Between Cartography and Representation: Borders and Maps of Early Modern Bologna and Modena
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Between Cartography and Representation: borders and maps of early modern Bologna and Modena Volume I Miriana Carbonara Doctor of Philosophy University of East Anglia School of Art, Media and American Studies June 2016 This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with the author and that use of any information derived there from must be in accordance with current UK Copyright Law. In addition, any quotation or extract must include full attribution. Name: Miriana Carbonara Reg. No: 100019672 School: Art, Media and American Studies (AMA) Thesis Title: Between cartography and representation: borders and maps of early modern Bologna and Modena I certify that the total word count in this thesis (including bibliography and footnotes) is 95.005 words BETWEEN CARTOGRAPHY AND REPRESENTATION: BORDERS AND MAPS OF EARLY MODERN BOLOGNA AND MODENA ABSTRACT In the early modern period the border between the states of Modena and Bologna - cities under the control of the Este family and Papal State respectively - was marked by two main watercourses: the Panaro River and the Muzza canal. This generated an abundance of manuscript materials – drawings, maps, notes, chronicles – dealing with questions relating to water changes which in some parts made the border very unstable and, therefore, subject to continuous interventions to reinscribe political and administrative ownership. The maps, in particular, focus on the possibilities and frustrations of establishing and representing a definitive border, continuously challenged by the properties of water: its transparency, its motion and its instability; in other words its fluidity. By taking into account a variety of unpublished manuscript visual and textual documents, my research draws attention to how this material stresses the idea of the ‘border’ as a process. I explore attempts to define borders by water and the resultant ambiguities. In seeking to understand how the maps work visually, I draw attention to the tension between what can be represented and what escapes description, that which remains problematic, contingent and self-contradictory. In this paradox, I argue, the two sides of cartographic representation lie: the constant oscillation between opposites, between certainty/uncertainty, visibility/invisibility, opacity/transparency. My focus moves in between these opposites where instability, conversion and uncertainty acquire a distinct theoretical status. Thus, the analysis of the visible aspects of this ambiguity becomes an investigation into the problematic nature of representation itself. list of contents Volume i Acknowledgements ..................................................................................................... viii-ix notes on trAnslAtion And AbbreViAtions ...................................................... x introduction The ambiguity and indeterminacy of a border ........................................................................... 2 Mapping Bologna and its Territories in the Vatican Sala: borders and maps of early modern Bologna ............................................................................... 7 Fixing the flow: chapter outline ................................................................................................. 18 Beyond boundaries, towards fluidity: state of literature and theoretical framework ................. 21 chApter i stAte, cArtogrAphy And territory between bolognA And modenA: the border seen through stAte Agreements Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 33 pArt i hydro-landscape, state and water management .................................................................... 36-55 1.1 Water for Bologna and Modena: the Este Map 175 ............................................................. 36 1.2 The management of water between Bologna and Modena in the early modern period .................................................................................................... 42 1.3 Relations and political identities between Bologna and Modena ......................................... 46 1.4 Cartography .......................................................................................................................... 49 1.4.1 Maps of borders ........................................................................................................... 52 pArt ii from the middle Ages to 1790: the border seen through state agreements ........................ 56-86 1.5 The conflict in the Middle Ages ........................................................................................... 56 1.6 The conflict in the early modern period ............................................................................... 63 1.6.1 The pass of Sant’Ambrogio ......................................................................................... 67 1.6.2 The Muzza Valley ........................................................................................................ 72 1.7. The final agreement: the maps ............................................................................................. 75 1.8 The final agreement: the text ................................................................................................ 82 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 87 chapter ii representAtion And the border: mAps of the pAnAro riVer And the muzzA cAnAl Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 90 pArt i borders and fluidity: an introduction to a paradox ............................................................. 92-116 2.1 Composition ......................................................................................................................... 93 2.2 Colours and Lines ................................................................................................................. 100 2.3 Points of view ....................................................................................................................... 105 2.4 Transparency and opacity ..................................................................................................... 109 v pArt ii defining borders: debates and conventions ........................................................................... 116-127 2.5 Lines of border: a map of the official agreement of 1613 .................................................... 118 2.6 Tracking the border on a map: Bartolo, Aimo and Aleotti ................................................... 121 pArt iii re-mapping the border ............................................................................................................ 127-136 2.7 Flowing lines and flowing texts ........................................................................................... 128 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 136 chapter iii from the body of the cArtogrApher to the body of the trAVeller: experiencing And representing borders Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 141 pArt i the body of the cartographer ................................................................................................. 143-163 3.1 Into the dispute: territoriality, authority and mobility .......................................................... 144 3.2 Into the dispute: the drawing by Pasio Pasi .......................................................................... 153 3.2.1 Beyond definition: Cartography and Chorography ..................................................... 156 3.3 Body and mapping ................................................................................................................ 160 pArt ii the body of the traveller .......................................................................................................... 163-179 3.4 In between a map and an itinerary: a seventeenth-century drawing .................................... 164 3.5 In between points and lines: representing movement .......................................................... 168 3.6 Mapping mobility: body, time and movement in an eighteenth-century itinerary ............... 170 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 180 chApter iV borders As methodology: A LAndscApe with the FLight into egypt Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 183 4.1 Borders in the history of spatiality ....................................................................................... 187 4.2 A Landscape with the Flight into Egypt : a perfect balance? ................................................ 192 4.2.1 Land and water ............................................................................................................ 198 4.2.2 Figures ......................................................................................................................... 201 4.2.3 The trees .....................................................................................................................