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Italian Studies
Jewish Studies September 30, 2023

Living Under the Evil Pope

The Hebrew Chronicle of Pope Paul IV by Benjamin Neḥemiah Ben Elnathan from Civitanova Marche (16th Cent.)

Martina Mampieri

Hosted by Ari Barbalat
In Living under the Evil Pope (Brill, 2019), Martina Mampieri presents the Hebrew Chronicle of Pope Paul IV, written in the second half of the sixteenth century by the Italian …

Italian Studies

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Interviews with scholars of Italy about their new books.

Biblical Studies September 26, 2023

Roman Self-Representation and the Lukan Kingdom of God

Michael Kochenash

Hosted by Rob Heaton
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Michael Kochenash published his revised dissertation from Claremont School of Theology as Roman Self-Representation and the Lukan Kingdom of God (Lexington Books/Fortress Academic) in 2020. A student of Dennis R …
Early Modern History September 13, 2023

Defining Nature's Limits

The Roman Inquisition and the Boundaries of Science

Neil Tarrant

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
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Neil Tarrant challenges conventional thinking by looking at the longer history of censorship, considering a five-hundred-year continuity of goals and methods stretching from the late eleventh century to well into …
Ancient History September 10, 2023

Vergil

The Poet's Life

Sarah Ruden

Hosted by Benjamin Phillips
The Aeneid stands as a towering work of Classical Roman literature and a gripping dramatization of the best and worst of human nature. In the process of creating this epic …
Intellectual History September 9, 2023

Christian Intellectuals and the Roman Empire

From Justin Martyr to Origen

Jared Secord

Hosted by Benjamin Phillips
Early in the third century, a small group of Greek Christians began to gain prominence and legitimacy as intellectuals in the Roman Empire. Examining the relationship that these thinkers had …
Music August 31, 2023

Voice Machines

The Castrato, the Cat Piano, and Other Strange Sounds

Bonnie Gordon

Hosted by Nathan Smith
Italian courts and churches began employing castrato singers in the late sixteenth century. By the eighteenth century, the singers occupied a celebrity status on the operatic stage. Constructed through surgical …
General History August 27, 2023

Why Empires Fall

Rome, America, and the Future of the West

Peter Heather and John Rapley

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
Over the last three centuries, the West rose to dominate the planet. Then, around the start of the new millennium, history took a dramatic turn. Faced with economic stagnation and …
Jewish Studies August 26, 2023

The Specter of the Jews

Emperor Julian and the Rhetoric of Ethnicity in Syrian Antioch

Ari Finkelstein

Hosted by Ari Barbalat
In the generation after Constantine the Great elevated Christianity to a dominant position in the Roman Empire, his nephew, the Emperor Julian, sought to reinstate the old gods to their …
European Politics August 20, 2023

Mussolini's Grandchildren

Fascism in Contemporary Italy

David Broder

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
The fastest-rising force in Italian politics is Giorgia Meloni's Fratelli d'Italia - a party with a direct genealogy from Mussolini's regime. Surging to prominence in recent years, it has waged …
History Ex Silo August 14, 2023

Toward a More Expansive View of Medieval Europe

Kyivan Rus and Norman Salerno in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries

Christian Raffensperger and Joanna Drell

Hosted by Stephen Bittner
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Focusing on gender relations, family formation, and marriage patterns in areas peripheral to the England, France, and the Holy Roman Empire, Christian Raffensperger and Joanna Drell argue for a more …
Jewish Studies July 15, 2023

Jews in Southern Tuscany During the Holocaust

Ambiguous Refuge

Judith Roumani

Hosted by Ari Barbalat
The province of Grosseto in southern Tuscany shows two extremes in the treatment of Italian and foreign Jews during the Holocaust. To the east of the province, the Jews of …
Italian Studies July 13, 2023

Citizens and Subjects of the Italian Colonies

Legal Constructions and Social Practices, 1882-1943

Simona Berhe and Olindo de Napoli

Hosted by Ari Barbalat
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Simona Berhe and Olindo de Napoli's Citizens and Subjects of the Italian Colonies: Legal Constructions and Social Practices, 1882-1943 (Routledge, 2021) is the first book on Italian colonialism that specifically …
Medieval History July 3, 2023

The Donkey and the Boat

Reinterpreting the Mediterranean Economy, 950-1180

Chris Wickham

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
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A new account of the Mediterranean economy in the 10th to 12th centuries, forcing readers to entirely rethink the underlying logic to medieval economic systems. Chris Wickham re-examines documentary and …
Christian Studies June 29, 2023

The Great Western Schism, 1378-1417

Performing Legitimacy, Performing Unity

Joëlle Rollo-Koster

Hosted by Morteza Hajizadeh
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The Great Schism divided Western Christianity between 1378 and 1417. Two popes and their courts occupied the see of St. Peter, one in Rome, and one in Avignon. Traditionally, this …
MIT Press Podcast June 20, 2023

The Eternal Letter

Two Millennia of the Classical Roman Capital

Paul Shaw

Hosted by MIT Press
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The fiftieth anniversary of Helvetica, the most famous of all sans serif typefaces, was celebrated with an excitement unusual in the staid world of typography and culminated in the release …
Jewish Studies June 18, 2023

Shadal on Numbers

Samuel David Luzzatto's Interpretation of the Book of Bemidbar

Daniel A. Klein

Hosted by Michael Morales
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Samuel David Luzzatto (1800-1865), known by his Hebrew acronym, Shadal, was the leading Italian Jewish scholar of the 19th century. Now, for the first time, an all-English version of Shadal's …
Jewish Studies May 27, 2023

The Shamama Case

Contesting Citizenship Across the Modern Mediterranean

Jessica M. Marglin

Hosted by Geraldine Gudefin
In the winter of 1873, Nissim Shamama, a wealthy Jew from Tunisia, died suddenly in his palazzo in Livorno, Italy. His passing initiated a fierce lawsuit over his large estate …
Early Modern History May 26, 2023

In Fortune's Theater

Financial Risk and the Future in Renaissance Italy

Nicholas Scott Baker

Hosted by Michael Martoccio
In this episode, I was joined by Nicholas Scott Baker to discuss his book, In Fortune’s Theater: Financial Risk and the Future in Renaissance Italy (Cambridge University Press, 2021). Professor …
General History May 23, 2023

Southern Europe in the Age of Revolutions

Maurizio Isabella

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
After the turbulent years of the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna’s attempt to guarantee peace and stability across Europe, a new revolutionary movement emerged in the southern peripheries …
Medieval History May 23, 2023

Rome and the Invention of the Papacy

The Liber Pontificalis

Rosamond McKitterick

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
The remarkable, and permanently influential, papal history known as the Liber pontificalis shaped perceptions and the memory of Rome, the popes, and the many-layered past of both city and papacy …