke 50 Cochin 90 Coimbra 59, 60, 69, 87, 90–​91, 100, 143 Jesuit College. See Jesuit pedagogy and schools Cologne 143 Columbus, Christopher 26, 139, 153 Coronelli, Vincenzo Maria 145 Correia-​Afonso, John 103 Costa, Duarte da 68n Council of Trent 49, 102 Cranganore 86 Crisolora, Emanuele 136–​137 Crowther, Kathleen 136 Da Capodistria, Monaldo 20 Dal Ponte, Gottardo 12 Danti, Egnazio 139 Danti, Giulio 138 Danti, Piervincenzo 134, 138–​139 Danti, Teodora 138 Dati, Gregorio 134, 137–​139, 152 Dati, Leonardo 134, 137–​139 De Roover, Raymond 21–​22 Desmarest, Nicolas 148 De Solis, Giulio Cesare 145 Ditchfield, Simon 112 Diu 92 Dominicans, religious order 82n Colleges 49n Dyer, Joseph 32 England 115, 145, 147 Erasmus 99, 143 Espírito Santo, city in the current State of Espírito Santo, Brazil 54, 67 Estado da India. See Portugal Ethiopia 138 Euclid 144 Europe, continent 2–​3, 5, 10, 26, 37, 57, 61, 71, 80, 83, 88, 93, 105, 113, 132–​133, 135, 140, 150–​155 Fer, Nicolas de 146–​147 Ferrara 110, 125 Ferreira Jr., Amarilio 67 Fibonacci, Leonardo 15

Flanders 33, 37 Florence 11–​12, 127, 136–​139, 152 Florida 117 Fortunate Islands 113 France 33, 145–​146 Franciscans, religious order 50, 82n, 86–​88 Colleges 49n Province of San Gabriel (Spain) 86 Province of Piedade (Portugal) 86–​87 Fugger, Jakob 17 Gaffurio, Franchino 36 Geneva 17 Geography, teaching of 132–​133, 144 Giles of Rome 39 Giolito, Gabriele 18 Glarean, Heinrich 143 Goa 85–​88, 92–​94, 98–​99, 101, 104 Gonzaga, dynasty 25, 38 Ferrante, governor of Milan 25 Govenzate, family 24 Grafton, Anthony 131 Grover, Mark L. 50n Guadalupe, Juan de 86 Guicciardini, Francesco 153 Guido of Arezzo 30 Guldin, Paul 144 Haar, James 40 Habsburg, dynasty  Charles v, Holy Roman Emperor 25 Philip ii, king of Spain 144 Harrison, John 146–​147 Hartford 147 Holland 115 Holland, Philemon 119 Holy Land 113 Holywood, John 7, 133–​138, 143 Homer 131 Hugh of Saint Victor 31 Iberian Peninsula 86 Ilheus, city in the current State of Bahia, Brazil 67 Index Prohibitorum Librorum 83 India 3–​5, 7, 80–​95, 97–​100, 102–​103, 105–​106, 111, 117 Indian Ocean 113 Indonesia 115 Inquisition, Holy Office 83n, 85

Index Italy 10, 79, 93, 110, 118, 126, 133, 139, 145 Risorgimento 127 Ithaca 113–​114 Japan 84, 101, 112 Jerusalem 81 Jesuits (individuals)  Álvares, Gonçalo 105 Álvares, Manuel 69 Anchieta, José de 62, 67 Andrade, António de 70 Aquaviva, Claudio 53n, 61n–​62, 68n Arriaga, Rodrigo de 69 Azevedo, Inácio de 57 Azpilcueta Navarro, João de 53n, 56n Bartoli, Daniello 4, 6, 110–​120 Bellarmine, Robert 81 Bettendorff, Johann Philipp 71–​72 Biancani, Giuseppe 143 Cabeo, Nicolo 144 Carvalho, Luiz 70 Clavius, Christopher 142–​144 Criminali, Antonio 94, 99–​100 Dainville, François de 141 Dias, Pedro 63 Figueira, Luís 62 Fonseca, Pedro da 69 Franco, António 69 Gomes, António 90–​92, 96, 105 González Dávila, Gil 51n Gouveia, Cristóvão de 53n, 57, 61n–​62, 70 Grã, Luiz da 56n, 58 Grienberger, Christopher 144 Henriques, Henrique 94–​95, 101 Ignatius of Loyola 49n, 51n, 55, 57n, 79, 82–​84, 89–​93, 99, 103, 121 Jácome, Diogo 53n Jorge, Marcos 56n Kircher, Athanasius 81 Laínez, Diego 58, 82, 95 Lancilotto, Niccolò 89–​99, 101, 103–​105 Luís, Pedro 105–​106 Lobbet de Lanthin, Jacques 70 Mansilhas, Francisco 104 Mercês de Melo, Carlos 102 Mercurian, Everard 105 Mersenne, Marin 111 Molina, Luiz de 69–​70 Morães, Manuel de 100 Morais de Madeira Feijó, João de 69

