The Italians before Italy: Conflict and Competition in the Mediterranean

By: Kenneth R. Bartlett, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Kenneth R. Bartlett

Take a riveting tour of the Italian peninsula, from the glittering canals of Venice to the lavish papal apartments and ancient ruins of Rome.

In these 24 lectures, Professor Bartlett traces the development of the Italian city-states of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, showing how the modern nation of Italy was forged out of the rivalries, allegiances, and traditions of a vibrant and diverse people.

This comprehensive portrait of Italian history opens an exciting new world-a grand mosaic of lustrous and storied cultures as distinctive as the people who helped build them. As you come to know these many "Italys," you'll see how the Italian states defined themselves against the others, competing for territory, trade, and artistic supremacy - and how the vestiges of these interactions are visible even today.

Among other things, you'll consider the rivalry between the Genoese and the Pisans, which stems from a nearly 800-year-old grudge; examine how the crusades influenced the development of Genoa, Pisa, and Venice; and explore Italy's troubled relationship with the Holy Roman Empire and the Catholic Church during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

You'll also get a glimpse into the lives of the powerful and influential, including Pope Paul IV, who championed the Roman Inquisition, and Luigi Gonzaga, who cut out the hearts of his enemies and nailed them to the doors of their palaces as a warning to others who might challenge his power.

As you get to know the distinctive personalities and events that define the peninsula, you'll gain fresh insights into the Italy of today. Surprising, enriching, always engaging, this course offers a unique perspective on one of the most dynamic and creative cultures of the modern world.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2007 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2007 The Great Courses

Great quick background before a trip to Italy

Seems like a great quick background to mostly renaissance Italy. It’s quite uncritical of any group or leader that sponsored art or architecture no matter what they did to get that power. It’s very much from the viewpoint of the nobility and church and very little of the common people. Or the mischievous roles Italian nobility may have played in world events like the sack of Constantinople. Still I think it should be required listening before a trip to Italy.

One from Many

This audiobook is one of the “Great Courses” set, 24 half-hour lectures dealing with the history of the Italian peninsula from around 1,000 AD through the unification as a single nation in 1861. Professor Kenneth R. Bartlett does well with cramming a lot of material into a short amount of time. 

Yes, there was no “Italy” until 1861. Before that there were a multiitude of city-states and small kingdoms or republics with shifting alliances, shifting borders, and never any single one that was preeminent. This meant that the Italian peninsula was caught between the other powerful kingdoms that arose during this time but it also meant that there was continual competition among the city-states which led to more experimentation as well as set the stage for the Renaissance. Rome was governed by the Bishop of Rome (the Pope, though his power was not as universally recognized to be as absolute as the Catholic Church does today) who was both head of the church and the head of state for Rome. When the Bishop of Rome crowned the Frankish king, Charlemagne, as the Holy Roman Emperor it set the stage for more confusion in centuries to come as some city-states gave the church in the position of Pope their ultimate allegiance while others gave allegiance to the Emperor, giving rise to further divisions. Some city-states had kings with absolute authority who were appointed by the Pope or by the Emperor, while others were dynastic monarchies, though a common problem arose when there were no male heirs. Others were republics, led by a council of merchants or a group of guilds. Venice was exceptional in that it rose up independently in the marshes and was a republic led by a hereditary council of original founding merchants, but whose original loyalty and alliance was to the Byzanitine Empire in Constantinople. 

Professor Bartlett does not give us a chronological history, but deals with various key city-states separately, describing how they began, how they developed, their relationship to their neighboring areas as well as to Rome, their form of governance, and how the rose and, in most cases, eventually fell, were absorbed by other powers, or gradually lost prominence. He deals with the main cities that everyone knows of–Rome, Venice, Milan, Pisa, Florence, and Naples, but also some others that are less well known but that made a significant contribution to Italian and Western culture such as Mantua (home of the first opera), Genoa (an original competitor to Venice, home of the first true international banking house, the Bank of St. George, and the home of Christopher Columbus), Urbino (great collector of art and literature that was later plundered and which comprise much of the Vatican’s collection), Ferrara (source of many military geniuses as well as great art that is also now at the Vatican), and Siena (a republic that struggled to retain its liberty). There are several lectures on Rome and the church, its scandals, corruption, and the growth of its power. 

With all of this I found that I was continually looking up places on Google maps as well as historical information, photos, architecture, and articles about the persons discussed in these lectures. There is a 190-page guidebook that comes with the lectures that is also very helpful. But the fact that the nation was only unified around 150 years ago after centuries of struggle and ancient rivalries, some of which go back even to the time of the empire helps to explain why Italian politics, culture, and even cuisine can still be so contentious. 

And, there are lot of little things that make the course even more interesting. Pisa, Venice, and Genoa became enormously wealthy supplying and transporting crusaders to the holy land, but before ships from Pisa realized that there was a market for products from the east that they could fill their empty ships with on the voyages back, they first filled their ships with soil from Jerusalem as ballast to spread on the cemeteries of the churches of Pisa since they assumed that the resurrection would begin in Jerusalem and if they had soil from there, they would also be among the first to enter heaven. That is a real competitive spirt. Venice learned glassmaking from Syrian glassmakers and it became such an industry for them that if any of their artisans left the city-state they would send assassins to find them to make sure that they could not share their “trade secrets” with others.   

