Genoa and Spain: A Mediterranean Axis between Geopolitics, Finance and Trade in the Early Modern Age
13 November 2025. From 18:30 | Conference | Italian | IEMed
The lecture will focus on the nature of relations between the Republic of Genoa and the Spanish monarchy during the beginning of the early modern era. From the famous agreement between Charles V and Andrea Doria in 1528, which laid the foundations for this solid Mediterranean axis, we will examine the various aspects on which the alliance was based throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The systemic approach will then give way to a diachronic analysis, aimed at understanding the local and international factors that led to the weakening of the political ties between Genoa and Madrid from the 1620s and 1630s onwards.
The lecture will conclude with a reflection on the resilience of the Spanish-Genoese axis, linked to the dynamics of international long-distance trade between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean throughout the Early Modern period.
A lecture by Paolo Calcagno, professor at the University of Genoa where he gives the courses ‘Elements and Sources of Early Modern History’ and ‘History of the Mediterranean in the Early Modern History”, among others.
His fields of research focus on the Mediterranean region in Early Modern History, with special attention to social and economic history. Among his most important publications: La quotidiana emergenza. I molteplici impieghi delle istituzioni sanitarie nel Mediterraneo moderno (a cura di Paolo Cacagno e Daniele Palermo, 2017, New Digital Press); The Barbarian Obsession: The Story of the ‘Turks’ through the Reports of Incursions in Liguria in the Sixteenth and Seventeeth Centuries (in A Mediterranean Other, 2021, Genoa University Press); “Venezia e il mare nel XVIII secolo. Un cantiere di ricerca” (in Rivista di Studi Storici del Mediterraneo, 2025)
Within the framework of the Aula Mediterrània lecture series. Co-organised with Master’s Degree in History and Identities in the Western Mediterranean, 15th-19th Centuries, UB/UA/UV/UJI.
Language: Italian (with translation into Catalan).
Speakers
Diego Sola
Senior Lecturer of Early Modern History and Coordinator of the Master’s Degree UBOrganised by
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