161 Nadal, Jerónimo 81 Nobili, Roberto de 81, 84–​85 Nóbrega, Manuel da 53, 56, 57n–​58 Nunes Freires, João 69 Nunes, Leonardo 53n Pereira, Bento 69 Pétau, Denis 70 Polanco, Juan 82, 90 Possevino, Antonio 145 Ramos, Domingos 70 Ricci, Matteo 81 Riccioli, Giovanni 144 Rodrigues, Pero 68n Rodrigues, Simão 104 Rodrigues, Vicente 53n–​54 Sforza Pallavicino, Francesco Maria 70 Soares, José 69 Soares Lusitano, Francisco 69 Stansel, Valentin 71 Suárez, Francisco 70 Teles, Baltasar 69 Vale, Leonardo do 56n Valignano, Alessandro 83, 101 Vieira, Antônio 56, 61–​63, 70, 72, 74 Xavier, Francis 49, 80n, 83n, 86–​94, 96–​97, 99–​104, 106 Jesuit missions 48, 50, 52 Lusitanian Assistancy 48, 51n–​52 Mission of Maranhão 48, 61, 63n Provinvia Brasiliae 48, 51n, 56, 62n Provincia Maragnonensis 48 Jesuit pedagogy, spirituality, and regulation  Constitutions 57–​58, 61, 79–​81, 89n, 93, 96 Latin, teaching of 60, 69, 127 Philosophy, teaching of  58, 60, 62, 68–​69, 110 Ratio Studiorum 57, 60–​61, 68–​69, 79, 142 Regula pro scholaribus Societatis 81 Rhetoric, teaching of 60, 80, 82–​84, 93, 97, 123, 127 Spiritual Exercises 89, 113 Theology, teaching of 58, 60 Tamil, Indian language, teaching and learning 88, 93–​95, 106 Tupi, Brazilian language, teaching and learning 56n, 62–​63 Jesuit Restoration 126

162 Index Jesuit schools  abc houses (casas de bê-​a-​bá) 54–​55, 57n–​58, 67–​68, 73 College and Seminary of São Paulo do Piratininga (Colégio de São Paulo do Piratininga; after 1653, Colégio de Santo Inácio; from 1757, also Seminário de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil) 66n–​67, 72 College of Bahia (Brazil). See Royal College and Novitiate of Bahia College of Coimbra (Real Colégio das Artes de Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal) 60, 70, 87, 90–​91, 143 College of Évora (Colégio de Évora, Évora, Portugal) 68, 70–​71 College of Goa (India) 92 College of Luanda (Colégio de Luanda,Luanda, Angola) 63 College of Messina (Italy) 79 College of Our Lady of Light (Colégio de NossaSenhora da Luz; before 1670, Residência de São Luís, São Luís do Maranhão, Brazil) 67, 69, 71 College of Our Lady of Solitude (ColégioNossaSenhora da Soledade, Salvador,Brazil) 66n College of Paranaguá (Colégio do Paranaguá, Paranaguá, Brazil) 68 College of Parma 144 College of Saint Alexandre (Colégio de Santo Alexandre, Belém do Pará, Brazil) 67 College of Saint Ignatius, Brazil. See College and Seminary of São Paulo do Piratininga College of Saint Jacob (Colégio de São Tiago, Espírito Santo, Brazil) 67 College of Saint Michael (Colégio de São Miguel, Santos, Brazil) 67, 72 College of Saint Paul (India) 88 College of Salvador (Brazil). See Royal College and Novitiate of Bahia College of Santa Fé (India) 91 College of Santo Antão (Colégio de Santo Antão, Lisboa, Portugal) 68, 71 College of São Vicente (Colégio de São Vicente, São Vicente, Brazil) 59, 72 Novitiate of Bahia, Brazil. See Royal College and Novitiate of Bahia