For me, one interesting note was that with city-states where the ruler had absolute power, they had the ability to move fast and make difficult changes according to the situation, if (and that’s the big if) they had a very competent ruler. Therefore, at times they were able to rapidly increase their power. However, they also tended to fall more rapidly either during transitions between administrations as power struggles often arose or when they had weak leaders. So, over the longer history, their strength tended to fluctuate more wildly. Republics were slower to change but more stable over the longer term. But of course even that was tempered by events around them as well as their neighbors. Venice was a republic but when the crusades started, it rapidly took advantage of the opportunities and became enormously wealthy. Genoa, a republic, became equally wealthy, also due to the crusades, but was riven with infighting and was eventually defeated by Venice and relegated to a has been. 

Is it a complete history? No. But, it is a good introduction for those who want a general overview that not only is a story of the past but helps to understand what made has made Italy and even the Catholic Church what it is today. In that, it does a pretty good job.

lots of information but...

I would have preferred a different organization of material and the narration was peppered with distracting sighs and pronunciations.

Don't Bother

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

No.

What was most disappointing about The Great Courses’s story?

The professor is very long winded. He obviously cares about the topic but most of the material is opinions. He tells you how important and unique the story of Italy is but, if after five chapters, I've only learned ten minutes of material, I don't really care.

What three words best describe Professor Kenneth R. Bartlett’s voice?

Not bad. He sighs a lot and his pronunciation of words like peninsula- which he says every five minutes as peninchula-
and fragmentation are distracting.

Was The Italians before Italy: Conflict and Competition in the Mediterranean worth the listening time?

No. The material could have been summarized in a fraction of the time. Extremely repetitive and unnecessarily explanatory but using words like "of course" when presenting geographical and historical information a newcomwe to Italian history would not know.

Any additional comments?

This was so boring. I have listened to histories of China, Egypt, and Russia from the Great Courses and loved them. I drifted off multiple times listening to this. Also, his pronunciation and overuse of peninsula was irritating.

Enough dicey info to make this questionable

The biggest WHAAAAT???!! comes when the author/narrator refers to the "Babylonian Captivity." While a small handful of authors erroneously call the Avignon Papacy the "Babylonian Captivity," it stands as 1) a misleading fallacy, 2) academic ignorance, 3) using a descriptive name assigned to another clearly and widely known event (and therefore unavailable to RE-use), or 4) just plain stupid.
If I refer to Napoleon's conquering Europe as World War II, some might think a) Interesting analogy or b) what a dumb reference, WWII happened in a different century, with different people, different weapons, etc. Or if I refer to the futbol World Cup as the World Series, people might wonder why I used a term for Major League Baseball's championship to refer to the international futbol/soccer championship.
The Babylonian captivity or Babylonian exile is the period in Jewish history during which a number of people from the ancient Kingdom of Judah were captives in Babylon. from 605-539 BCE.
The Avignon Papacy (YES, it already has a name!) refers to the period from 1309 to 1376 CE during which seven successive popes resided in Avignon rather than in Rome.
Another smaller but equally annoying quirk: The frequent reference to the land mass of Italy as the Italian "puh nin shoe luh." Italy certainly produces fine leather footwear, and the Italian land mass resembles a form of footwear, but the term describing land surrounded on three sides by water has no "shoe" in it. It sounds more like "puh NIN soola."
Most historians of banking agree that Italy has great claim to banking's origin. But most historians identify Venice (or Siena) as the point of banking origin... not Genoa and Pisa. In fact, the term "BANK" comes from the original location where Venetian merchants exchanged currencies - the benches (Italian: BANCO) on the bridges over the Venetian canals.
After several questionable pieces of information, I listen mostly for major points of interest, but typically tune out.
Look elsewhere for reliable history on Italy.

Learned about Italy

Great course and the lecturer was a passionate and compelling speaker. Generally, the format has each chapter focusing on a specific city/region of Italy.

Portrait of Italy from early middle age to ~ 16-17 century

It’s essentially individual histories of major Italian Italian states (Sicily,Naples,Rome - Papal state,Venice,Genova,Pisa,Florence,Siena,Ferrara,Mantua, etc). Highly recommend, very interesting. Must read if you have Italy in your heart.

Could've Used More Culture + Color

There is a lot of detailed information here, but it is very dry: old-school history focused on political and military matters – to the exclusion of all else.

Professor Bartlett has a difficult task, as Italy between the fall of Rome and the Risorgimento was divided into many states, each with their own history and identity. He chooses to organize these lectures regionally more than chronologically. This has its drawbacks: many historical figures (like the Borgias) or international events (like the Plague) appear in the narrative of multiple states, and so we hear about them again and again, but only in little snippets each time – it can be disorienting.

This approach would make much more sense if he spent any time describing the states' individual cultures – he says over and over again that they were unique, but does little to illustrate what made them distinct beyond political organization. When he does mention something cultural, it's still dry: he might say that the Sienese developed their own painting style, but not say anything about what that style was or what made it special.

The lectures are also strangely limited in chronological scope: the (500+ year!) period between the fall of Rome and the first crusade is quickly glossed over (a single lecture!), and the lectures largely stop at the 16th century, long before Italian unification.

Great, most enjoyable course

I would eagerly recommend any history course by Ken Bartlett. I am sorry to have listen to all offered by him, in some cases having enjoyed them twice.

Great prep for a 2-week trip to Italy

History with context!

The professor has a superb job putting everything in context. Italy is such a complex place which such a diverse set of historical drivers, and so it's tough to do right.

Most tour guide histories are just a list of "then this happened, then this king did this."

In contrast, this professor ably articulates the trends and particulars, so that the names, places, and events make sense.