Lecture by Manfredi Merluzzi | “Text, Context, and Cultural Framework of Bernabé Cobo, S.J., and His HISTORIA DEL NUEVO MUNDO, 1653”

A key source on pre-Hispanic Indigenous societies and natural history

This public lecture introduces the extraordinarily rich source that is History of the New World (1653), completed in Lima by the Spanish Jesuit Bernabé Cobo but never published in full. By reconstructing the work’s complex publishing history, the cultural and religious framework in which it was produced, and the author’s aims, Professor Merluzzi will situate this vast investigation—the result of more than 40 years of direct research across Spain’s dominions in America—and relate it to broader Jesuit production as well as to the political contexts that informed Cobo’s History.

A light reception will follow the lecture. This event is free and open to all, but registration is required.

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About the speaker

Manfredi Merluzzi is professor of early modern history in the Department of Humanities at Università Roma Tre. An expert on the history of Latin America in the period of the Habsburg Monarchy and Catholic modernity, he has published several volumes on viceregal Peru, historical sources, and historiography. He participates in several international research groups and coordinates the node “Representaciones y autorepresentaciones del poder en las sociedades y los territorios de frontera” of Red Columnaria.

Professor Merluzzi serves on the Cushwa Center’s Rome Advisory Committee and on steering committees for many international projects, including Primed (2021), REDIF (since 2020), Transcribir America (2022–2023), Elitesit (2017–2021), Cliohworld (2009–2011), Cliohnet2 (2005–2008). He has served as director of CRISA (2016–2018) and coordinator of the project, “Frontiere: modelli politici e culturali di integrazione e conflitto in Europa e in America in età moderna e contemporanea” (2012–2013).

He recently published Tra Roma, Madrid e i nuovi mondi. Le canonizzazioni del 1622 e la competizione tra gli universalismi cattolici, co-edited with Isabella Iannuzzi, Carlo Pelliccia, Michele Maria Rabà, and Gaetano Sabatini (Rubbettino, 2025).

Image: Detail of a portolan chart of the world by Giovane Oliva of Messina. Manuscript on vellum, 1643. Wikimedia Commons, public domain.