Novitiate of Our Lady of Annunciation (Noviciado de Nossa Senhora da Anunciada, Giquitaia, Brazil) 61n Residence (Hospice) of Tapuitapera (Hospício de Tapuitapera, Alcântara, Brazil) 64–​65, 66n Residence (Hospice) of Paraíba (Hospício da Paraíba, João Pessoa, Brazil) 66n Residence (Hospice) of Ceará (Real Hospício do Ceará, Aquiraz, Brazil) 66n Residence of São Luís, Brazil. See College of Our Lady of Light Residence of the Savior (Residência do Salvador, Porto Seguro, Brazil) 66n Residence of Vigia (Residência de Vigia, Vigia de Nazaré, Brazil) 66n Retreat of Maranhão (Recolhimento do Maranhão, São Luís do Maranhão, Brazil) 66n Roman College (Collegio Romano, Italy) 50n, 51n, 68, 143 Royal College and Novitiate of Bahia (Real Colégio da Bahia or Colégio de Salvador; until 1728, also Noviciado da Bahia, Salvador de Bahia, Brazil) 59, 61–​63, 67, 69–​71 Royal College of Pernambuco (Real Colégio de Pernambuco; before the 18th century, Colégio de Nossa Senhora da Graça de Olinda, Olinda, Brazil) 67, 72 Royal College of Rio de Janeiro (Real Colégio do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) 67, 69 Royal College of the Village of Recife (Real Colégio da Vila do Recife, Recife, Brazil) 67, 72 Seminary of Aldeias Altas do Itapicuru, Brazil. See Seminary of Guanaré Seminary of Belém da Cachoeira (Seminário de Belém da Cachoeira, Cachoeira, Brazil) 66n, 72 Seminary of Guanaré (Seminário de Guanaré; later, Seminário de Aldeias Altas do Itapicuru, Itapicuru River in Maranhão, Brazil) 66n, 72 Seminary of Mariana (Seminário de Mariana, Mariana, Brazil) 66n

163

Index Jesuit schools (cont.) Seminary of Our Lady of Immaculate Conception (SeminárioMaior de NossaSenhora da Conceição, Salvador, Brazil) 66n Seminary of Our Lady of the Missions (Seminário de Nossa Senhora das Missões, Belém do Pará, Brazil) 66n Seminary of Saint Ursula (Seminário de Santa Úrsula, also Seminário de Simbaíba, Parnaíba, Brazil) 66n, 72 Seminary of São Luís (Seminário de São Luís, São Luís do Maranhão, Brazil) 66n Seminary of São Paulo, Brazil. See College and Seminary of São Paulo do Piratininga Kepler, Johannes 31 Kirkman, Andrew 32 Kollam 94 Kristeller, Paul 32, 35 Lagos, Frei Vicente de 86 La Mothe Le Vayer, François de 145 Lazius, Wolfgang 144 Leitão, Henrique 1 Leite, Serafim 53n, 55n–​56, 66–​68 Leopardi, Giacomo 126 Libya 118 Linda, Luca di 145 Lion 147 Lisbon 1, 3, 48, 55, 62n, 64, 68, 71, 150n College of Santo Antão. See Jesuit pedagogy and schools Lodi, Treaty of 25 Lombardy 11, 24, 120 London 17, 134–​135, 145, 147–​148 Louis xiv, king of France 145 Lourned, Damien 35 Louvain 38 University 38 Lucian of Samosata 123 Macau 2 Machaut, Guillaume de 36 Machiavelli, Niccolò 26 Macrobius 123, 138 Magellan, Ferdinand 124n, 149

Magellan, Strait of 117 Magini, Fabio 145 Mangani, Giorgio 122 Mantua 38 Maranhão and Grão-​Pará, State, Brazil 48, 51, 61, 65, 71–​72 Marino, Giovanni 25 Marino, Tommaso 25 Maritain, Jacques 31 Maryks, Robert 79 Massaio, Piero del 137 Mastri, Bartolomeo 70 Mathematics, teaching of 14, 16, 18, 20, 35 Mauretania 138 Maurolico, Francesco 142 Mazzolini, Silvestro 99 Medici, dynasty 22, 24n Mediterranean Sea 2, 138 Melanchthon, Philip 140, 143 Melis, Federico 16 Mercedarians, religious orders 50, 65 Messina 79, 142 Jesuit college. See Jesuit pedagogy and schools. Middleton, Richard 21n Milan 5, 11–​13, 19, 23–​25, 42, 127 Ambrosian Republic 19 Duchy of Milan 19–​20, 23 Spanish rule 19, 25 Moluccas, islands 115 Munich 134 Music, teaching of 32 Myconius, Oswald 143 Naples 38, 127 New Haven 147 New Spain 86 Nicholas v, Pope 36 Nile, river 115 Nivelles 38 Nombre de Dios, city in the current state of Panama 117 Noronha, Afonso de 92 Oceania, continent 150 Olinda, city in the current State of Pernambuco, Brazil 54, 67, 72 Ostiglia 120 Oxford 21n, 141

