- Comerford, Kathleen M. (1999) "What did early modern priests read? The library of the seminary of Fiesol, 1647-1721." Libraries & Culture, 34 (3), 203-221.
- A "Dig Deeper" article from Modern Libraries
- Accessible online at http://bit.ly/2l7H7tr
I chose this article to read because I knew how much influence religious institutions had on libraries and literacy in society. "If a person is known through her books, then an institution is no less so, and these early inventories allow historians to understand the intellectual atmosphere of a fledgling establishment." That is the thesis statement of Comerford's article, with which I agree and is why I was interested in this topic.
I was surprised by what I found. I imagined churches and monasteries always seeking to have large libraries, the best copies. Common sense would dictate that smaller institutions of course wouldn't or couldn't, but regardless, that isn't what I imagined. But that was the case of the Fiesol seminary. They kept a library as small as they were, although inventory records often seemed to be incomplete or missing. What was available showed that the seminary was focused more on the practical aspects of their job, rather than the theological. Rather than books on Scripture or debating it, they texts on how to hear confessions, punish sinners, and counseling methods. Comerford also noted the increase in grammatical books over time, indicating either (or both) a renewed interest in education or the downward trend in age among those living in the seminary. I did enjoy reading the conundrum Comerford also came across; that Fiesol held volumes by Tacitus, a critic of Christianity who had fallen so far out of favor as to have most of his books destroyed, and volumes by Justus Lipsius, who was mostly responsible for pushing Tacitus out of favor. Judging by the rest of the library holdings, it wasn't out of intellectual responsibility to examine both side...but rather nobody realized and nobody weeded!
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