Italian Studies Chair Publishes Book on Church Historian

The first layperson to write a history of the Catholic Church, Donato Giannotti, is now the subject of an international volume covering the full range of his multifaceted career. Professor William Connell, holder of the La Motta Endowed Chair in Italian Studies, together with Helene Soldini, a professor at the University of Lyon 3 in France, has published a 425-page volume of essays by 15 scholars, written in French, English and Italian, that treat Giannotti as secretary of the Florentine Republic, political theorist, diplomat, playwright, classical scholar and ecclesiastical historian. Giannotti has long been famous for his books on the republics of Venice and Florence, while his history of the Church was only recently discovered in manuscript by Professor Connell, who published it in a critical edition in Italian that was widely reported in Italian newspapers. At the request of a prominent cardinal in 1541, Giannotti compared the surviving sources and wrote a history beginning with Christ and St. Peter that concluded with a proposal that the Church of his own day be governed as a republic: bishops would be elected by the people and clergy of their dioceses; administrative power would be exercised by the College of Cardinals; and the pope would become a ceremonial figure.

His history remained in manuscript—to publish it would have been dangerous—and in his old age the author admitted the plan would have been impractical, but his historical work was solid and his reform ideas did become part of Catholic debate as the Church reorganized itself in response to the Protestant Reformation. Giannotti's other books were quite influential, for they described how republican governments functioned in practice, thus influencing English and American writers of later centuries. The new book is published by Classiques Garnier of Paris.

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