164 Index Pacioli, Luca 11, 16–​17, 20 Padua 36 University 36 Panama 117 Paraguay 62 Paraná 62 Paris 21n, 33, 36, 135, 142, 147–​148 Collège de Cornuailles 36 University 135 Parma 144 Jesuit college. See Jesuit schools Patagonia 153 Pavia 36 Pemble, William 141 Penyafort, Raymond 21n Perez, Filippo 148 Pernambuco, State, Brazil 67 Peru 117 Perugia 134, 138–​139 Pesaro 148 Philippines 132 Piarists, religious order 132 Pierozzi, Antonino 21n, 99 Pirenne, Henri 10 Pirovano, family 11, 24 Pliny the Elder 119, 131 Plutarch 123 Po-​chia Hsia, Ronnie 85 Pombal, Marquis of 74 Pomponius Mela 131 Ponce de la Fuente, Constantino 83n Po river 120 Portinari, Pigello 19–​20, 24–​25 Porto Seguro, city in the current State of Bahia, Brazil 66n, 67 Portugal 4, 49, 70, 132, 142–​144 Estado da India 84–​85, 97, 100 Pombaline Reforms 73 Portuguese overseas territories 5, 7, 47–​49, 51, 62, 74, 81 United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil, and the Algarves 48 Prague 144 Prosdocimus de Beldemandis 36 Protestant Reformation 3, 6, 140, 143 Ptolemy, Claudius 133–​138, 141, 150 Pythagoras 31 Quadrivium 7, 32, 132–​133, 136

Quintilian 41 Raimondi, Ezio 111 Recife, city in the current State of Pernambuco, Brazil 63n, 67, 72 Rhodes, island 17 Rio de Janeiro, city and captaincy in the current State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 61, 63n, 67, 69 Rome 57, 110, 122, 144 Roman College. See Jesuit pedagogy and schools Rudière, Ramier de 147 Sacrobosco, Giovanni. See Holywood, John Saint-​Omer, collegiate church 32 Salvador, city in the current State of Bahia, Brazil 53, 59, 61, 63n, 64n, 66n, 67, 68n, 70 Sampaio e Carvalho, Jorge 72 Sant’Eustorgio, basilica 20 Santos, city in the current State of São Paulo, Brazil 67, 72 Santo Antonio de Alcântara, village in the current State of Maranhão, Brazil 64–​65, 66n São Luís do Maranhão, city in the current State of Maranhão, Brazil 66n, 67, 69, 71 São Paulo do Piratininga, city in the current State of São Paulo, Brazil 54, 56–​57, 67, 72 São Vicente, capitancy and city in the current State of São Paulo, Brazil 54, 59n, 67, 72 Sauter, Michael 151 Schwarz, Matthäus 17 Sena Gomide, Ana Paula 84 Seneca 123 Seville 138 Sfortunati, Giovanni 17 Sforza, dynasty 19, 23 Francesco 20, 25 Galeazzo Maria 41 Socrates 115 Somascans, religious order 132 Souza, Tomé de 53 Spain 132, 142, 144 Spori, Armando 10

165

Index Sri Lanka 86 Strabo 131 Strathern, Alan 87 Tapuitapera, village in Brazil. See Santo Antonio de Alcântara Tartaglia, Niccolò 17 Tasso, Torquato 125 Teixeira Cesar, Layla Jorge 49 Terracina, Laura 18 Terra Incognita 116 Thevet, André 153 Tierra del Fuego 117 Tinctoris, Johannes 36, 38, 39 Travancore 100 Trecchi, family 24 Trivium 32, 135n, 144 Turin 127 Tuscany 137 Ulysses 114

Urban viii, Pope 72 Ursulines, religious order 66n Vaz Coutinho, Miguel 86–​87 Venice 127, 134, 145 Verini, Alessandro 11–​12, 14–​15, 17–​18, 22–​23, 26 Verini, Giovanni Battista 11–​12, 19, 23, 25–​26 Verini, school and manuals 12–​15, 19, 22–​23, 26 Vico, Giambattista 128 Vienna 143–​144 Visconti, dynasty 19, 37n Vittorino da Feltre 38 Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo 74n Vögelin, Johann 144 Wegman, Rob 40 Wittemberg, University 140, 143 Županov, Ines 84–​85, 87, 101–​102