Infrastructures of Mobility in Trans-Alpine Europe (1450-1750)

  • Anderson, J. (Speaker)
  • Sandra Toffolo (Organiser)
  • Rosa Salzburg (Organiser)

Activity: Disseminating Research Invited talk

Activity

Research workshop of established and early career scholars

Description

The transalpine zone has long been a major European crossroads, connecting the north and west of the continent with the Mediterranean and Adriatic through the Alpine passes and associated traffic arteries. In the early modern period, people moving through this region for a vast variety of motives - among them artisans, artists, merchants, pilgrims, pedlars, couriers, diplomats and some of the first tourists - promoted the exchange of goods, ideas and culture. At the same time, the acceleration of migration and mobility, as well as the spread of epidemic disease, religious and political divisions, made the period fundamentally important for the evolution of policies and infrastructures to channel and regulate mobility, from the use of documentary identification to the invention of quarantine.

This workshop brings together researchers working on mobility between northern Italy and the Alpine zone to explore questions such as: How did mobility and migration shape the history of both the major urban centres of the region as well as rural communities that lay along key transit corridors? How did transport, hospitality and communication systems developed in the early modern period facilitate the mobility of people through the transalpine zone? How did high levels of mobility accentuate the perception of difference, and the desire for separation, borders and controls? How did the natural environment of this region shape the movement of people through it? How did this area of high mobility and cross-cultural contacts promote new kinds of artistic, artisanal or food cultures?
Period30 Sept 2021
Held atIstituto Storico Italo-Germanico Trento, Italy
Degree of RecognitionInternational