«Piccola, ma sufficiente per li miei studi»: the library of Cardinal Roberto Bellarmino. First investigations and census of annotated books

Abstract

The article presents the first results of a research about the library of the Jesuit Cardinal Roberto Bellarmino (1542-1621). The starting point are some unpublished works dedicated to this topic compiled by two Jesuit scholars in the first half of ‘ 900: François Xavier Le Bachelet and Sebastian Tromp. In particular, Tromp’s work had concerned the identification of the editions cited in the library inventory, without however proceeding with the identification of the items actually belonging to the cardinal, today mainly preserved at the National Central Library of Rome and the Historical Archive of the Pontifical Gregorian University. In addition to providing a first analysis of the composition of the Bellarminian collection, the article examines the events related to its conservation at the Roman College, to which Bellarmino donated it after his death and where on several occasions it was subject to spoliations – even if today it is difficult to evaluate their extent. These episodes testify to the problematic intellectual legacy left by Bellarmino and how it influenced not only his long process of canonization (which lasted three centuries) but also the conservation of his books. In the appendix, the inventory of the library is published for the first time, as well as a catalog of 122 books with the provenance note of the Bellarmine’s private collection and, in several cases, containing his autograph annotations.

Keywords

• roberto bellarmino
• sebastian tromp
• roman college
• library history