In this era of great contradictions, characterized by the economic crisis, political instability, wars and migratory flows, Europe finds itself questioning itself profoundly about its own cultural identity. Isolationist visions of Europe clash with broader and more cosmopolitan ones. The complexity of European culture, its non-univocal nature, is reflected in the vast plurality of cultures and books from which it has been transmitted.
For this reason it was decided to give life to an exhibition that materially represents, through some fundamental works and the evolution of the book form - from the Carolingian reform to the Gutenberg revolution - the common historical-cultural path that led from classical culture and literature -Christian and Middle Latin to Romance and Modern literature and culture, and therefore to Western European culture.
Thus was born the exhibition The books that made Europe. Latin manuscripts and novels from Charlemagne to the invention of printing. Corsiniana and Roman libraries, curated by Roberto Antonelli, Michela Cecconi and Lorenzo Mainini, which will be open to the public from 31 March to 22 July 2016 in Rome at the Library of the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei and Corsiniana, organized by the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei and by the Department of European, American and Intercultural Studies of "Sapienza" University of Rome and conceived also in virtue of the XXVIII International Congress of Romance Linguistics and Philology to be held in Rome from 18 to 23 July 2016.
There are 180 manuscript-books presented (many of extraordinary importance), mostly from the Corsiniana Library of the Accademia dei Lincei and partly on loan from the other large Roman public libraries (Angelica, Casanatense, Nazionale, Vallicelliana), as well as from the exceptional collection of the Vatican Apostolic Library. Alongside the Latin manuscripts and romances, Greek, Arabic and Hebrew manuscripts will also be exhibited in the setting designed by SNA Susanna Nobili Architettura (Susanna Nobili, Allegra Albani and Fabrizio Furiassi).
The exhibition intends to place the plurality of books and cultures that have formed Europe at the center of attention, and offer the opportunity to make the cultural heritage of Rome's libraries known to young people and the wider public, above all through the books precisely, through the centuries, they "made Europe" and Europeans as they are today.
The manuscripts, incunabula and sixteenth-century manuscripts will be presented through 5 diachronic sections, further articulated within them (I. The classical-Christian tradition: Trivium; Quadrivium; Bible; Auctores; The Founding Fathers; II Towards the new European culture: Encyclopaedias; Treatises on science; III. The new European culture: Law; Aristotelianism; Hagiography and didactic literature; Historiography; Epic; Novel; Lyrics; Laudari and sacred representations; IV. The first canon: Dante; Petrarch; Boccaccio; V. Towards Modernity ). The exhibition is accompanied by texts, videos, maps and media material which help to place the works in their context and in their historical path.
