Pasquale Villari - Jérôme Savonarole et son temps - 1874

Pasquale Villari. Jerome Savonarola and His Time. Paris, Firmin-Didot, 1874, cxix-417 pp., 617 pp.

2 volumes in octavo (195x130 mm), half ivory vellum, black morocco title pieces, gilt top (bindings of the period). Fine bindings. Interior fresh, no foxing.

French edition translated from Italian by Gustave Gruyer, accompanied by a preface and a preliminary study followed by a selection of Savonarola's letters and poems.

Exemplar enriched with a translator’s inscription on the half-title page.

The Italian historian Pasquale Villari traces the life of Jerome Savonarola by placing it in the political, religious, and cultural context of Renaissance Italy. Relying on numerous unpublished documents, he analyzes the rise of the Dominican preacher, his influence on the Florentine Republic, his projects of moral and religious reform, and the conflicts that opposed him to the papacy and to the Medici. More than a simple biography, the work constitutes a history of Florence at the end of the 15th century and remains one of the first critical studies devoted to Savonarola.