Journal |
Venezia Arti
Monographic journal issue | 29 | 2020
Research Article | The Gelati Academy, the Gessi Family and Edgar Allan Poe
The Gelati Academy, the Gessi Family and Edgar Allan Poe
Abstract
The article tries to exemplify the possible work of research and contextualization one can make on an isolated and not immediately understandable source: in this specific case, an encrypted ownership mark put on a sixteenth-century printed book. Starting with mark deciphering, the work reconstructs the writers’ biographic deeds, their social position and the cultural milieu in which they acted, trying to look both at the little-known mentality of a family from little Bolognese nobility between sixteenth and seventeenth century, and at the possible social spread (in a period thought to be characterised by conformism and mind control) of cultural elements bound to hermeticism, neoplatonism, qabalah, alchemy, magic, heterodoxy; a spread which was promoted by some academies and religious orders.
Submitted: July 9, 2020 | Accepted: July 29, 2020 | Published Dec. 11, 2020 | Language: it
Keywords Neoplatonism • Bologna, gentry (XVI-XVII cent • Bologna, accademia dei Gelati • Ownership marks • ) • Cryptography
Copyright © 2020 Andrea Gardi. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
Permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/VA/2385-2720/2020/01/002
