The Life and Legacy of Ferdinando I de’ Medici (Florence, 3 Feb 23)
The Medici Archive Project, Via dei Benci, 10, 50121 Florence (Italy),
Deadline: Dec 8, 2022
The Life and Legacy of Ferdinando I de’ Medici: Medici Prince (1549–1562), Cardinal (1562–1587), and Grand Duke of Tuscany (1587–1609).
The Medici Archive Project invites proposals for individual presentations on the life and reign of Ferdinando I de’ Medici. Published scholarship on Ferdinando has barely scratched the surface of a long and illustrious career inflected by the religious turmoil and shifting global alliances of the Reformation. This workshop seeks to re-examine the epistolary and visual record of Ferdinando’s public and private life; first as Duke Cosimo de’ Medici’s fifth born son, then as a prince of the church, and ultimately as Tuscany’s third grand duke.
Proposals for papers of no more than 20 minutes in length could address one or more of the following themes:
Ferdinando’s tenure as a cardinal in Rome;
Ferdinando’s patronage of literature, the visual arts, and architecture, both during his residence in Rome as a cardinal and as grand duke of Tuscany;
Ferdinando’s passion for hunting and curated collections of rare fauna, birds, and animalia;
The grand duke’s marriage, offspring, and dynastic strategies;
Christine of Lorraine, her regency and her legacy;
Livorno, Pisa, and Ferdinando’s foreign policy strategies and global interests;
Ferdinando’s political, economic and judicial administration of the Tuscan territory;
The relationship between Ferdinando and his father Grand Duke Cosimo I and his brother Francesco I de’ Medici; differences and similarities in their governance and policies;
Ferdinando’s relationship with the Habsburgs and other foreign courts;
The Florentine ghetto, slavery, and Ferdinando’s role in post-Tridentine religious politics.
The workshop organizers, Carla D’Arista and Oscar Schiavone, encourage the participation of international and early career scholars. Abstracts (250 words max.) and a short biography (150 words) should be submitted via email at: education@medici.org.
The deadline for proposals is 8 December 2022. Within approximately four weeks of this date, the workshop organizers will contact all those who have made submissions regarding their proposals. The workshop will take place in Florence at the Medici Archive Project headquarters on 3 February 2023.
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