Rom: bewunderte Vergangenheit - inszenierte Gegenwart

The present book entitled "Rom: bewunderte Vergangenheit - inszenierte Gegenwart. Die Stadt in literarischen Topographien der Renaissance" is dealing with (originally) Latin written and prose, i.e. historical-descriptive Rome descriptions of the 15th and 16th century. More precisely the focused period comprises the phase between the edition of the first thorough topography of Rome and the most significant representative in this field, Jean Jacques Boissard (1602). The work is divided into four respectively five bigger sections: On an introductory part, which is treating definition and development of the genre and its forerunners as well as intentions and communication purposes of the authors more extensively approached, two longer textual comparisons are following, for which those originally Latin- writing authors with their works were selected who may be compared with each other in form and content and who are repeatedly mentioned as benchmark within theoretical reflections on topography starting in the 17th century: exactly Flavio Biondo`s (De) Roma instaurata, Andrea Fulvio`s Antiquitates urbis, Giovanni Bartolomeo Marliano`s Urbis Romae Topographia und Jean Jacques Boissard`s Topographia Romanae Urbis. Criteria for the selection of texts were their contentual relevance corresponding to the time of their composition and their first reception, but also to the today`s reader`s interest: Thus the chapters introducing the topographies on the city`s foundation and its evolution are envisioning the significance of the tale of Romulus for the papacy newly reinvigorated in the 15th century and the related, deliberate demonstration of Rome continuously evolving from the ancient regal town to the "modern" papal residency, the thematically and topographically somewhat rounded parts on the Forum Romanum and Capitol however with specific distinctness the authors` and contemporary educated society`s archaeological and art historical interest; the Capitol, having become the urban political centre still in the Middle Ages, but, due to its ancient ascents starting from the Southeast, still orientated towards the ancient Rome plainly presented in the Forum and squalid in large parts, should be - not least through its restructuring - established as new centre of art opening up to the "modern" Rome: a transformation that also the presented texts are communicating. The today`s recipient, whether scientist or layman interested in Rome, may feel addressed by the texts out of various reasons, especially as they provide historical, archaeological, art and church historical as well as etymological informations and details on important areas investigated since antiquity. The textual comparisons presented in Latin and in German translation are affiliated by an evaluation each time observing linguistic and contentual differencies as well as the applied sources. In a further section analogies between the depiction of Rome in literature and cartography arising in that time respectively the criteria of fiction and reality applicable to each, what reveals that the texts dispose of the potential to "draw" a diachronic, though not consistently equally evaluated overall picture of Rome. A synopsis of city- shaping measurements adopted by the popes in those times, both protecting and destructing the monuments, finally induces the analysis of a possible manipulation of them or their architects by means of the various topographies; particularly what the above mentioned authors wrote about the Vatican`s monuments and its historical development throws a light upon the narrow interweaving between the educated class and papacy of that time as well as upon the content of propaganda the Rome descriptions implied and made useable for the catholic church. A specific, conclusive section on Wolf Dietrich`s Salzburg is dealing with a regional area on which the imperial ideology of Rome imitating classical antiquity showed immediate effects. In the see of the prince-archbishop called - even if only 100 years after Wolf Dietrich - "Rome of the North" the adoption of a city through an absolutist ruler impregnated by the spirit of Renaissance is reflected and allows to distinguish an acquaintance with the respective literature.