Pope Benedict XIV Lambertini (r. 1740-58) was one of the driving forces behind the Italian Enlightenment of the eighteenth century. His campaign to reconcile faith and empirical science, re-launch a dialogue between the Church and the European intellectual community, and expand papal patronage of the arts and sciences helped restore Italy's position as a center of intellectual and artistic innovation.

Benedict XIV and the Enlightenment offers a broad and nuanced assessment of Benedict's engagement with Enlightenment art, science, spirituality, and culture. The collection's essays, written by international experts in the field, cover topics ranging from Benedict's revisions to the Church's procedures for beatification and sanctification to his patronage of women scientists and mathematicians at the university in Bologna, his birthplace.

"Benedict XIV and the Enlightenment is a superb collection of essays. The Benedict XIV that emerges from its pages is a nuanced and fascinating figure of the Catholic enlightenment, a man who was both idealistic and pragmatic, rigorously logical yet at times contradictory in his views on the world around him and the Church's role in it." -- Catherine Sama, Professor of Italian, University of Rhode Island "Collectively, these wonderful essays frame the outline of a new, more humanized portrait of an early modern pope whose career, actions, personality, and values deserve still more study." -- William V. Hudon, Professor of History, Bloomsburg University

About the Author
Rebecca Messbarger is a professor in the Department of Romance Languages at Washington University in St. Louis. Christopher M.S. Johns is a professor in the Department of History of Art at Vanderbilt University. Philip Gavitt is a professor in the Department of History at Saint Louis University.

Reviews

'Accompanied by a wonderful set of colour plates, this book remarkably succeeds in its attempt to read the ambiguities and nuances of the "Catholic Enlightenment" through the figure of Benedict XIV. Historians of science will find an abundance of materials to work on the relationships between Catholicism and the science on a global scale in the early modern period.'

-- Paolo Savoia * Metascience 24 October 2016 *

"This collection of eighteen articles offers undoubtedly the most comprehensive reappraisal of the pontificate of Prospero Lambertini, who became Benedict XIV (ruling from 1740 to 1758), that is currently available in English."

-- Simon Ditchfield, University of York * University of Toronto Quarterly, vol 87 3, Summer 2018 *



Book Information
ISBN 9781442637184
Author Rebecca Messbarger
Format Hardback
Page Count 536
Imprint University of Toronto Press
Publisher University of Toronto Press
Weight(grams) 900g
Dimensions(mm) 235mm * 159mm * 25mm