BOOKS BY CINZIA CREMONINI

The central role of the city in European history has been studied from a vast number of perspectives using multiple methodologies. In the centuries of the old regime, the Spanish Monarchy relied heavily on its cities to govern and control its vast territories in Europe and in the New World. In the second half of the 17th century, the work by Alonso Nuñez de Castro, Solo Madrid es corte, enjoyed great success and was published in several editions. The analysis of this text (in light of the contemporary European political events, of the shifting power balance from the Spanish to the imperial branch of the Habsburg dynasty, and of the new needs related to the problem of the Spanish succession) allows us to suggest some hypotheses for the interpretation of concepts such as ‘composite monarchy’ and ‘polycentric monarchy’ that have recently characterized the historiographical debate.

Il contributo esamina alcuni dei testi presentati al Convegno di Vercelli e mette a confronto le caratteristiche dei feudi pontifici con quelle delle realtà feudali dipendenti dall’Impero. Dall’analisi emergono molte analogie, ad esempio sia i feudi pontifici sia quelli imperiali erano "enclaves semisovrane"; i vassalli papali come talvolta quelli imperiali spesso appartenevano a una "nobiltà di frontiera" perché immersi nelle dinamiche di territori a cavallo tra una sovranità e un’altra. Differenti invece appaiono le modalità di acquisizione del titolo feudale, molto più variegate nell’ambito della feudalità pontificia.

The period of transition between seventeenth and eighteenth century (1680-1720), culminated in the Spanish Succession War, represents an age of great changes all over the Continent; in the Italian mainland, centuries-old Spanish government came to an end and a new era began. This book, that collects benefits of an international workshop hold at Università Cattolica in Milan in 2013, wants contribute to throw light on an important and so far disregarded period of European History.