Arriving in all Italian bookstores on May 30, 2025, A European “Revolution”. Naples, Masaniello and the Republic of 1647-48 by Aurelio Musi, with which Colonnese inaugurates the new series “The Adventures of Clio”, directed by the author.
Contents
What was the 1647-48 revolt in the Kingdom of Naples? Not a pure explosion of popular anger, but one of the "six contemporary revolutions", as it was perceived in the 40s, together with the Catalan one, the Portuguese secession, the English revolution, the Sicilian uprisings, the French Fronde: all signs of a world "out of line". It was not a class war, even if there was no lack of economic-social pressures, and conflicts between the excluded and the castes of an ancien régime that was similar in almost all of Europe. Masaniello was not the only protagonist, even if in the first ten days he played an important role, uniting around the anti-tax, anti-noble and political objectives - equal representation in the government of the capital - the most structured popular classes and the common people. The revolt lasted almost a year, also spreading to the provinces of the Kingdom. It was crossed by ideas and political objectives spread throughout Europe and had internal and international repercussions: for the repercussions on the balance of the Spanish Empire, for the echoes in European relations, for the exceptional fortune of the myth of Masaniello. Certainly, Spain and Naples were no longer the same after 1647.
The new series
“Le avventure di Clio” is the new series directed by Aurelio Musi, with agile volumes, readable by the general public, to make Naples known, its millenary history, its characters as important protagonists not of a local, but European event, who have made an extraordinary contribution to its civilization. To courageously face the adventures of Clio, the Muse of History, bringing this form of knowledge - although open to perspectives and conceptual and methodological tools of other disciplines - back to the center of the interpretation of the new reality in which we live. Among the upcoming titles in the program, Miracolo a Mezzogiorno by Giulio Sodano and Servono le Regioni? by Isaia Sales and Pietro Spirito.
Aurelio Musi
He was a full professor of Modern History and dean of the Faculty of Political Science at the University of Salerno. He taught at American universities. A member of the Real Academia de la Historia, he is an officer of merit of the Republic, a journalist, and a columnist for the Neapolitan pages of “La Repubblica”. Among his most recent volumes: History of Solitude. From Aristotle to Social Networks (Neri Pozza, 2021), Maria Sofia. The Last Queen of the South (Neri Pozza, 2022), Modern Mezzogiorno. From the Spanish Viceroyalties to the End of the Two Sicilies (Salerno ed., 2022), The Great Illusion. Thirty Years After Tangentopoli (Biblion, 2022), Baroque Melancholy (Neri Pozza, 2023), Melancholic Counter-Renaissance (Colonnese, 2024).
Article published on 3 June 2025 - 12:00
