85520 - Christianity and Cultural Heritage

Learning outcomes

The aim of the course is to teach students how to adopt a critical approach to the main historical and cultural dynamics that influenced the origins and development of Christianity. From the first centuries of the Christian era onwards, the call to conversion meant that the Gospel had to be translated into all the languages of the world, thereby boosting levels of literacy and the contamination of different cultures. Between the Middle Ages and the early modern period, lively intellectual and institutional competition between the major urban centres in the Mediterranean took shape in unprecedented forms of dialogue and clashes between civilizations, which the contemporary world is still dealing with. Christianization affected the imaginary of the body, time, and space, moulded economies, societies, and political institutions, and transformed the production of art, books, and documents. At the end of the course, the student has the critical tools for understanding the decisive role played by Christianity in globalization processes

Course contents

The course focuses on one specific object of Christian cultural heritage: the book. The analysis of the Christian book is divided into two closely connected sections: firstly, its material forms, including manuscripts, libraries, and places of preservation; secondly, its conceptual content, with particular attention to what may be defined as the library of the Christian imaginary. This approach will provide an understanding of cultural heritage in its broad sense of memory, legacy, transmission, and self-representation.

The main questions addressed in the course are the following: how Christianity shaped its own books and libraries, and how Christianity shaped its own cultural memory and identity through books. In order to answer the first question, the book will be analysed from a material perspective, through the examination of crucial historical and technological transformations related to the spread of Christianity, such as the transition from the volumen to the codex. In order to answer the second question, Christian texts will be analysed as vectors of cultural memory, with a special focus on the translation of Christian texts from the early centuries to the Reformation and on the translation of the Bible into modern languages.

Translations will be approached not simply as linguistic operations, but as processes that convey entire cultural systems. The choice of certain concepts in the target language is never neutral: through translation, cultural categories are expressed — more or less consciously — by means of new terminology. Many of these categories concern the ways in which Christianity described the body, gesture, discipline, and forms of belonging to the Christian community. In this perspective, the course will also explore the regulatory dimension of Christianity, focusing on how norms, texts, and manuscripts contributed to defining the forms, times, and limits of Christian identity.

A central part of the course will be devoted to fieldwork, which is conceived not as a supplementary activity but as an essential methodological component. The study of Christian cultural heritage requires direct engagement with places, objects, manuscripts, monuments, and material traces of transmission. For this reason, the course will include two major field experiences.

The first will take place in Ravenna, where students will examine some of the most important early Christian and Byzantine monuments, including sites such as the Arian Baptistery and the Basilica of San Vitale. These monuments will be used to investigate how Christian doctrine, imperial power, visual language, liturgy, and sacred space interact in the construction of cultural memory. The mosaics and architectural spaces of Ravenna will allow students to reflect on the relationship between image and theology, between material heritage and religious identity, and between local history and broader Mediterranean connections.

The second fieldwork activity will take place at the Cathedral Library of Verona (Biblioteca Capitolare), one of the oldest surviving libraries of its kind. Students will have the opportunity to directly experience late antique and medieval manuscripts. Particular attention will be given to juridical and canonical manuscripts from the Middle Ages, through which students will explore how Christian communities regulated social life, authority, discipline, and belonging.

Through these fieldwork experiences, the course aims to connect classroom discussion with direct observation. Ravenna and Verona will function as two complementary laboratories: Ravenna as a laboratory for the study of monumental, visual, and liturgical heritage; Verona as a laboratory for the study of manuscript, textual, and normative heritage. Together, they will allow students to understand Christianity as a cultural system that produced books, images, spaces, institutions, and practices of memory.

Readings/Bibliography

Choose one of:

H. Y. Gamble, Books and Readers in the Early Church: A History of Early Christian Texts, New Haven – London, Yale University Press, 1995

A. Grafton – M. Williams, Christianity and the Transformation of the Book: Origen, Eusebius, and the Library of Caesarea, Cambridge, MA – London, Harvard University Press, 2006

A further reading list will be provided during the lectures and depending on the subject chosen by the students for the final paper (see the section below about Assessment methods).

Teaching methods

The traditional lecture format will be supported by the analysis of texts, images, manuscripts, monuments, and religious objects, which will be shown during classes and made available online to students through the Virtual Learning Environment on the university website. The online platform will also include sections on learning how to research and identify sources, with practical guidance on the use of academic databases, digital libraries, manuscript catalogues, and other research tools.

The course will also include fieldwork activities, conceived as an essential part of the learning process. Visits to the Christian monuments of Ravenna and to the Biblioteca Capitolare of Verona will allow students to connect classroom discussions with direct observation of mosaics, sacred spaces, manuscripts, canonical collections, and other material traces of Christian cultural heritage. These activities are intended to help students develop an integrated understanding of Christian heritage as both material and immaterial, textual and visual, institutional and lived.

At the beginning of the course, students will be asked to complete an introductory questionnaire on their background, interests, and previous knowledge. This will help tailor part of the teaching activity to the group’s profile and support students in identifying a suitable topic for the final paper.

Assessment methods

At least ten days before the oral examination, students are required to present a final paper (max 5000 words) on a topic defined together with the lecturer.

The evaluation of the paper will constitute the starting point for the oral examination that will assess:

- basic knowledge of the course program;

- the ability to understand the problems faced during the lectures;

- the ability to frame the sources examined in class in their context, and to discuss them critically;

- the quality of oral expression and the ability to construct a logical-argumentative type of speech.

For students attending the course: in addition to the discussion of the paper presented, the examination will check the knowledge acquired during the course.

For non-attending students: all those who cannot attend the course are required to agree their syllabus in advance by contacting the lecturer via email or during the office hours.

The final evaluation will follow these criteria:

- The ability of the student to achieve a coherent and comprehensive understanding of the topics addressed by the course, to critically assess them and to use an appropriate language will be evaluated with the highest grades (A = 27-30 con lode).

- A predominantly mnemonic acquisition of the course's contents together with gaps and deficiencies in terms of language, critical and/or logical skills will result in grades ranging from good (B = 24-26) to satisfactory (C = 21-23).

- A low level of knowledge of the course’s contents together with gaps and deficiencies in terms of language, critical and/or logical skills will be considered as ‘barely passing' (D = 18-20) or result in a fail grading (F).

Students may use AI tools responsibly as learning aids, for example for clarification, summarising, and self-assessment. The uncritical use of AI, as well as any use aimed at replacing personal study or producing work without independent critical engagement, is not allowed. In assessment activities, any substantial use of AI to produce the final paper without explicit acknowledgement and critical revision is prohibited and constitutes a violation of academic integrity.

Teaching tools

The main teaching support tools, which will be illustrated in class and on the Virtual course page, are available at the Campus Central Library (Palazzo Corradini) and at the website AlmaRe - the Library of Bibliographic and Documentary Electronic Resources of the University of Bologna.

Students with different abilities or Specific Learning Disorders (SLD), whether temporary or permanent, are encouraged to contact the relevant University office in due time. Any proposed adaptations must be submitted to the lecturer for approval in relation to the learning outcomes of the course.

Office hours

See the website of Donatella Tronca