Search

This article analyses Italian illustrated editions of Little Women published between 1908 and 1945. After an overview of the publishing history of the novel in Italy, the paper will examine Italian illustrations as hermeneutic tools in order to examine their ideological function in the representation of gender. The belated reception of Alcott's novel in Italy, caused by its representation of a nonconformist educational model for girls, is mirrored in the tension between the nationalistic drive and the influence of foreign models that can be pinpointed in the illustrated editions. By analyzing adaptations of American illustrations, original Italian creations, and omissions of iconic illustrations, this paper will unveil how much the visual element is embedded in the Italian historical and cultural context, as the choice (or omission) of particular images impacted the interpretation of the book. By examining the Italian editions of Little Women published in this time frame, we will also be able to retrace the links with the American illustrated history of the book and bear testimony to the powerful impact of the 1934 film version on printed editions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the history of stratigraphy, geological and mining travels, and their significance within the Italian context of Earth sciences. The article highlights six papers presented at the STRATI 2019 conference in Milan, which aim to investigate and compare the development of stratigraphy with other research fields in geology and mining. The papers cover various topics, including the meaning of stratigraphic studies in Italian mountain areas, the role of mining and visual culture in Earth sciences, and the results of fieldwork undertaken by Italian geologists during extra-European travels. The article emphasizes the importance of these papers in reassessing the research on the history of stratigraphy and promoting interdisciplinary approaches within the historiography of Earth sciences. [Extracted from the article]

This paper aims to analyze the role of natural heritage cataloging when criminal events challenge natural history museums. This study investigates the rhino horn thefts in Italian natural history museums from 2011 to 2015 to provide a comprehensive framework for these robberies while highlighting the weaknesses and strengths to prevent thefts and safeguard both rhino horns and natural history collections from future targeting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The introduction of synthetic dyes completely changed the industrial production and use of colorants for art materials. From the synthesis of the first synthetic dye, mauveine, in 1856 until today, artists have enjoyed a wider range of colors and selection of chemical properties than was ever available before. However, the introduction of synthetic dyes introduced a wider variety and increased the complexity of the chemical structures of marketed dyes. This work looks towards the analysis of synthetically dyed objects in heritage collections, applying an extraction protocol based on the use of ammonia, which is considered favorable for natural anthraquinone dyes but has never before been applied to acid synthetic dyes. This work also presents an innovative cleanup step based on the use of an ion pair dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction for the purification and preconcentration of historical synthetic dyes before analysis. This approach was adapted from food science analysis and is applied to synthetic dyes in heritage science for the first time in this paper. The results showed adequate recovery of analytes and allowed for the ammonia-based extraction method to be applied successfully to 15 samples of suspected azo dyes from the Azienda Coloranti Nazionali e Affini (ACNA) synthetic dye collection, identified through untargeted HPLC-HRMS analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the 16th century, Ovid's Metamorphoses was the object of several translations and rewritings, either of single books or the whole Latin poem, which were often accompanied by valuable illustrative sets. This paper examines the different versions of Pluto's abduction of Proserpina as described in the main Italian translations of Ovid's Metamorphoses printed in the 16th century (Agostini, Dolce, Anguillara). My primary focus is on the illustrative sets which are essential to understanding to the transmission of classical mythology between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. On the one hand, the article aims to understand the artists' choices of which elements of the story to illustrate, and the relationship between the text and the images. On the other hand, my purpose is to situate these versions of the myth of Proserpina in both the literary and artistic history of the Italian Renaissance, by comparing the rewritings of Ovid's Metamorphoses with other broadly contemporary works. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The latest reorganization of the Vertebrate collections preserved at the "Pietro Doderlein" Museum of Zoology of the University of Palermo (Italy) has made it possible to draw up a check-list of the Mammal taxa present in the stuffed (M), fluid-preserved (ML) and anatomical (AN) collections. The intervention was planned under the National Biodiversity Future Center (NBFC) agenda, focused on the enhancement of Italian natural history museums. The growing interest in museum collections strongly demands databases available to the academic and policy world. In this paper, we record 679 specimens belonging to 157 specific taxa arranged in 58 families and 16 orders. Most of the species (75.1%) come from the Palaearctic Region (southern Mediterranean and North Africa), with a minority of taxa coming from the Afrotropical (7.8%), Neotropical (4.6%), Indo-Malayan (3.4%) and Australasian (1%) regions. Among the 24% of the taxa listed in the IUCN categories as threatened (VU, EN, CR, RE) the specimens of the Sicilian wolf, a regional endemic subspecies that became extinct in the last century, stand out. Even if small (<1000 specimens), the collection of mammals of the Museum of Zoology is an important asset for research on biodiversity in the Mediterranean area, representing an international reference for those wishing to conduct morphological and genetic studies in this area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Il Capitale Culturale: Studies on the Value of Cultural Heritage is the property of Il Capitale Culturale Studies on the Value of Cultural Heritage and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

