How was the Bologna of Francesco Petrarca and Ezio Raimondi?

The Literary Walks, organised by the Department of Classical Philology and Italian Studies (FICLIT) of the University of Bologna, aim to strengthen the bond between the city of Bologna and its citizens through the discovery of an often-overlooked part of its history. The first edition – scheduled for Saturday 21 and 28 September and Saturday 12 and 19 October – will focus on the city of Bologna as seen by Francesco Petrarca (in the 650th anniversary of his death) and Ezio Raimondi (whose centenary celebrations are currently underway).

The four events were arranged thanks to the participation of the most important museum and library institutions of the city and will guide participants through the most iconic places in the life of the two writers. The journey will explore Petrarca’s life as student in Bologna, and that of Raimondi as both a student and Petrarca’s scholar.

These events will provide an opportunity for the citizens to view works of art, documents, manuscripts, prints and photographs that are rarely shown to the public and tell the history of an ancient Bologna through the voices of Petrarca and Raimondi, in the hope that this can represent a source of social and cultural enrichment.

The walks will begin at the Medieval Museum, where participants can explore the 14th-century Bologna, the city lived and described by Petrarca, and view the most important artistic and monumental works bearing traces of this great poet, such as the monumental tombs of the doctors of the Bolognese Study and especially of Giovanni d’Andrea, who had been Petrarca’s teacher in his early years, and whose monumental tomb represents a true masterpiece of the Bolognese sculpture of the mid-14th Century. The second stop will be the University Library, which will feature an exhibition of Petrarcan manuscripts and prints emblematic of his relationship with the city of Bologna.

The tour will conclude with a visit to the ‘Ezio Raimondi’ Humanities Library, providing the opportunity to explore Raimondi’s early years, which he spent in a city that was both different and similar to the one described by Petrarca, to whom Raimondi dedicated fundamental works from the beginning of his career. Participants will admire the most significant materials preserved in the Fondo Raimondi, showcasing the young student’s engagement with Petrarca, including the books he owned, read, annotated, and the volumes he wrote, dedicated to other notable figures of the University of Bologna.

The tour will include a unified narrative curated by young researchers from the FICLIT Department, which will leave plenty of space to the words of Petrarca and Raimondi, featuring their most significant excerpts. This will shed light on what the city of Bologna has meant to Petrarca and what it left in him, but also on what the writer has meant for the city, in a fruitful exchange that is, in many ways, at the core of the modern Italian literary culture. At the same time, the narrative will explore the impact that the poet has had on the Bolognese intellectual scene of the 20th Century by resorting to Ezio Raimondi’s most famous pages.