The conference will explore the question of the relationship between events and the printing press from its advent around 1450 to about 1515. Beginning with the fall of Constantinople in 1453, the most diverse events were accompanied (and recorded) by printed and illustrated material. These ranged from calendars, papal bulls, indulgences and proclamations to publications of diplomatic writings, meetings and festivities. Information on natural disasters, miraculous phenomena, prognostications, pamphlets, war and pilgrimage reports also were printed, often in the form of broadsides and pamphlets, some of which were illustrated with woodcuts. The conference will explore how printed materials functioned as media, how they shaped the way events were perceived and interpreted, whether they gave meaning or distorted it, how they steered the course of events, and how the news market changed printing itself.
Comitato organizzatore
Fondazione Bruno Kessler – Trento
Matteo Fadini
Massimo Rospocher
Sandra Toffolo
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
Tobias Daniels
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milano
Edoardo Barbieri
Stefano Cassini
Luca Rivali
Segreteria organizzativa
supporto.direzioni@fbk.eu