We reply to the comments made by Benvenuti et al. (2022) about our paper on the Italian natural history museums and scientific collections and the need of a centralized hub and repository. While agreeing that digitization is a useful tool to valorize each museum and collection, we still believe that the suggestion of a centralized hub is valid and necessary. This would largely help in boosting coordination among museums, sharing personnel and resources, and in providing a place to deposit scientific collections that do not fit the scope of smaller museums. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Ricerche di Pedagogia e Didattica is the property of Universita di Bologna, Dipartimento di Scienze dell'Educazione and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Natural history museums are irreplaceable tools to study and preserve the biological diversity around the globe and among the primary actors in the recognition of species and the logical repositories for their type specimens. In this paper we surveyed the consistency of the preserved specimens of amphibians and reptiles housed in the major Italian scientific collections, and verified the presence of threatened species according to the IUCN Red List, including the Extinct (EX), Extinct in the Wild (EW), Critically Endangered (CR), Endangered (EN), and Vulnerable (VU) categories. Altogether, we analyzed 39 Italian zoological collections. We confirmed the presence of one extinct reptile (Chioninia coctei) and five extinct or extinct in the wild amphibian species (Atelopus longirostris, Nectophrynoides asperginis, Pseudophilautus leucorhinus, P. nasutus, and P. variabilis). Seven CR amphibians, fourteen CR reptile species and the extinct skink C. coctei are shared by more than one institution. Museums which host the highest number of threatened and extinct amphibian species are respectively Turin (17 CR and 1 EX), Florence (13 CR and 1 EX), and Trento (15 CR and 1 EW), while for reptiles the richest museums are those from Genoa (15 CR and 1 EX), Florence (11 CR and 1 EX), and Pisa (7 CR). Finally, we discussed the utility of natural history museums and the strategies to follow for the implementation of their functionality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article critically assesses Italian scholarship on the history of witchcraft over the last 60 years. Beginning with Carlo Ginzburg's influential Night Battles (published in 1966 and translated to English in 1983) and ending with the recent work of Matteo Duni, Tamar Herzig, Vincenzo Lavenia and Louise Nyholm Kallestrup, the article traces the intellectual contexts and shifts in historiographical debates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Historia y Memoria de la Educación is the property of Historia y Memoria de la Educacion and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Alien species are species that are introduced into an area where they are not naturally present. Some of them may exert negative ecological impacts, thus being defined as invasive. The aoudad or Barbary sheep Ammotragus lervia is a north-African ungulate commercialised and introduced for game hunting to Europe, South Africa, and America. As a generalist herbivore, the aoudad has a high capacity to adapt to new habitat conditions, possibly representing a threat to local biodiversity. We studied the aoudad population present in the Beigua Natural Regional Park in Liguria, northwestern Italy. By using historical data and camera trapping data, we reconstructed the colonization process and current distribution, estimated minimum abundance, assessed population trends over the years, and investigated habitat selection and activity rhythms. Aoudads most likely escaped from a game reserve in Ponzone Municipality, Piedmont, and settled in the park at least since 2009. The minimum number alive doubled in 10 years, from 9 to 23, and the population shows an increasing trend. Aoudads showed a preference for steep, rocky and woody areas in the southern and warmer part of the Beigua massif, especially at intermediate elevations. Some observations have recently occurred in the northern part of the Park, potentially due to geographical expansion. Aoudads show mostly diurnal activity, unlike native ungulates such as roe deer Capreolus capreolus and wild boar Sus scrofa which were most active at dawn, dusk and during the night, possibly reflecting anti-predator behaviour towards wolf Canis lupus. Our results are in line with other studies, though births occurred across a wider period of time compared with native populations. As the potential ecological impacts of this alien species in the study area have never been investigated, it will be important to monitor the population and evaluate its ecological effects to provide the most appropriate management solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the fatal grip of the Covid-19 pandemic started to ease, in summer 2022 Italy underwent seismic political developments, which saw the establishment of the first totally populist radical right government in Italian history. On 25 September 2022, the general elections shook up the Italian political scene, with Fratelli d'Italia (FdI) scoring a resounding victory that earned the party the seat of the Prime Minister. Despite fears of a radicalisation of FdI resulting in a neofascist government, evidence points in a different direction. Therefore, the aim of this article is to investigate