Transalpine Travellers and Friendly Affairs: Alba Amicorum in Early Modern Italy, ca. 1550-1700

My project offers the first investigation of the presence of Northern-European alba amicorum in early
modern Italy, mapping networks of travellers, artists, and artisans in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. This highly interdisciplinary study, combining approaches from book-, art-, and cultural history
as well as early modern mobility studies, demonstrates how alba both facilitated and reflected a
transregional expansion of social networks. Widening the geographical scope of existing scholarship, my
research will illuminate the yet-unexplored Italian response to this foreign market demand.
Alba amicorum were notebooks used to collect dedications (e.g. illustrations, mottoes, heraldic crests)
from friends, acquaintances, and notable figures. While particularly popular among Northern-European
students, alba often travelled across Europe through private and academic tours, thus witnessing various
localities and cultures. As many alba show, travels to Italy were especially common. However, the
evidence of Italy in northern alba contrasts with the lack of popularity enjoyed by the practice in the
peninsula itself. My project is the first to review this disparity and explore the interactions that followed
from the foreign use of alba in Italy. Expanding current scholarship, which focuses on the genre in its
German and Netherlandish contexts and so has overlooked the prevalence of Italian contributions, this
project will answer the question: to what extent and in what manner were Northern-European alba
amicorum used and produced in early modern Italy?
Though Nevinson and Welch have suggested that album illustrations were acquired in Italian shops and
markets 'just as one might buy a set of coloured postcards' (Nevinson 1979: 169), serving as 'evidence
that the album's owner had been to Italy' (Welch 2005: 59), the production and collection of these
images have never been studied in depth. Furthermore, since the genre's 'most important characteristic
is that it records encounters and the networks behind those encounters' (Reinders 2016: 150), tracking
these networks and reconstructing the hubs and structures behind album production in Italy will pioneer
a significantly better understanding of the genre. Moreover, by investigating the role of women, I build
on, and expand, Reinders' previous research.
I have already identified over 80 relevant alba in international libraries, archives, and museums (most
notably the British Library (London, M4C partner), Koninklijke Bibliotheek (The Hague), and Herzogin
Anna Amalia Bibliothek (Weimar)). I shall bolster my analyses with complementary primary sources (e.g.
travel accounts, shop/workshop inventories, university matriculation lists). Upon completion, I aspire to
present my findings to a larger public in a physical and/or digital exhibition. In sum, by exploring the
presence of Italy within alba amicorum and the presence of alba in Italy, this project addresses a
considerable gap in current literature. Overall, connecting this tradition to today's social media, this PhD
explores how and why we construct, share, and remember social networks.