Italian Classes Visit Department of Conservation and Preservation at Johns Hopkins University
On Thursday, April 19, Dr. Rossana Barbera took her AP Italian and Italian Honors IV students to the Department of Conservation and Preservation at Johns Hopkins University. The group was hosted by Dr. Neil Weijer, Postdoctoral Curatorial Fellow in Premodern and Early Modern Studies. Dr. Weijer explained the importance of preservation and restoration of rare and precious books, most of them ancient Italian books and manuscripts, collected in the Eisenhower Library. Our students also learned about the skills and needs involved in restoring books.
Dr. Weijer and other collaborators, Mr. Alessandro Scola and Mrs. Jennifer Jarvis, pulled out several books from the Hopkins collections and had them on display for our students to look at and discuss. These books included Italian and non-Italian Medieval and Renaissance books, architectural books, literary works, as well as some fragments recovered from the restoration of books, among which included:
• A fourteenth century leaf from Petrarch’s Trionfi della morte, used as waste material in a later binding.
• A board (cover) from a medieval manuscript, showing the impression of a 9th-10th century manuscript leaf that was once glued to it.
• Hypnerotomachia Polyphilii (1499), the first book printed with woodcut illustration by the venetian printer Aldus Manutius.
• A printed book of hours (a prayerbook dated 1492) illustrated by hand using the woodcuts as models.
• An early edition of Vitruvius’ De Architectura, the author’s attempt to define the proportions of classical architecture.
• An Antiphonary (or, more conversationally, a medieval choirbook): a fifteenth century manuscript, written in Latin. It contains the musical portions of the liturgy, and was made to be large enough that a group could gather around it and sing from it.
• A board (cover) from a medieval manuscript, showing the impression of a 9th-10th century manuscript leaf that was once glued to it.
• Hypnerotomachia Polyphilii (1499), the first book printed with woodcut illustration by the venetian printer Aldus Manutius.
• A printed book of hours (a prayerbook dated 1492) illustrated by hand using the woodcuts as models.
• An early edition of Vitruvius’ De Architectura, the author’s attempt to define the proportions of classical architecture.
• An Antiphonary (or, more conversationally, a medieval choirbook): a fifteenth century manuscript, written in Latin. It contains the musical portions of the liturgy, and was made to be large enough that a group could gather around it and sing from it.
Dr. Weijer and his collaborators were really impressed by the level of interest and engagement that our Dons had with the material.
