Church, Censorship and Culture in Early Modern Italy

This book covers one of the most controversial subjects in Italian historiography, namely the success or failure of the Church's policy during the counter-Reformation to exert rigorous control not only over theology but over all branches of knowledge. By drawing extensively upon newly-opened sources in the archive of the former Congregation of the Holy Office, generally known as the "Inquisition", it affords a more articulated and objective assessment of the effects of ecclesiastical censorship on religion and culture in early modern Italy.