whether, in the first 100 days in government, FdI moderated, radicalised, or displayed continuity with its trademark ideology and manifesto pledges. While acknowledging the copious amount of bills, decrees, and laws proposed by the governing coalition, as well as a plethora of speeches they released, in the interest of space, the scope of this article is circumscribed to the analysis of the new executive, with a special emphasis on FdI, in the timeframe between the election results and the first 100 days of the new government. Considering this evidence, this article argues that FdI is definitely acting as a populist radical right party, tilted towards moderation, and, mostly, continuity with the 2022 electoral pledges, albeit with some oscillations to radicalisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the Risorgimento (1800–61), southern Italy was less industrial than central‐northern Italy and initially agricultural provinces in the north saw rapid structural transformation. During the Renaissance (1400–1600), structural transformation in the south led to a near halving of the initial difference in agricultural employment share between the centre‐north and the south, but convergence came to a halt with the 'seventeenth‐century crisis'. These trends suggest that regional inequality was evolving rather than persistent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reviews the history of Snia Viscosa and its moves into the production of staple fibres and cellulose (as well as allied chemicals) between 1933 and 1970. This is a neglected but crucial episode in the business as well as industrial history of Italy and feeds into a variety of debates, most notably the nature and impact of autarky. This article confirms that autarky stimulated innovation via scale economies rather than a demand-induced effect. It also seems to show that, while redistributing resources also towards giant firms not directly involved in the war effort, autarky led to an overexpansion of technologies which were overtaken by wholly synthetic fibres, in the production of which Snia Viscosa lagged behind. One strength of the article lies in its extensive sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sinkholes are a widespread geological hazard, typical of karst lands, where they generally originate as collapse features related to presence of underground voids. Nevertheless, other types of sinkholes can be formed through solution, suffusion and sagging processes. Sinkholes can also be originated in relation to artificial cavities, excavated by man in past times. In Italy, sinkholes interest large sectors of the country, given the very long history of Italy with an intense utilization of the underground. They cause serious damage to infrastructures, economic activities, and human health every year. We present a catalogue on natural and anthropogenic sinkholes in Italy, as the first step toward evaluation of the sinkhole hazard. After introducing sinkholes, which is definitely a highly underrated type of disaster in Italy, we point out their occurrence in the country. We illustrate the methodology used to build the database, with particular focus on accuracy and reliability of the data. Collecting information from different types of sources, a catalogue of some 1190 sinkhole events is built. Database structure and data analysis are then illustrated. Eventually, we draw some conclusions on the likely uses of our work by providing recommendations for environmental management on this very delicate issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay examines how early moderns used birth horoscopes (genitures) to assess the compatibility of prospective spouses before marriage. Astrologers could probe the horoscope of an individual to investigate his or her present and future physical and moral qualities or compare charts to reveal the personal compatibility of a couple and help establish the best time to consummate their marriage. These practices aimed at ensuring a fruitful marriage and the harmony and happiness of the couple and their families. Focusing on a few key examples, the essay outlines both the astrological theories and the social politics that propelled astrological matching, suggesting that its appeal lay in the promise of informed choice while also preserving free will. Finally, the author suggests ways in which astrological practices and the use of vast amounts of astronomical data share affinities with data-driven matching in our own time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Definition: Frederick III of Aragon, King of Sicily (1296-1337). Frederick III of Aragon was the third king of the Aragonese dynasty on the throne of Sicily. He ruled from 1296 to 1337 and he was the only Aragonese king of Sicily who made a significant use of his image. In particular, we have four official (namely, commissioned directly by him or his entourage) representations of him: the royal seal, the billon silver denaro coin, the lost mosaic from the Church of Santa Maria della Valle (known as Badiazza) near Messina, and the mosaic in the Cathedral of Messina. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides the first harmonized quantitative evidence on the rise of mass education across the provinces (today's NUTS 3) of Italy and Spain in the period c. 1861–1921. Visual analysis of this new dataset suggests that an important factor linked to the expansion of schooling was the feminization of the teaching profession, something that has been largely neglected so far in quantitative historical studies of educational development. This hypothesis is put to the test using panel‐data models. The results show that the feminization of teaching went hand in hand with the rise of schooling rates by prompting more girls to enrol into primary education. By the beginning of the twentieth century, Italy's gross enrolment rate had surpassed that of Spain—partly as the result of increasing feminization within the primary‐school teaching profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]